Cinemablographer: Oscar Nominations: Good Day for Canada!

1/14/2016

Oscar Nominations: Good Day for Canada!

Brooklyn - Film is one of few Canadian Best Picture nominees

A bittersweet morning with these Oscar nominations. Carol misses the Best Picture race and Jane Fonda does too. Some big surprises in the screenplay categories with The Hateful Eight and Golden Globe winner Steve Jobs not making the cut. But the list has some pleasant surprises, including What Happened, Miss Simone? in a very strong quintet of documentary nominees. (I'll have a review of Winter on Fire up soon.) It's also a very good day for Canada, as we have our second and third Best Picture nominees since Atlantic City got a nom for 1981. Those Best Picture nominees are Brooklyn and Room, the latter of which came on strong with an unexpected Best Director nomination for Irish director Lenny Abrahamson, who squeezed out The Martian's Ridley Scott, whom many pundits favoured to win! Denis Villeneuve's Sicario also has a bunch of nominations, although he and the film missed the top categories. Canadian nominees also include Emma Donoghue's screenplay for Room, short doc Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah, and Rachel McAdams for Spotlight, who offers a silver lining to the Jane Fonda snub.

Which are your biggest snubs/surprises?

Best Picture:

The Big Short
Bridge of Spies

Brooklyn

Mad Max: Fury Road

The Martian
The Revenant

Room

Spotlight

Best Director:

Lenny Abrahamson, Room
Alejandro G. Inarritu, The Revenant
Adam McKay, The Big Short
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight
George Miller, Mad Max: Fury Road

Best Actor:

Bryan Cranston, Trumbo
Matt Damon, The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio, The Revenant

Michael Fassbender, Steve Jobs

Eddie Redmayne, The Danish Girl

Best Actress:

Cate Blanchett, Carol

Brie Larson, Room

Jennifer Lawrence, Joy
Charlotte Rampling, 45 Years

Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn

Best Supporting Actor:

Christian Bale, The Big Short
Tom Hardy, The Revenant

Mark Ruffalo, Spotlight

Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies

Sylvester Stallone, Creed

Best Supporting Actress:

Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Hateful Eight
Rooney Mara, Carol

Rachel McAdams, Spotlight

Kate Winslet, Steve Jobs
Alicia Vikander, The Danish Girl

Best Original Screenplay:

Bridge of Spies – Mark Harmon; Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
Ex Machina - Alex Garland

Inside Out - Pete Docter et al

Spotlight – Tom McCarthy, Josh Singer
Straight Outta Compton - Jonathan Herman and Andrea Berloff; Story by S. Leigh Savidge & Alan Wenkus and Andrea Berloff