Huge Milestones, Massive Surprises and Astonishing Snubs Make History

The Oscars finally seem to have taken note of the criticism aimed at them in recent years, which has resulted in a host of big surprises in this year’s nominations.

The number of awards seems to increase each year too, so there is no way we could discuss all of them here. The full show is to be broadcast on CTV at 5 PM Pacific Time, 8 PM Eastern on Sunday, April 25th. If you are interested in having a bet on the outcome of any award, you can check out the odds in full at Canadian bookmaker Unibet.

The Best Picture Award Has Many Surprising Nominees

With cinemas being closed for much of the past year, you probably won’t be familiar with many of these titles. An interesting aside is the fact that several films created for viewing on streaming platforms such as Netflix have been included in the nominations this year too, for the very first time. So, without further ado, here are the nominations for best picture:

  • The Father
  • Judas and the Black Messiah
  • Mank
  • Minari
  • Nomadland
  • Promising Young Woman
  • Sound of Metal
  • The Trial of the Chicago 7

Netflix Leads the Field with a Massive 10 Nominations for “Mank”

There are some big ones in there too, including a nomination for David Fincher as best director, Gary Oldman for best actor, and Amanda Seyfried as the best supporting actress. All that in addition to best picture? That’s quite some result, so what is “Mank” all about?

In truth, it’s a strange concept – a biographical drama about screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz and his development of the screenplay for Citizen Kane. Those of the younger generations could justifiably ask why anyone would be interested in watching a 131-minute movie about the creation of a screenplay for a different film?

Ask your parents about Citizen Kane, and you will soon understand – the 1941 American drama is considered by many critics, filmmakers, and fans to be the greatest film ever made. And it’s an accolade that has stood the test of time too – the movie topped the American Film Institutes 100 Years… 100 Movies list in 1998 and again in 2007.

Most notably, Citizen Kane was nominated for Academy Awards in nine categories including, of course, Best Writing of an Original Screenplay by Herman J.Mankiewicz. Suddenly, it all makes sense.

More than One Woman Makes the Shortlist for Best Director for the First Time Ever

There are many surprises in the best director category this year too – Regina King was a heavy favorite to earn a place on the shortlist for feature directing debut in Amazon Studios “One Night in Miami”, but whilst the picture did earn three nominations, Regina and best director were not one of them.

Danish director Thomas Vinterberg will no doubt be celebrating, however, as he did earn a surprise nomination for his work on the dark comedy “Another Round”. The film had been heavily tipped by critics over the past few months for several nominations, in particular the Best International Feature, but nobody expected Vinterberg to be nominated in the directing category. Congratulations to him and his team who worked on “Another Round”!

The full list of nominees for best director is as follows:

  • Thomas Vinterberg (Another Round)
  • David Fincher (Mank)
  • Lee Isaac Chung (Minari)
  • Chloe Zhao (Nomadland)
  • Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman)

Further Milestones Crossed in the Best Actor Category

Steven Yeun plays the lead role in Minari, a film about a Korean family starting a farm in 1980s Arkansas. The Critics say it’s a must-watch, whilst IMDB is a little more cautious with a respectable if not explosive 7.6 out of 23,604 votes. I’d trust the critics on this one – you really need at least 100,000 votes on IMDB before the statistics become truly representative and trustworthy.

The full list of nominations for best actor are as follows:

  • Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal)
  • Chadwick Boseman (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom)
  • Anthony Hopkins (The Father)
  • Gary Oldman (Mank)
  • Steven Yeun (Minari)