This amazingly cold month brings, along with hot beverages and warm blankets, the approach of one of the most important events regarding the cinematic world and the biggest awards ceremony of the year: the Oscars!
Today, we finally got to know the nominees for this year's show, so take a look:
Best Picture
American Sniper
Birdman
Boyhood
The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Imitation Game
Selma
The Theory of Everything
Whiplash
Best Actor
Steve Carell (Foxcatcher)
Bradley Cooper (American Sniper)
Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game)
Michael Keaton (Birdman)
Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything)
Best Actress
Felicity Jones (The Theory Of Everything)
Julianne Moore (Still Alice)
Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl)
Reese Witherspoon (Wild)
Marion Cotillard (Two Days, One Night)
Best Supporting Actor
Robert Duvall (The Judge)
Ethan Hawke (Boyhood)
Edward Norton (Birdman)
Mark Ruffalo (Foxcatcher)
JK Simmons (Whiplash)
Best Supporting Actress
Patricia Arquette (Boyhood)
Keira Knightley (The Imitation Game)
Emma Stone (Birdman)
Meryl Streep (Into The Woods)
Laura Dern (Wild)
Best Director
Wes Anderson (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman)
Richard Linklater, (Boyhood)
Bennett Miller, (Foxcatcher)
Morten Tyldum, (The Imitation Game)
Cinematography
Birdman
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Ida
Mr Turner
Unbroken
Costume Design
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Inherent Vice
Into The Woods
Maleficent
Mr Turner
Foreign Language Film
Leviathan
Ida
Tangerines
Timbuktu
Wild Tales
Makeup and Hairstyling
Foxcatcher
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Guardians of the Galaxy
Original Score
Alexandre Desplat (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Alexandre Desplat (The Imitation Game)
Johann Johannsson (The Theory of Everything)
Gary Yershon (Mr Turner)
Hans Zimmer (Interstellar)
Adapted Screenplay
Jason Hall (American Sniper)
Graham Moore (The Imitation Game)
Anthony McCarten (The Theory Of Everything)
Paul Thomas Anderson (Inherent Vice)
Damien Chazelle (Whiplash)
Original Screenplay
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Nicolas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris Jr, Armando Bo (Birdman)
Richard Linklater (Boyhood)
E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman and Bennett Miller (Foxcatcher)
Wes Anderson and Hugo Guinness (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Dan Gilroy (Nightcrawler)
Best Original Song
Lost Stars, Begin Again
Grateful, Beyond the Lights
I’m Not Gonna Miss You, Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me
Everything is Awesome, The Lego Movie
Glory, Selma
Best Animated Feature
Big Hero 6
The Box Trolls
How To Train Your Dragon 2
Songs of the Sea
The Tale Of Princess Kaguya
Best Documentary Feature
Citizenfour
Finding Vivian Maier
Last Days in Vietnam
Salt of the Earth
Virunga
Best Documentary Short
Joanna
Our Curse
The Reaper
White Earth
Best Film Editing
American Sniper
Boyhood
The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Imitation Game
Whiplash
Best Visual Effects
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Guardians of the Galaxy
Interstellar
X-Men: Days of Future Past
Best Short Film, Live Action
Aya
Boogaloo and Graham
Butter Lamp
Parvaneh
The Phone Call
Best Short Film, Animated
The Bigger Picture
The Dam Keeper
Feast
Me and My Moulton
A Single Life
Best Production Design
The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Imitation Game
Interstellar
Into the Woods
"Mr. Turner"
Best
Sound Editing
American
Snipper
Birdman
The
Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
Interstellar
Unbroken
Best Sound Mixing
American Sniper
Birdman
Interstellar
Unbroken
Whiplash
We can't say that
these nominations were an
absolute surprise for us, however, as usual, some options came surrounded with
controversy and divided opinions.
As a proud fan of
Wes Anderson and his majestic cinematography and visual style, I’m really
happy to see that, with a total of nine nominations in the most diverse categories, he and his excellent The Grand Hotel Budapest are leading the awards.
Boyhood, from Linklater, was the magnificent result of 12
years of production, hard-work and commitment. After this long journey, we are
reminded that after all, films can be timeless, absolutely deserving the recent spotlights.
Again this year, there was speculation of racism and discrimination on the lists, reminded by the total absent of nominated black actors in any categories, and even the total absent of female directors in the Best Director nominations. After a film like Selma, it's hard to understand how, and why, this happened.
In terms of Best
Actors and Actresses, we don’t have many surprises either. Sadly, some of the bigger
absents from this category were Jennifer Aniston (for her astonishing act on Cake) and Joaquin Phoenix (for his
frenetic interpretation on Inherent Vice).
It's ridiculous how, for the third year in a row (THIRD!), Bradley Cooper is
once again nominated for Best Leading Actor. These kinds of awards intend to value
new actor’s roles and interpretations, which means (or should mean) not giving the same places to the same people. For this reason,
I’m not even going to start with Meryl Streep on this (she’s amazing and one of
the best actresses ever, yes, but come on, in her life she got 19 nominations and won
them three times, she’s good and she knows it already!). However, it was lovely
to see Marion Cotillard nominated, as well as Steve Carell, for the Actors
category.
The Best Directors list was also predictable but the Cinematography category has beautiful choices this year. The more technical categories were also interesting. As a Portuguese, I’m proud
to know that the documentary portraying the work of one of our best
photographers, Sebastião Salgado, is nominated for Best Documentary. Que
orgulho, pá!
About the Animated
movies, it’s interesting to see the options, specially the short movie ones. It’s
strange the absence of Pixar on this one, and also the The Lego Movie, but we were rewarded with (at least)
the nomination of The Tale of the
Princess Kaguya and Songs of the Sea,
like they deserved it.
Nevertheless, we
have to say that the Best Original Song's list is one of the poorest of
the last few years. It’s sad to also
know that, in such an important ceremony, Everything
is New (from the Lego’s movie) is one of the nominees.
And oh well, after all,
even with their pros and cons, the important thing is that we (finally!!) now have the nominees, ladies
and gentleman!
We have until the 22 February to catch up and choose our favourites!
