Cannes just finished up with Ruben Ostlund’s Triangle of Sadness shocking the world and taking the Palme D’Or. While I doubt this will have any effect on the Oscar race, I believe that at least one film that premiered at Cannes will make it into the Best Picture that is something international like Decision to Leave or a major studio film that premiered out of competition like Elvis. Elvis could go the Bohemian Rhapsody route in that it’s a popular yet not too critically-acclaimed music biopic with a lauded central performance I personally don’t think that Elvis will be the juggernaut Bohemian Rhapsody was, but the film should nab noms for Austin Butler and in some below-the-line categories.
So what are this year’s frontrunners? The consensus picks seem to be Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans, and Damien Chazelle’s Babylon. If these films are released this year they are essentially guaranteed Best Picture nominations in my mind. Of these films, Scorsese’s effort seems to me the most likely winner. It’s a drama centering on an FBI investigation of murders of members of the Osage tribe in the 1920s. It’s a Scorsese film so it’s almost guaranteed to be critically-acclaimed and it has the social relevance factor through its likely examination of themes such as racism and American expansionism. Women Talking and Everything Everywhere All at Once are, to me, the films I am most confident about rounding out the top five of the Best Picture race.
(A little digression about Everything Everywhere All at Once which I’ve now seen twice in theaters:
Coming into the film I heard many people comparing it to Marvel movies and to martial arts films, which piqued my interest since when has an A24 film ever been compared to anything made by Marvel? Still, the comparison that captured my mind the most was one where the film was said to be like “It’s a Wonderful Life”. It’s a connection that, on the surface, seems completely absurd. How can the first movie you think of when you see a colorful action film centering on a multiverse be a black-and-white drama from the 1940s? It’s a Wonderful Life is one of my absolute favorite films so I was excited to see this comparison come to life and, after watching it, it’s absolutely justified.
On the most obvious level, both films use a sci-fi conceit to reveal universal truths about the importance of love: It’s a Wonderful Life with the idea of seeing what the world would be like if you’ve never existed and Everything Everywhere All at Once with the idea of seeing what your life would be like if you made different decisions through the medium of a multiverse. Both films illustrate the beauty of human connection in an immensely profound way. Both are incredibly life-affirming experiences that somehow reach their audiences in their cores and allow them to feel the importance of the seemingly mundane. They’re both films that love their audience and are incredibly humanist works that call for love and unity. But, most importantly of all to me, they’re both remarkably sincere films. Themes, messages, moments, and pieces of dialogue that would seem overly-saccharine, unearned, trite, or corny in other films don’t come off as such in these due to their utter honesty. You’d might think with the fantastical moments that both of these films have they wouldn’t reach their audiences as powerfully as they do, but I’d argue that they reach their audiences so profoundly due to those premises. I won’t elaborate further into that for obvious reasons, but the films’ premises are an instrumental aspect of what make them as powerful as they are. To me, no moment in these films come off as overwrought due to many elements especially the acting and storytelling. You feel for these characters and it’s obvious that the filmmakers love their characters as well, even with all their shortcomings and mistakes.)
Netflix has a massive slate this year but none seem like sure things. The streamer has Noah Baumbach’s White Noise and Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, two civil rights biopics in Shirley and Rustin, and also David Fincher’s The Killer and Tobias Lindholm’s The Good Nurse. Seeing what they prioritize will be one of the biggest questions for the studio that still hasn’t won a Best Picture Oscar.
Anyways, here are my predictions for May and my first predictions for the 2023 Oscars:
BEST PICTURE
Killers of the Flower Moon (Apple+)
Women Talking (MGM)
The Fabelmans (Universal)
Babylon (Paramount)
White Noise (Netflix)
She Said (Universal)
Empire of Light (Searchlight)
Thirteen Lives (MGM)
Rustin (Netflix)
Everything Everywhere All at Once (A24)
Could Jump In:
Amsterdam (20th Century)
Bardo (N/A)
Elvis (Warner Bros.)
Maestro (Netflix)
Poor Things (Searchlight)
Shirley (Netflix)
Decision to Leave (MUBI)
Don’t Worry, Darling (Warner Bros.)
Till (UA/MGM)
Asteroid City (N/A)
Armageddon Time (Focus)
Avatar 2 (20th Century)
Napoleon (Apple)
The Son (Sony Classics)
The Woman King (Sony)
The Good Nurse (Netflix)
The Killer (Netflix)
The Banshees of Inisherin (Searchlight)
Nope (Universal)
Three Thousand Years of Longing (MGM)
The Greatest Beer Run Ever
I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Sony)
Tar (Focus)
Disappointment Blvd. (A24)
Next Goal Wins (Searchlight)
The Lost King (N/A)
Bones and All
The Whale (A24)
Longer Shots:
Emancipation
Broker (N/A)
Holy Spider (N/A)
RMN (N/A)
Alcarras (MK2)
The Wonder (Netflix)
Crimes of the Future (Neon)
Iao Capitano (01 Distribution)
Monica (N/A)
Rheingold (N/A)
Showing Up (A24)
The Way of the Wind (N/A)
Tori and Lokita (N/A)
BEST DIRECTOR
Martin Scorsese – Killers of the Flower Moon
Sarah Polley – Women Talking
Steven Spielberg – The Fabelmans
Damien Chazelle – Babylon
Daniels – Everything Everywhere All At Once
Could Jump In: Maria Schrader – She Said, Alejandro G. Inarittu – Bardo, Park Chan-Wook – Decision to Leave, Yorgos Lanthimos – Poor Things, James Cameron – Avatar 2: The Way of Water, Darren Aronofsky – The Whale, Noah Baumbach – White Noise, Ron Howard – Thirteen Lives, Sam Mendes – Empire of Light, Ridley Scott – Napoleon
BEST ACTOR
Colman Domingo – Rustin
Adam Driver – White Noise
Leonardo DiCaprio – Killers of the Flower Moon
Michael Fassbender – The Killer
Austin Butler – Elvis
Could Jump In: Hugh Jackman – The Son, Brendan Fraser – The Whale, Jesse Plemons – Killers of the Flower Moon, Bill Nighy – Living, Diego Calva – Babylon, Colin Firth – Empire of Light, Timothee Chalamet – Bones and All, Michael Fassbender – Next Goal Wins, Joaquin Phoenix – Disappointment Blvd., Colin Farrell – The Banshees of Inisherin
BEST ACTRESS
Naomi Ackie – I Wanna Dance With Somebody
Carey Mulligan – She Said
Margot Robbie – Babylon
Michelle Yeoh – Everything Everywhere All at Once
Olivia Colman – Empire of Light
Could Jump In: Cate Blanchett – Tar, Regina King – Shirley, Viola Davis – The Woman King, Ana de Armas – Blonde, Emma Stone – Poor Things, Helen Mirren – Golda, Emma Thompson – Good Luck, Leo Grande, Michelle Williams – Showing Up, Tang Wei – Decision to Leave, Jessica Chastain – The Good Nurse
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Paul Dano – The Fabelmans
Brad Pitt – Babylon
Robert DeNiro – Killers of the Flower Moon
Ben Whishaw – Women Talking
Anthony Hopkins – Armageddon Time
Could Jump In: Willem Dafoe – Poor Things, Leonardo DiCaprio – Killers of the Flower Moon, Ke Huy Quan – Everything Everywhere All at Once, Mark Ruffalo – Poor Things, Ashton Sanders – I Wanna Dance with Somebody, Andre Holland – Shirley, Tom Hanks – Elvis, Brendan Gleeson – The Banshees of Inisherin, John David Washington – Amsterdam, Glynn Turman – Rustin, Don Cheadle – White Noise
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Michelle Williams – The Fabelmans
Jean Smart – Babylon
Lily Gladstone – Killers of the Flower Moon
Laura Dern – The Son
Jessie Buckley – Women Talking
Could Jump In: Vanessa Kirby – The Son, Patricia Clarkson – She Said, Stephanie Hsu – Everything Everywhere All at Once, Samantha Morton – She Said, Frances McDormand – Women Talking, Hong Chau – The Whale, Anne Hathaway – Armageddon Time, Samantha Morton – The Whale, Greta Gerwig – White Noise, Audra McDonald – Rustin
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
The Fabelmans
Everything Everywhere All At Once
Empire of Light
Babylon
Asteroid City
Could Jump In: Bardo, Nope, Don’t Worry Darling, Amsterdam, Shirley, Armageddon Time, Maestro, Three Thousand Years of Longing, The Menu
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
White Noise
Women Talking
She Said
Killers of the Flower Moon
Poor Things
Could Jump In: The Son, The Whale, The Banshees of Inisherin
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Lightyear
Turning Red
Wendell and Wild
Pinocchio
The Bad Guys
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN
Babylon
Killers of the Flower Moon
The Fabelmans
Poor Things
Amsterdam
Could Jump In: Avatar 2, Elvis, Don’t Worry, Darling, Maestro, Asteroid City
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Killers of the Flower Moon
The Fabelmans
Babylon
Empire of Light
Poor Things
Could Jump In: Maestro, Elvis, Amsterdam, Women Talking, Asteroid City
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Babylon
Poor Things
Amsterdam
Don’t Worry, Darling
Elvis
Could Jump In: Persuasion, Killers of the Flower Moon, Blonde, The Lost King, The Fabelmans
BEST FILM EDITING
Babylon
Killers of the Flower Moon
The Fabelmans
Elvis
Everything Everywhere All at Once
Could Jump In: The Killer, Avatar 2, She Said, Women Talking, Bardo
BEST MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING
Maestro
The Whale
The Batman
Elvis
Poor Things
Could Jump In: Blonde, The Fabelmans, The Northman, Persuasion, Killers of the Flower Moon
BEST SOUND
Avatar II
Top Gun: Maverick
The Batman
Elvis
Babylon
Could Jump In: Everything Everywhere All at Once, Killers of the Flower Moon, Maestro, Thor: Love and Thunder, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Avatar II
Top Gun: Maverick
Thor: Love and Thunder
Everything Everywhere All at Once
Jurassic World: Dominion
Could Jump In: Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Top Gun: Maverick, Nope, Fantastic Beasts 3
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
The Fabelmans
The Batman
Babylon
She Said
Asteroid City
Could Jump In: Empire of Light, Pinocchio, Killers of the Flower Moon, The Lost King, The Woman King, The Banshees of Inisherin, The Son
BEST INTERNATIONAL FEATURE
Bardo
Decision to Leave
Close
Triangle of Sadness
Holy Spider
Could Jump In: Broker, The Eight Mountains, RMN, Leila’s Brothers, Tori and Lokita
