By Haydn Elmore | January 29, 2024
Photo Credit: Prayitno on Wikimedia Commons
The nominations for the 96th Academy Awards were announced this past week. Here’s a breakdown of the nominations.
Leading the pack of the nominations is “Oppenheimer,” scoring 13 nominations including Best Picture, Best Director for Christopher Nolan, Best Actor for Cillian Murphy, Best Supporting Actor for Robert Downey Jr, Best Supporting Actress for Emily Blunt, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Original Score. “Oppenheimer” is set to be the frontrunner to win in multiple categories, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Other noteworthy films nominated for Best Picture include “Poor Things” (with 11 nominations), ‘Killers of the Flower Moon” (with 10 nominations), “Barbie” (with eight nominations), “Maestro” (with seven nominations), “The Holdovers” (with five nominations), “American Fiction” (also five nominations), “Anatomy of a Fall” (with five nominations), “The Zone of Interest” (with five nominations), and ‘Past Lives” (with two nominations).
Highlights include Lily Gladstone becoming the first Native American actress to receive a Best Actress nomination for her performance as Mollie Burkhart in “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Gladstone depicts an Osage woman whose family is slaughtered for their oil rights..
Big blockbuster films like “Godzilla Minus One” and “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” garnered recognition in some technical categories including Best Visual Effects. This is the first time a film from the “Godzilla” and the “Mission: Impossible” franchises respectively have received Oscar nominations.
Actor Colman Domingo became the first LGBTQ actor to receive a Best Actor nomination for an LGBTQ role in the film “Rustin.” Films like “Anatomy of a Fall” and “The Zone of Interest” got the recognition they deserved, each receiving five nominations including Best Picture and Best Director. Fun fact: Sandra Huller is in both films and has received a Best Actress nomination for “Anatomy of a Fall.”
However, for every film, actor, and director that got nominated, a handful got snubbed. Despite “Barbie” receiving 8 nominations including Best Picture, the omission of Greta Gerwig for Best Director and Margot Robbie for Best Actress spawned massive controversy and uproar from critics, fans, and even fellow “Barbie” actors including Simu Liu, America Ferrera, and Ryan Gosling (the latter two of whom received nominations in the supporting acting categories). Many expressed their disappointment that the two ladies responsible for making “Barbie” the global phenomenon it became didn’t get recognized for the hard work they put into making the film in their respective categories. Some even compare the snubs to the plot of the film.
Other noteworthy snubs include Greta Lee and Celine Song for Best Actress and Best Director respectively for “Past Lives” (though Song received a Best Original Screenplay nomination). “Killers of the Flower Moon” didn't score nominations in two major categories (Best Actor for Leonardo DiCaprio and Best Adapted Screenplay). The scores for “The Boy and the Heroin” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” got snubbed for Best Original Score. Neither Charles Melton in “May December'' and Dominic Sessa in “The Holdovers” received nominations in the Best Supporting Actor category, and critically beloved films like “Asteroid City,” “Priscilla,” and “The Iron Claw” received no nominations whatsoever.
Overall, this year's lineup of Oscar nominations is solid, filled with many surprises and upsets as usual with every Oscar ceremony. With so many noteworthy films, actors, and filmmakers up for many of the big categories, this will be an exciting ceremony for film fans to see who will walk home with that Oscar trophy in their hands this year.
The 96th Academy Awards air on Sunday, March 10 at 7:00 p.m. on ABC.
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