366 films eligible for Best Picture at the 93rd Oscars
Friday, February 26, 2021 at 3:04PM 
It's here. The annual "reminder list" from the Oscars about what Academy members can vote for this year for Best Picture (and other categories). Of course this list does not apply to all categories as some movies have already been eliminated in the specialized categories that use bakeoffs or finalists systems or that have extra additional eligibility requirements like...
- Animated Feature (27 finalists)
- Documentary Feature (15 finalists)
- International Feature (15 finalists)
- Makeup and Hairstyling (10 finalists)
- Original Score (15 finalists)
- Original Song (15 finalists)
- Visual Effects (10 finalists)
- ...and all three Short Film categories (but feature films aren't eligible there anyway)
But if the movie is on this overall reminder list it's still eligible in any other category. A lot more notes after the jump...
Not every film that is released in a given year is submitted to the Oscars (I noticed at least three from my own 2020 screening list that were absent: an indie called Lost Girls and Love Hotels, Iceland's A White White Day, and China's Wild Goose Lake) but most films do submit.
AND THEN WE DANCED and BACURAU holdovers from 2019, released in 2020
Of particular interest each year is noticing which films that had a healthy festival life or were frequently discussed in a specialized category the previous year end up being eligible in the current race instead. This season that's the case for And Then We Danced, Bacurau and Martin Eden, which were heavily discussed in 2019. In the case of And Then We Danced, Oscar passed in International Feature but its US release in February 2020 means its eligible this time. Not that it will be nominated but it should be. And in the case of Bacurau and Martin Eden, Brazil and Italy opted to submit different films for the 92nd Oscars so here they are on the list a year later due to subsequent US releases. I'm hoping that happens to Serbia's excellent drama Father in 2021 but it doesn't currently have US distribution.
Another always interesting peculiarity is to track which International Feature contenders that were already axed from their own category still met other requirements and could theoretically get nominations anywhere else like Apples (Greece), Atlantis (Ukraine), and Dara of Jasenovac (Serbia).
It's ALSO worth noting (I mentioned this is confusing, didn't I?) that some films that were axed from the International Feature finals already but haven't been released yet could be eligible next year. I'm hoping that's the case for Poland's Never Gonna Snow Again (which I loved) and is probably coming out in March or April though it could apply to several other films from the 93 wide International contenders list if they get US distribution in 2021.
Despite many festivals and a qualifying release SPC has really been hiding I CARRY YOU WITH ME which shoulda been a contender
And of course the current Oscar race is exponentially more confusing than usually since they're allowing the first two months of 2021 releases to compete for 2020 as well even if they didn't do the typical one-week qualifying release during 2020 (as Minari, Nomadland, The Father, French Exit, I Carry You With Me and a few others did). For the record, films that didn't premiere anywhere until 2021 are not eligible for the Film Bitch Awards (our annual awards yearbook of sorts, which is usually more Oscar parallel) as we go by the calendar year. Those purely 2021 titles that could theoretically be named the best film of 2020 (sigh) on the Dolby Theater wall if they miraculous win Best Picture, include but probably aren't limited to:
JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH one of many strictly 2021 titles that might get nominated for the 2020 awards
- Barb & Star Go To Vista Del Mar
- Cherry
- I Care a Lot
- Judas and the Black Messiah
- Malcolm and Marie
- Music
- Palmer
- Tom & Jerry
- The United States vs Billie Holliday
- The White Tiger
- The World to Come
It makes the head spin! Calendar year is so much cleaner.
Reader Comments (19)
Ugh. I hate the extended eligibility period. I understand the optimism that made them extend it, but it ended up being pretty pointless.
366 films: one for each day of the 2020 leap year (theoretically).
For some reason, I get unreasonably excited every year when this list is published. Maybe it's the THE OSCARS ARE SOON of it all.
There are a number of films missing from my own viewing list:
BEANPOLE
BUFFALOED (featuring a great comic performance by Zoey Deutch)
CLIFTON HILL (excellent Canadian mystery set in Niagara Falls, and co-starring David Cronenberg!)
COME TO DADDY
GOLDIE
GRETEL & HANSEL (which has amazing </> crafts)
THE GRUDGE
I WAS AT HOME, BUT... (from Germany, which honestly never stood a chance)
INCITEMENT (from Israel)
JOSÉ (gay movie from Guatemala)
JUST ONE MORE KISS
LORE
OLYMPIC DREAMS
A SIMPLE WEDDING (delightful cross-cultural rom-com)
STRAIGHT UP (gay-ish rom-com, and one of the best movies of the whole year)
THOSE WHO REMAINED (from Hungary, which was not nominated last year, so it could have been eligible for general categories this year)
THREE CHRISTS
VITALINA VARELA (from Portugal, which could have gotten a cinematography nomination)
THE WHISTLERS (from Romania)
YOU GO TO MY HEAD (weird but great Euro amnesia arthouse romance)
YOUNG AHMED (from the Dardennes)
ZOMBI CHILD
among others, I'm sure
I looked the list of yesterday and am always confused by some films that are on FYC websites and then not on the Oscar eligibility list, like Arkansas and The Quarry from Lionsgate this year. There are also so many Netflix titles that aren't on its FYC website, including The Christmas Chronicles 2, that I look at mostly to note that they won't be entered at the Emmys. Same with HBO Max, as An American Pickle, No Sudden Move, Superintelligence, and Unpregnant are not here, so I figure they are Emmy eligible, while Let Them All Talk and Locked Down are on the list
For my own awards, I’m extending the eligibility to Feb 28, 2021. I don’t see why not, especially in a year when so much was delayed and rescheduled.
The Oscars weren’t strictly by the calendar in their inception, so I don’t see why we can’t make an exception here.
Beanpole was not submitted, right? Because theoretically it could, isn't it?
Walter & Nicolas -- my assumption. and maybe it's incorrect, is that making the finalist list will, like being nominated, make you ineligible the next year. which would xplain the absence of both BEANPOLE and THOSE WHO REMAINED.
Nicholas: I just saw Buffaloed. Pretty good, fleet comedy. Best in show? Judy Greer.
Strange how some films are just left off completely without any real reason (except, I assume, the producers just not filling in the paperwork to submitting them for final consideration - which I believe technically everyone still has to do). Just a quick perusal of the list and I noticed that THE VAST OF NIGHT is missing, for example.
This extension period is bullshit as the fact that it allows shit like Music to be eligible is just disgusting.
But it would have been eligible next year instead. Who cares? Let's get it out of the way now, lol.
Jack -- omg. i didn't notice that one. but that's a biggie given critical awards attention.
Sorry We Missed You is almost missing. I loved that film.
Now that I know for certain that The Dig is eligible for nominations, my indignation can really ramp up. WHY is it not in the conversation AT ALL for Best Actor, Art Direction and Cinematography?
And while we’re at it, why is no one discussing the original score in Nomadland as a contender? That was best film score of the year, IMO.
Uncle Frank and The Surrogate both missing. I can't imagine either one of them picking up a nomination but I'm sure they were both mentioned is dispatches over the last year.
Excited to see that Historias Lamentables (Unfortunate Stories) is not ellegible for 2020, so there's still some (extremely low) hope that the film can be seen and aprecciated for 2021... I may be alone on this, but it was 2020's best film, to my taste (the Spanish Academy and rest of awards have overlooked it inmensely, only 3 nominations, but that has a lot to do on how much overrewarded was Fesser's last film, Campeones, which undeservingly took Best Picture after scoring a huge b.o. success).
Jason -- Nomadland wasnt even the long list for score eligibility so i believe it was determined that the music was either written for something else originally or there wasn't enough of it to qualify.
BJT - Uncle Frank is fycing for the Emmys.
Nomadland’s score (which I agree is the best of the year) was originally written for an album released a couple years ago not for the film, hence why it’s ineligible.
I'm just going to.combine 2020 and 2021 in my own awards because i kinda expect both years to be wan overall.
Not that it matters because I'm totally gonna flake out anyway. Only now am I comfortable with my 2016 list!