Oscars 2022

[Totenkindly]

Oscar Nominations 2022: ‘Power of the Dog’ Leads With 12 Nods, ‘Dune’ Follows With 10 (Full List)

Here is the full list of 2022 Oscar nominations.

variety.com

Probably the most interesting selections are in the acting categories, although most are as expected.

For example, Jessica Chastain in "Eyes of Tammy Faye" -- I think she was considered a dark horse. I would have been happy to ditch Nicole Kidman off that list; Kidman did fine in the role and I don't have issues with the film casting, but nothing really stood out to me (aside from maybe JK Simmons) in that film. I also found Nina Arianda (as Vivian Vance) more interesting on screen.

Encanto is going to win Best Animated Feature. I don't think it deserves it, but I will not be surprised when it wins.

Happy to see Nightmare Alley pick up a few nods for production design, costuming, etc.

With the noms, I generally feel like they're all in the same boat as me -- I missed most of the films, so the voting is either for films someone saw and liked (versus having a clearer sense of the actual field) or just hearsay that influences the results. ("Oh, everyone likes [this performance], so I will watch it too and like it, even if I had watched it in a vacuum it might not have stood out to me.") The ideal would be for people who attach themselves to a category (I think they have to identify themselves in a certain category) would see as many of the potential films as possible in that given category before voting.

 

[chickpea]

simon rex was snubbed!!!

i need to watch a lot of the movies still, but i hope kirsten dunst wins best supporting actress.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

all i care about is the best score category (and occasionally sound design and visual fx--both of which have decent films nominated this year). Hope Dune or something decent wins best FX.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

overall a weird selection of films in various categories this year. Something about this selection smacks of the late 2000s for some reason.

 

[Totenkindly]

2022 Oscar nominations snubs and surprises: Kristen Stewart is in, but 'Spider-Man,' Lady Gaga and Leo miss the cut

"The Power of the Dog" and "Dune" lead the way at the 2022 Oscar nominations, topping a slate that was full of shockers — and had mixed results in terms of diversity and inclusion.

www.yahoo.com

simon rex was snubbed!!!

i need to watch a lot of the movies still, but i hope kirsten dunst wins best supporting actress.

I admittedly was shocked to realize this was her first Oscar nomination, as she's been so damned good out of the box.

I mean, she got a Golden Globe nom at age 12 for Best Supporting Actress in one of her first films and has typically rocked any film she's in, with a diversity of roles. If they are giving away "lifetime achievement" Oscars this year, she's earned one.

 

[Totenkindly]

all i care about is the best score category (and occasionally sound design and visual fx--both of which have decent films nominated this year). Hope Dune or something decent wins best FX.

I need to watch "The Power of the Dog," which I've been putting off for weeks. I'm a fan of Johnny Greenwood and am still bitter he didn't win for "Phantom Thread" (absolutely gorgeous piano work) over Alexandre Desplat's "The Shape of Water" score that was a lesser version of scores Desplat had done previously.

One of my son's friends is a movie buff, so the two of them are always chatting. Apparently his friend hates Hans Zimmer and was ranting about how awful and derivative the Dune score was. Any time I now see a film with my son with a Zimmer soundtrack, I start going on about, "OMG THIS GOD-AWFUL MUSIC IS DESTROYING THE FILM," lol.

[For the record, both my son and I think Zimmer is great. He's definitely very well known and maybe oversaturated, but at the same time this shouldn't take way from some of his great scores that he weds completely to the film in question. Like Interstellar, for example.]

Looking at the visual effects noms, Dune's definitely got a shot. Will there be a sympathy vote for Spiderman?

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

I need to watch "The Power of the Dog," which I've been putting off for weeks. I'm a fan of Johnny Greenwood and am still bitter he didn't win for "Phantom Thread" (absolutely gorgeous piano work) over Alexandre Desplat's "The Shape of Water" score that was a lesser version of scores Desplat had done previously.

One of my son's friends is a movie buff, so the two of them are always chatting. Apparently his friend hates Hans Zimmer and was ranting about how awful and derivative the Dune score was. Any time I now see a film with my son with a Zimmer soundtrack, I start going on about, "OMG THIS GOD-AWFUL MUSIC IS DESTROYING THE FILM," lol.

[For the record, both my son and I think Zimmer is great. He's definitely very well known and maybe oversaturated, but at the same time this shouldn't take way from some of his great scores that he weds completely to the film in question. Like Interstellar, for example.]

Looking at the visual effects noms, Dune's definitely got a shot. Will there be a sympathy vote for Spiderman?

i'd cum if jonny greenwood won best score

desplat is pretty good but it seems predictable that he would be popular with the academy, seeing as how much they loved john williams through the years

 

[Totenkindly]

I usually don't watch the show anymore, and I still haven't seen some of the films (although this week/weekend I finally got access to some more).

Thoughts:

Best Picture

The Power of the Dog is a cold film but mentally intriguing -- it demands concentration and sticking with it to determine what's going on. So that's why it's leaving some dry -- although I propose it's on the level of No Country for Old Men, just less overt activity. CODA is more heart-warming and has 2-3 powerful moments near the end of the film -- but it simply isn't as well-made as many of the other films in this category. Like, it deserves to maybe be mentioned but I'm kind of disappointed if it wins; it's not a film that advances the industry except maybe in terms of how to handle representation. I found "Sound of Metal" from last year far better made, if we want to talk about issues facing the deaf community.

I plan to watch "Drive My Car" later and am not sure how the Oscars should be handling this. Are they going to keep "Best Foreign Film" as a category and where should these kinds of films fall in the categorization? Dune was only the first part of a book but knocked it out of the park with its own consistent and unique vision that also forebodes on the reality of how the "chosen one" cliche would play out -- I expect it to deliver on Part 2. Maybe it will then pull a LotR and grab something then?

Anyway, I'm not honestly feeling much about many of the films here this year. I'm kind of shocked that "Pig" didn't even get an Oscar nod, it was such a great little film. CODA will probably win, and I don't plan to wait up to see it.

Best Director

Campion is my choice, although I haven't seen Drive My Car yet or Licorice Pizza.

Best Actor

Bardem is the worst of the five in the running this year. Like, seriously? Why isn't Nicholas Cage for "Pig" here? Honestly he should be a contender for best actor, even over Will Smith. But no, it's basically going to be Will Smith because his character is more accessible than Cumberbatch.

Best Actress

Another weird category. Sorry, I know Kidman is a darling, but ... really? the Ricardos film simply wasn't as good as it might have been, it's okay. Olivia Colman was stunning in "The Lost Daughter" and it's not a feel-good roll, in fact it's quite impenetrable which is why the audience has trouble connection -- but quality-wise, it should have been at the top. Chastain gets marks for playing something so well and out of type for her, in a barely average biopic. Watched about 30 minutes of Spencer; Stewart seems to really become Diana... but the film feels very cold and flat and uninteresting, so it's hard to care about her or know what her point is. The one film I wish I had seen was "Parallel Mothers" -- but thanks USA streamers, we did not get access to this film at all, aside from a week or two ago being able to BUY the streaming access for $20!! Yeah, but no -- I've heard Cruz was tremendous, but damned if I got a chance to see it.

Getting back to bitching about overall issues -- I really hate that the bar for Best Actor and Actress seems to be centered around who can emulate a historical figure the best. THat's always impressive, but acting is more than that.

Best Supporting Actor

This is a toss up between Kodi Smit-McPhee and Troy Kotsur at this point. They are very different performances -- Kodi is impenetrable and cold, Kotsur is a quirky but endearing and committed father. This is coming down to a likability question. I think as far as ACTING that Smit-McPhee was hands down a better actor, playing the role required of him and totally nailing it (his inability to be read is in fact the hinge for the plot), but people warm up to Kotsur's dad better and he will get this now. The choices could be a lot worse (like, if it was handed to Simmons playing yet again his crusty old geezer role). Plemons is interesting because I haven't yet decided whether he's good or bad here. I mean, he's a good actor; his character is also hard to read, he doesn't say much and holds a lot in. Again, it makes him feel inaccessible.

Best Supporting Actress

Frankly, Cate Blanchett should have been here for Nightmare Alley. I don't know another way to say it. I would have bumped Judi Dench, probably. A more hail-mary pass would have been Kathryn Hunter from Macbeth. I'm okay with the nominees otherwise. I'm feeling like DeBose will get this, but I also feel like it was predetermined again by the popularity of the role and how she was positioned in it. She is definitely good but there were really great performances here, namely from Buckley (who manages to preserve emotional continuity with a difficult-to-match nuanced performance from Coleman), and also with Dunst making her role look too easy when it was more difficult.

Those are my thoughts on the main categories so far.

 

[Totenkindly]

Well at least we got to see Will Smith bitch slap Chris Rock for making cracks about his wife's hair loss.

 

[Totenkindly]

Interesting breakdown of Power of the Dog's lack of favor....

Why ‘The Power of the Dog’ Got Dogged (Column)

From the moment it premiered at the Venice Film Festival last September, Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog” has been a divisive film. Yet the divisiveness has had an element of being foggy and vague, hard to get a fix on. In part, that’s because those who command the media megaphone, and are...

www.yahoo.com

 

[ceecee]

Well at least we got to see Will Smith bitch slap Chris Rock for making cracks about his wife's hair loss.

While I don't advocate for more assaults in the world - I totally get this. The complete lack of scale and perspective from the general public is far worse.

 

[Totenkindly]

Everyone seems to have an opinion on this and I haven't posted anything on social media sites -- getting kind of tiring to read it all.

But my private thoughts (since this group is small and knows each other):

• Will seemed to laugh at first, then get mad. Not sure how to read the first -- funny, or "can you believe this guy?" laugh, or something else he was still laughing at?
• Jada looked ticked off from the start and didn't change as the cameras lingered on her.
• Open slap, but it looked pretty hard to me. Will also seemed really to be pissed when he was shouting back to get his wife's name out of his effin' mouth.
• The apology later was realistically awkward and not really direct to Chris.
• Makes me think there's already been bad blood in the past (from 2016?) but maybe in general, where the Smiths and Rock might have had it out on more private channels -- because this seemed more like a, "You dick, we told you to knock that shit off" kind of 0-60mph in a few seconds response. It also might be why Chris didn't want to press charges. I don't think we know the history.
• There's no way Chris Rock didn't know about Jada's hair issue, she was public about it, they would have tracked each other on media, he voiced a documentary on Good Hair for black people's hair in 2009. Naw, their response to his comment makes it sound like he had talked this shit in the past somewhere and they had told him off at the time.
• I'm not much for assault (and he could be charged with it), but at the same time the comment was pretty offensive and the lines got drawn now. I know how vulnerable I am about my hair and easily embarrassed even trying not to be. She's owning it in public, which is awesome, but it was a cheap shot by Rock and just smacking someone who was down.
• Makes me angry when people drag in their "open marriage" as if that justifies Will not standing up for her here. That's their relationship, they can set the rules if they do it together, but this was essentially a different situation w/different parties and why wouldn't he stand up for her if she was insulted?
• I wish social networks were talking about the films more.

 

[Stigmata]

Well at least we got to see Will Smith bitch slap Chris Rock for making cracks about his wife's hair loss.

I hope whatever misguided sense of vindication he thought he was getting was worth it because this is only going to further tarnish his personal reputation/brand even more(if the whole thing with his wife embarrassing him on national TV, revealing the intimidate details of what led to her cheating on him wasn't enough, this is definitely it).

Chris Rock's joke was honestly pretty softball in comparison to some of the things Ricky Gervais said on his last stint hosting the Oscars -- when you're on that sort of platform, taking a few jokes in stride is just part of the program.

Ironically, this is going to have a Streisand Effect of drawing even more jokes/criticism toward both Will and Jada Smith after this.

 

[Totenkindly]

I agree it will tarnish Will's star a bit and draw criticism towards them both in the long run. I'm still feeling like there was some personal history we don't know that was driving this. They acted like Rock committed an act of betrayal of some kind.

 

[Stigmata]

It is funny to watch the usual cast of conspiracy theorists try to say that whole thing was staged: these people believe nothing they see yet everything they read.

Absolutely no way that was staged -- you even hear Chris Rock's nervous forced laughter as Will approaches the stage.

Apparently Chris Rock made some much more scathing remarks about his wife when she said she was boycotting the Oscars back in 2016 when he was the host.

 

[Totenkindly]

It is funny to watch the usual cast of conspiracy theorists try to say that whole thing was staged: these people believe nothing they see yet everything they read.

Yeah, I've seen that kind of thing too, including people I've graduated from college with. Just eyeroll. One of them tried to compare it to Andy Kaufman, and I made fun of the guy by saying, "What, Andy Kaufman has been pretending to be Will Smith all these years, so he could sucker-slap Chris Rock?" Damn, talk about the long game!

Absolutely no way that was staged -- you even hear Chris Rock's nervous forced laughter as Will approaches the stage.

definitely. It plays pretty straight.

Apparently Chris Rock made some much more scathing remarks about his wife when she said she was boycotting the Oscars back in 2016 when he was the host.

I found one of the jokes, something about how her not attending the Oscars that year was like him not getting into Rihanna's panties -- "I wasn't invited."

Back then it sounds like they just sucked it up and said they had better things to focus on, but it seems now that they took that comment and their boycott / lack of black presence in the Oscars pretty personally. (Exacerbated by the fact Chris Rock is black and thus should have been supportive?)

I dunno.

There's a lot of this kind of social jockeying going on. Like Rachel Zegler (lead from WSS) being slighted supposedly because she wasn't invited to the Oscars, yet the deal seems to be she was overseas filming and on a schedule that she couldn't be spared to travel back to attend? To me, that's a lot different than being denied entry / snubbed; but it blew up on social media as a racist thing.

 

[Totenkindly]

I am really gratified. I really like film critic Jeffrey Overstreet, and he posted his favorite 27 films of 2021 today. CODA wasn't even in the list. He couldn't pick a #1, he had it in a three-way tie -- The Green Knight, Pig, and C'mon C'mon (the last of which I haven't yet seen, but now I should watch it).

I am really disappointed Pig did not even get nominated for anything. It was a small but incredible film, with unexpected plotting, a really nuanced performance by Nicholas Cage (and also Alex Wolff), and I think it was a first-time director.

 

[Totenkindly]

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I am really gratified. I really like film critic Jeffrey Overstreet, and he posted his favorite 27 films of 2021 today. CODA wasn't even in the list. He couldn't pick a #1, he had it in a three-way tie -- The Green Knight, Pig, and C'mon C'mon (the last of which I haven't yet seen, but now I should watch it).

I am really disappointed Pig did not even get nominated for anything. It was a small but incredible film, with unexpected plotting, a really nuanced performance by Nicholas Cage (and also Alex Wolff), and I think it was a first-time director.

I feel like The French Dispatch got robbed, but maybe that's just because I really like Wes Anderson.

 

[Totenkindly]

I feel like The French Dispatch got robbed, but maybe that's just because I really like Wes Anderson.

I haven't seen it yet but plan to, it's free on one of the streamers. Kinda surprised it got no attention, I think that was also in top ten of the critic I mentioned.