Who Will Be This Year's Surprising Snub at the Oscars?

Coco here, ready to talk about the current Oscar race and the surprising snubs that wait around the corner.

Last week, I wrote about performances that might get nominated despite not having a lot of precursor support. This week, I'm writing about the opposite. If you're an actor and you're nominated for the Golden Globes, the SAG awards, and the BAFTAs, then you're widely assumed to be a lock for an Oscar nomination. This is true for the most part, but there are plenty of instances in which seemingly beloved performances that do great with precursors are nowhere to be found on Oscar morning. This has been especially true in recent years. We've seen at least one such performance be left off Oscar's list in each of the last four years.  

Here's a quick rundown... 

2014 - Jake Gyllenhaal's performance in Nightcrawler popped up at all the right places. What's more, the movie seemed to gain momentum consistently, scoring nominations from practically every awards-giving body throughout January. As you probably know, Jake didn't get the nomination. Maybe Oscar didn't like Nightcrawler as much as we were expecting. After all, the movie only got one nomination for Original Screenplay.  

2013 - This year was a bloodbath as far as snubs are concerned. The most surprising omission was Tom Hanks, who gave one of the best performances of his career in Captain Phillips. The movie scored six nominations including Best Picture, but Oscar couldn't make room for its lead star. Also ignored despite support from SAG, BAFTA, and the Globes were Emma Thompson in Saving Mr. Banks and Daniel Brühl in Rush. Although neither of those films were as beloved as Phillips (Saving Mr. Banks only got one nomination for Original Score, Rush wasn't nominated at all). 

2012 and 2011 stats, as well as 2015 speculation after the jump. 

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The Confusing Art Directors Guild Nominations. Is "Crimson Peak" Period? Where is "Carol"?

Coco here, ready to talk about the Art Directors Guild and their wacky nominations. 

Usually we reserve the term category fraud for when lead performances are nominated in less competitive supporting categories, but the Art Directors Guild suggests we expand the definition. The Guild divides its film categories into period, fantasy, and contemporary, which makes senses. But this year's nominations suggest the division between the three categories are rather arbitrary. (The Film Experience is on the record saying that categories only matter if you follow the rules, so maybe the ADG should read this piece by our beloved Nathaniel.)

Anyway, here are the nominations:

Production Design (Period Film)
Bridge of Spies - Adam Stockhausen
Crimson Peak - Thomas Sanders
The Danish Girl - Eve Stewart
The Revenant - Jack Fisk
Trumbo - Mark Rickner 

Thomas Sanders's gothic sets are gorgeous, but Crimson Peak is a movie about ghosts. The production design is not historically accurate either unless gigantic bleeding houses used to actually exist in the real world. How is this not in "fantasy"?

The question one everyone's mind has to be "Where is Carol?" Judy Becker's designs are not only richly detailed, but they're integral in a film that's all about its precise visuals. It's worth remembering, though painful: Todd Haynes previous 50s masterpiece, Far From Heaven, did not get an Art Direction nomination from this guild or from the Oscars (!!!). 

Meanwhile, Trumbo continues its inexplicable love affair with awards voters.

More surprises and category confusions after the jump.

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Who Will Be This Year's "Out-of-Nowhere" Oscar Nominee?

Coco here, ready to talk about the current Oscar race and the surprises that might pop up.

Last week, we discussed SAG's bizarre taste. The math works against it but we're desperately hoping the Academy breaks free of their influence. Perhaps we should focus our hope on a recent wave of surprising, "out-of-nowhere" nominations at the Oscars.  Ever since 2011 (the year the Academy turned Best Picture into a flexible category with as little as 5 and as many as 10 nominees), there's been at least one acting nominee that landed on Oscar's list without being previously nominated at either the Golden Globes, SAG, or BAFTA.

Here are the stats...

2011 - The shocking inclusion of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close in Best Picture came with the legendary Max von Sydow in tow for his mute performance in Best Supporting Actor. 

2012 - Everyone was surprised by the amount of support Silver Linings Playbook had considering the supporting Actress nomination for Jacki Weaver. (Various precursors had usually included Nicole Kidman in the divisive Lee Daniels film The Paperboy or random shout outs to Dames Judi Dench (Skyall) and Maggie Smith (Marigold Hotel) and even the then lesser known Ann Dowd (who was pitched as supporting in Compliance though she had the film's central role). It's also hard to remember now, but Quvenzhané Wallis had none of the big three precursor nominations before she made the Best Actress line-up for Beasts of the Southern Wild (though she was included at Critics Choice and at the Spirit Awards)

2013 & 2014 stats. Plus 2015 speculation after the jump... 

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Oscar Race: How Crazy Are Those SAG Awards, Really?

Coco here, ready to talk about the current Oscar race and those crazy SAG awards in particular.

As you already know, the Screen Actors Guild decided to honor the best acting of 2015 in the most bizarre way possible; handing the most nominations to blacklist Hollywood drama Trumbo, and nominating a number of performances whose inclusion range from surprising to outright insane. 

Don't worry, I'm not here to defend SAG's ridiculous choices. I'm here to do what The Film Experience best at: speculate about Oscar nominations. See, the other day I saw someone on Twitter say he'd be surprised if any of this year's SAG categories are repeated 5-for-5 at the Oscars. This comment got me thinking...

Although the amount of correlation between SAG and Oscar has gone down a bit in the last couple years, the math still says that at least one of Oscar's acting categories will look identical to SAG's. The question I'm here to answer is: which one?

Lots of awards spaculation after the jump. 

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YES, NO, MAYBE SO: Anomalisa

Coco here, ready to talk about the trailer for Charlie Kaufman's Anomalisa. 

YES

- Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine... Even if you don't love Synecdoche New York, a Charlie Kaufman project deserves enthusiasm.
- We don't get enough stop-motion animation in our screens, and even fewer animated movies aimed at adult audiences.
- In a sea of computer generated mediocrity, it's always nice to see a strong voice be inspired by the medium of animation, which seems to be a good way for auteurs to find revitalizing force. Think, for example, of Wes Anderson's wave of success after Fantastic Mr. Fox. 

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