Masterpiece vs. Meh-sterpiece: 2019 Oscars Predictions

Was it only a year ago that we were debating The Shape of Water versus Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri? It seems like it's been longer than that, mostly because those two films have almost completely been forgotten already—Get Out has, rightly, cemented its claim as *the* movie of 2017, Best Picture win or not. That gets me wondering what will be remembered as *the* movie of 2018. It certainly won't be would-be Best Picture contenders Green Book or Bohemian Rhapsody. Even with a (very undeserved) win, they would fall to the cinematic wayside like previous Best Picture winners Crash and Chicago. Not even frontrunner Roma seems destined to be the 2018 film everyone is talking about 5 or 10 or 20 years from now—too underseen, too personal, not connected enough to the zeitgeist. No, I suspect that two other Best Picture contenders—and two who just might be able to pull off the upset—will be the ones audiences and critics alike will remember long after the lights are dimmed in Hollywood on Sunday night: Black Panther and BlacKkKlansman. Well-made, timely, and entertaining as all hell—that's how you get remembered. But only one of these films can win Best Picture. Which one do I think it will be? Read on to find out. Once again, I've seen all the nominees in the major categories, and I'll be hoping for a repeat of last year when I went 8-for-8 in my predictions. Let's see if I can do it again, starting, as they generally do in the ceremony itself, with the supporting categories.

Gold = predicted winner

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams – Vice
Marina de Tavira – Roma
Regina King – If Beale Street Could Talk
Emma Stone – The Favourite
Rachel Weisz – The Favourite

I suppose there is a chance for an upset here—Weisz? Adams?—given that Regina King wasn't nominated by her peers (who comprise the largest Oscar voting body) for the SAG, but it doesn't seem likely. She gives a powerhouse performance in a film that likely came up just short of a Best Picture nomination—and this might be the only category to reward Barry Jenkins's follow-up to Moonlight. If not King, Academy voters might decide that Adams is overdue (she is, but not for Vice) or that Weisz gave the best supporting performance of the year (she did). Stone and de Tavira are (deserving enough) also-rans.

My Non-Existent Vote: Weisz

Best Supporting Actor

Mahershala Ali – Green Book

Adam Driver – BlacKkKlansman

Sam Elliott – A Star Is Born

Richard E. Grant – Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Sam Rockwell – Vice

Barring a monumental upset, Mahershala Ali will win his second Oscar in three years for his affecting, empathetic performance in a film that is neither of those things. He was better in Moonlight, and at least two of the nominees here give better performances (Elliott and Grant), but he'll make a fine winner. I'd prefer Elliott, or, especially, Grant, but A Star Is Born's star has faded to a dull glow over the past few months, and Can You Ever Forgive Me? was always destined to be a "nominated but doesn't win" film. I'm not an Adam Driver guy, but he was admittedly good in BlacKkKlansman, but he'll have to wait for his first Oscar (it's coming). Rockwell already got his last year and will be relegated to clapping for the winner on Sunday, just happy to be there for his entirely undeserved nomination.

My Non-Existent Vote: Grant

Best Actress

Yalitza Aparicio – Roma

Glenn Close – The Wife

Olivia Colman – The Favourite

Lady Gaga – A Star Is Born

Melissa McCarthy – Can You Ever Forgive Me?

For a film awards show, there sure will be a lack of drama in the acting categories (for a second year in a row), as Glenn Close will win her first career Oscar (in seven tries). She was nominated five times between 1982 and 1988, then again in 2011 for all-time great movie title Albert Nobbs, and will get her first statue for playing the wife in The Wife, a thoroughly ho-hum literary drama in which she gives a largely reserved performance. In other words, this is the Denzel Washington Training Day or Julianne Moore Still Alice treatment. Still, it'll bring the house down when she wins. I'd prefer Colman or even Gaga, but it's hard to disparage a legend finally getting hers. It wouldn't at all surprise me to see McCarthy back in the field at some point, which I can't say about Aparicio.

My Non-Existent Vote: Colman

Best Actor

Christian Bale – Vice

Bradley Cooper – A Star Is Born

Willem Dafoe – At Eternity's Gate

Rami Malek – Bohemian Rhapsody

Viggo Mortensen – Green Book

This is a truly sorry group. I actually consider myself a Christian Bale fan, but other than The Fighter (for which he won), not a one of his other nominations was deserved (American Hustle, The Big Short, and, now, Vice). Mortensen, as usual, approached his character with an almost zealotous dedication... but it wasn't a very good character to begin with, and the movie around him is even worse (although it's not *quite* the total dumpster fire many would have you believe). Likely winner Rami Malek was... fine in a biopic that had the production values of a VH1 movie (but one that will have a ton of rewatch value on cable). The fake chompers did him no favors though, and he's destined to be more of a trivia question answer than a screen legend. Cooper was actually pretty good, but I suspect he got in more on star power and the fact that he wrote and directed the film. Dafoe was quite good, but I don't think he'd even be nominated most years. Let's hope for a better field next year.

My Non-Existent Vote: Cooper

Best Adapted Screenplay

Joel Coen and Ethan Coen – The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

Charlie Wachtel, David Rabinowitz, Kevin Willmott, and Spike Lee – BlacKkKlansman

Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty – Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Barry Jenkins – If Beale Street Could Talk

Eric Roth, Bradley Cooper, and Will Fetters – A Star Is Born

I didn't believe it even after I'd looked it up: Until this year, Spike Lee didn't have a single dramatic Oscar nomination to his name since Do the Right Thing, which he didn't even win for (losing to fucking Dead Poets Society). Not Malcolm X, not Summer of Sam, not 25th Hour, not even Inside Man. The Academy did throw him an honorary Oscar bone in 2015, but not even one nomination in almost 30 years is embarrassing (although he did get a nomination for his 4 Little Girls documentary in 1998). They'll rectify their error on Sunday with a much deserved win for BlacKkKlansman, which is as funny as it is powerful. I honestly don't see any potential spoilers here.

My Non-Existent Vote: Wachtel, Rabinowitz, Willmott, and Lee

Best Original Screenplay

Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara – The Favourite

Paul Schrader – First Reformed

Nick Vallelonga, Brian Currie, and Peter Farrelly – Green Book

Alfonso Cuarón – Roma

Adam McKay – Vice

This is the toughest to call of the major categories. All five nominees seem to have a chance, although, unfortunately, the best of them—Schrader—seems to have the least chance (too complex, too dark, too... weird). I could see the Academy going with previous winner McKay for his Vice script that's as liberal as it is overwritten, Farrelly et al. for its didactic and glad-handed message, or Cuarón as a nod to the Best Picture frontrunner. But The Favourite is tied with Roma for the most nominations with 10, and this is the best chance it has in a major category, so that puts Davis and McNamara over the top for me. Their script is masterfully structured and bitingly funny, even if it's not the most substantive.

My Non-Existent Vote: Schrader

Best Director

Spike Lee – BlacKkKlansman

Paweł Pawlikowski – Cold War

Yorgos Lanthimos – The Favourite

Alfonso Cuarón – Roma

Adam McKay – Vice

It's tough to see anyone upsetting Alfonso Cuarón's bid for a second Oscar here. Kind of crazy to think his two Oscars will be for the CGI space epic Gravity and the ultra-personal, black-and-white drama Roma—and both are equally deserved. If anyone could play spoiler, it'd be Lee, but I think voters will be content to give him the screenplay award and leave it at that. Europeans Lanthimos and Pawlikowski are in the "nomination is their win" category, and McKay's nomination is a testament to the still formidable Old White Guard of the Academy (I think... hard to tell given the liberal slant of the movie). Maybe do another Ferrell/Reilly movie before your next Very Important Movie, eh?

My Non-Existent Vote: Cuarón

Best Picture

A Star Is Born

Black Panther

BlacKkKlansman

Bohemian Rhapsody

The Favourite

Green Book

Roma

Vice

The five I mentioned at the beginning seem to be the only real contenders here, so that means sorry A Star Is Born (my how its star has fallen), The Favourite (too niche), and Vice (just not very good). I don't think "BoRap" has much of a chance either, despite its Golden Globe win—sorry not sorry, Brian Singer. I still think there's a slight possibility of Black Panther or BlacKkKlansman (in that order) pulling the upset, but I think it comes down to Roma and Green Book. This race feels a lot like 2017, when it was Moonlight versus La La Land. Unlike last year, it felt like something was at stake that year—the aforementioned Old White Guard versus the new and vital and more inclusive Academy membership. It's that same dynamic this year, although the stakes feel heightened, as Roma, while not as important a film as Moonlight, is even more obviously superior to Green Book than Moonlight was to La La Land. Green Book seems like a relic of the '80s—its approach is that ham-handed and its messaging is that obvious. It's a movie that, frankly, doesn't have a reason to exist in 2018 other than for white people to pat themselves on the back. Roma, on the other hand, is a profound personal drama that touches on some of the same race/class/power issues but is infinitely more technically impressive. I was prepared for La La Land to win in 2017 despite its pat-ness because it was also technically impressive—it was nominated for and won several technical awards that year, including Best Cinematography. Green Book only has a Best Editing nomination, and that probably isn't even deserved. All of which is to say that it would just feel like a gut punch were it to win, just two years after Moonlight achieved the impossible. Even worse, it would feel like a step backward given the ever-diversifying Academy membership. That's why I think Roma will win—it feels like the Academy is done with back-patting, with mediocrity, with looking backward. I think Roma will take the award and then go quietly into the Hollywood night, making way for the next moving, challenging, skillful masterwork rather than the next crowd-pleasing meh-sterpiece. I'm prepared to be wrong, but I don't think I will be.

My Non-Existent Vote: Roma

Rant out of the way, let's do the rest of the categories lightning-round style.

Best Foreign Language Film

Roma – Gabriela Rodríguez and Alfonso Cuarón

Duh—if you're the only foreign language film to be nominated for Best Picture, you're gonna win this category. One of the easier calls of the night.

My Non-Existent Vote: Roma

Best Animated Film 

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman, Phil Lord, and Christopher Miller

This is also another fairly easy call—the superlative Spiderverse has taken almost every single precursor. And rightly so—it's a stunning feat of animation, and a heartfelt story to boot.

My Non-Existent Vote: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Best Documentary Feature

Free Solo – Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin, Evan Hayes, and Shannon Dill

This category is always a guess for me because I'm a Bad White Person who doesn't like documentaries. It's either this or RBG, and this one seems like it would be more memorable to me.

My Non-Existent Vote: Abstain (have not seen any of the nominees)

Best Documentary Short

Black Sheep – Ed Perkins and Jonathan Chinn

Another complete guess. You would have to pay me so much money to sit through not one but five documentaries.

My Non-Existent Vote: Abstain (have not seen any of the nominees)

Best Animated Short

Bao – Domee Shi and Becky Neiman-Cobb

Although they didn't win last year, it's usually a good idea to bet on Pixar. That said, Weekends was head and shoulders above the rest of the nominees—and not just because it featured the Dire Straits.

My Non-Existent Vote: Weekends – Trevor Jimenez

Best Live Action Short

Marguerite – Marianne Farley and Marie-Hélène Panisset

It wasn't the best of the nominees (see below), but I'll go with it because it was so vastly different than the other four nominees. Note that Detainment and, especially, Skin are utter pieces of shit.

My Non-Existent Vote: Mother – Rodrigo Sorogoyen and María del Puy Alvarado

Best Score

Terence Blanchard – BlacKkKlansman

This is my favorite of the nominees, and it's the only Best Picture nominee along with Black Panther so it's my pick. Watch for Nicholas Britell's If Only Beale Street Could Talk score though.

My Non-Existent Vote: Blanchard

Best Original Song

"Shallow" – Lady Gaga, Mark Ronson, Anthony Rossomando, and Andrew Wyatt (from A Star Is Born)

This is the single easiest call on the board—not only is it a damn good song, but it's integral to the film's story as well. Lady Gaga gets halfway to the EGOT.

My Non-Existent Vote: "Shallow"

Best Cinematography

Alfonso Cuarón – Roma

Cold War was also impressive as a black-and-white nominee, but this figures to go to Cuarón and Roma. And it's a damn good-looking movie too—especially the mid-film New Year's sequence.

My Non-Existent Vote: Cuarón

Best Editing

Barry Alexander Brown – BlacKkKlansman

This will probably be ACE Eddie award winner John Ottman, but I can't in good conscience predict it because it is actually very poorly edited. This is actually an uninspiring field, but Brown was best.

My Non-Existent Vote: Brown

Best Production Design

Fiona Crombie and Alice Felton – The Favourite

Watch for Black Panther here, but the opulent period (uh, phrasing?) sets of The Favourite are the kind of thing Oscar voters usually go for in this category.

My Non-Existent Vote: Crombie and Felton

Best Costume Design

Sandy Powell – The Favourite

Powell has an astounding 15 Oscar nominations, but only 3 wins. She'll make it four wins for her work on The Favourite, as AMPAS eats this shit up even more so than it does for Production Design.

My Non-Existent Vote: Powell

Best Makeup And Hairstyling

Greg Cannom, Kate Biscoe, and Patricia Dehaney – Vice

It's honestly fucking embarrassing that Suspiria wasn't nominated. The makeup/hairstyling in Vice paled in comparison, but it will almost assuredly win.

My Non-Existent Vote: Cannom, Biscoe, and Dehaney

Best Sound Mixing

Paul Massey, Tim Cavagin, and John Casali – Bohemian Rhapsody

These two are always a crapshoot. Is there a war movie? A musical? Do I vote for the same one for both? The latter is usually a good strategy, so I'll combine it with the musical biopic and call it a day.

My Non-Existent Vote: Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño, Ai-Ling Lee, and Mary H. Ellis – First Man

Best Sound Editing

John Warhurst and Nina Hartstone – Bohemian Rhapsody

Again, going with "BoRap" for both and hoping to get at least one right. But Black Panther and First Man are contenders in both categories.

My Non-Existent Vote: Ai-Ling Lee and Mildred Iatrou Morgan – First Man

Best Visual Effects

Paul Lambert, Ian Hunter, Tristan Myles, and J. D. Schwalm – First Man

This one, counterintuitively, almost never goes to CGI-heavy blockbusters—and Black Panther isn't even nominated here. I expect First Man to do well in the techs, so I'll give it this one.

My Non-Existent Vote: Dan DeLeeuw, Kelly Port, Russell Earl, and Dan Sudick – Avengers: Infinity War

This feels like another 18/24 year—which might be enough for an Oscar pool win. As usual, it'll come down to the shorts, which are almost impossible to predict. But best of luck to everyone in their pools, and may Roma take the big prize!

Genre vs. Prestige: My 2018 Fake Oscars

Regardless of what happens at the Oscars on Sunday—maybe they'll have a holographic Burt Reynolds host, or decide to hold the whole thing during commercial breaks, or maybe *gasp* pap like Bohemian Rhapsody or Green Book wins Best Picture—when I think back on 2018 in film, I'm going to think about how strong a year it was for genre films. I mean, think about it:

• A comic book movie was nominated for Best Picture.
• Another one (likely) won Best Animated Feature.
• Three horror movies made my top five.
• The sixth(!) Mission: Impossible film entered the all-time action pantheon.
• At least five crime/neo-noir movies made my top 20.

Of course, there was plenty of Fine Cinema in 2018 as well—Roma, Burning, and First Reformed all made my top 10—but I think the sheer quantity of outstanding genre entries will define the year for me. With that in mind, you can expect to see genre films pop up often in my annual fake Oscars—especially the horror genre, which the Academy completely ignored. Let's get started, as usual, with the supporting performances.

Gold = winner

^ = nominated for a real Oscar

Best Supporting Actress

Elizabeth Debicki – Widows

Cynthia Erivo – Bad Times at the El Royale

Andrea Riseborough – Mandy

Tilda Swinton – Suspiria

Rachel Weisz – The Favourite^

Of the actual Oscar nominees that didn't make my list, Regina King was closest to making the cut—her performance was very powerful, but the film as a whole was more allusive and less impactful than I was hoping. I was surprised at Marina de Tavira's nomination—she did emotive, unshowy work, but completely overshadowed by the lead. The last part goes for Stone as well—as much as I like her, she's just not in Weisz's league. As for Adams... I'm a big fan, but Vice was not her strongest work—which is probably more the film's fault than hers. I'll leave it at that.

• Like last year, only one nominee here overlaps with the real Oscars—the aforementioned Weisz. If you wanted to quibble and call her performance a lead, I wouldn't argue too much, although I think it's easier to argue for Weisz as supporting than the other two. However you want to categorize her performance, it's one of the year's best to me—steely and scheming, acerbic and affectionate. Her scenes with Stone are great, but she really shines when opposite Colman. Weisz has long been a favorite of mine, and she's a strong contender here.
• Swinton is also a long-time favorite, and she gets a nod here for her triplicate performance in the fantastic Suspiria remake. She plays the ethereal Madame Blanc, the demonic Mother Helena Markos, *and* the forlorn Dr. Josef Klemperer. The latter two are feats of prosthetics to be sure (and how the FUCK was Suspiria not at least nominated for makeup?), but even her unadorned performance as Blanc is typically excellent. Swinton is up there with Cate Blanchett as one of the best actresses working today.
• The next three are all relatively new names. The newest (to me) is Broadway veteran Erivo. She made her big screen debut in 2018 in two of the best genre films of the year: Widows and Bad Times at the El Royale. She was effective as a bit player in Widows, but she really shined in Royale as a down-on-her-luck soul singer. Her performance is equal parts vulnerability and resilience, and her scenes with Jeff Bridges are among my favorite of the year.
• The best of the many quality supporting performances in Widows, however, was Debicki's as Alice, one of the titular bereaved who must learn to navigate the world after her abusive husband's death. From escaping the clutches of her venomous mother to timidly exploring the world of escorting to playing a key role in the central heist, Debicki is consistently captivating throughout. She first caught my eye as Jordan Baker Baz Luhrmann The Great Gatsby, and I look forward to watching her continued ascendance in Hollywood.
• That leaves us with Riseborough, who has the least screen time of these nominees for obvious and spoiler-y reasons. But her slightly off-kilter yet naturalistic portrayal of the eponymous Mandy is perhaps the most important to her movie than any of these five (save probably Weisz). She's magnetic when on screen, and her absence suffuses every frame once she's out of the picture. It's outstanding work from another actress who we'll soon likely be hearing a lot more from.

While this is an absolutely loaded category, it was an easy call to pick the winner, Rachel Weisz. She doesn't seem to have much of a shot at the actual Oscar (which should go to King), but she already has one of those anyway. Now she gets a fake Oscar to match!

Best Supporting Actor

Jeff Bridges – Bad Times at the El Royale

Gabriel Byrne – Hereditary

Sam Elliott – A Star Is Born^

Richard E. Grant – Can You Ever Forgive Me?^

Steven Yeun – Burning

Likely (two-time!) Oscar winner and True Detective Mahershala Ali just missed the cut this year for his deeply empathetic work in the deeply mediocre Green Book. The other two actual nominees weren't in consideration at all—I'll fully admit I don't "get" Adam Driver, and I feel the same about Rockwell's performance in Vice as I do about Adams's—big fan, but should not have been nominated.

• The two guys who will be at the actual ceremony on Sunday are also perhaps the two biggest contenders for me. Let's start with Elliott, aka Wade Garrett, aka Virgil Earp, aka The Man Who Killed Hitler and Then the Bigfoot. He's one of those guys who's been around so long it's hard to believe he's never been nominated before. It's deserving, too, for a small but memorable role in a fourth-generation remake that's better than it has any right to be. Elliott elevates every scene he's in with an easy, world-weary gravitas (and, of course, his mustache).
• Grant is a name I was familiar with before 2018, but I admittedly hadn't seen him in much, never having seen Withnail and I and having absolutely no recollection of his appearance on Game of Thrones. However, he was sensational in Can You Ever Forgive Me? as a misanthropic grifter. Like his character, he steals every single scene in the film, especially his very final scene, which is one of the best of the year. His chemistry with McCarthy is effortless, and his ability to inspire both empathy and loathing is remarkable.
• Like Elliott, Bridges has been around forever—although, unlike Elliott, he has a well-established history with the Academy (7 nominations and a win to his name). It's not surprising that he didn't garner any buzz for the little-seen Royale, but he did his usual top-notch work as a preacher with a failing memory and a dicey relationship with the truth. Like I said above, his scenes with Erivo were the highlight of the movie. Although Bridges has been known to phone it in at times (*cough*RIPD*cough), he almost always makes anything he's in better.
• Byrne has also been around forever. Unsurprisingly, Miller's Crossing and The Usual Suspects were the first films that came to mind when thinking about Byrne before 2018. (More surprisingly, End of Days is the other film that came to mind for some reason.) However, henceforth I will always think of his eternally patient yet increasingly exasperated patriarch in Hereditary, where he went toe-to-toe with a majestically unhinged Toni Collette and mostly held his own. His constant "What fresh hell is this?" expression is almost like the audience's anchor, their last grasp at sanity.
• Finally, we have Yeun, who I guess I kinda remembered from the season and a half I watched of The Walking Dead but who I had more recently seen in Okja, Mayhem, and the delightfully bonkers Sorry to Bother You, where he was a standout supporting character. But he did his finest work to date in Burning as the slick, mysterious, and possibly dangerous Ben. There is a cool confidence to both the character and his performance that is undeniable. Will this prove to be a breakout role for him?

If we're being honest, this is a much weaker field than the actress field above, which made it much tougher to pick a winner. I seriously considered Byrne, Grant, and Elliott, but I ultimately decided on Richard E. Grant, who created the most unique character and had the more memorable scenes. While he won't win the Oscar on Sunday, perhaps the nomination will lead to a late-career resurgence that could have him up on the podium someday.

Best Actress

Toni Collette – Hereditary

Olivia Colman – The Favourite^

Regina Hall – Support the Girls

Nicole Kidman – Destroyer

Thomasin McKenzie – Leave No Trace

Man, this was a great year for female performances. Any of the real Best Actress nominees could have made it here. In order, my ranking would be Gaga, Aparicio, McCarthy, and Close (who was fine and will be a deserving winner for her career achievements, but The Wife was kinda meh). Not a weak one in the bunch. But I think AMPAS clearly whiffed on some of the best performances of the year, as you'll see below.

• We'll start, as seems to be the pattern, with the lone real-life nominee, Colman. Her performance in The Favourite kind of sneaks up on you, as she's bedridden and largely a side character for the first half of the film (other than the scene from the trailer—you know the one). But as Queen Anne slowly comes into her own, Colman's considerable talent starts to reveal itself. By the end of the film, it hits you that you've just watched one of the year's best performance, as heartbreaking as it is hilarious. "She might win Best Actress," I thought as I left the theater. I don't think that prediction will prove correct, but she'll probably be an, ahem, close second.
• Now, let's talk about what AMPAS missed. You done fucked up, Oscar—and fucked up bad. Collette's exclusion is probably the most egregious nomination snub since I started closely following the Oscars 15 or so years ago. I just don't understand how anyone could have watched her spectacularly unbridled, movie-length meltdown and NOT nominate her for Best Actress. (The obvious conclusion, I suppose, is that most Academy members didn't see Hereditary.) Not only did she easily give one of the best performances of the year, it was one of the best of the decade, if not the century (only 20 years old, but still). I'm still white-knuckle pissed about this. (Can you tell?)
• And Kidman's snub is a close second to Collette's as far as egregiousness is concerned. I'm not quite as pissed about her miss, as I didn't see Destroyer until after the nominations had been announced (so there was no disappointment on nomination morning), but this one is certainly more surprising given Kidman's stature (4 nominations and a win). She completely disappears into the character of Erin Bell—behind some impressive makeup, yes, but every gesture, every tic, every movement is an act of pure creation. It's a masterful performance. At least the Golden Globes recognized it, I guess?
• My two other nominees weren't quite snubs, but I would like to have seen them get at least a little more buzz than they did, especially Hall. But, like Hereditary and Destroyer, I don't think many Oscar voters saw Support the Girls. Although, to be fair, I don't think much of anyone saw it—it made only $129,124 at the box office. That's too bad, as its naturalistic, unpretentious look at suburban myopia and service-industry ennui deserved to be more widely seen—especially for Hall's excellent performance. She wears years of disappointment on every line on her face, every sag of her shoulders, but still has the courage to hope for better. (Shout out as well to Haley Lu Richardson, who nearly won my Best Actress last year for Columbus. She's note-perfect once again in this as a perky cocktail waitress.)
• The final and youngest nominee is McKenzie, who had the unenviable task of acting opposite the preternaturally intense Ben Foster in her first major film role. To say she held her own is a massive understatement—she matches her massively talented costar scene for heartrending scene. Their final scenes together are so good they're hard to sit through—the level of genuine emotion they achieve is that high. "The same thing that's wrong with you isn't wrong with me." Fuck. Good line, and an even better delivery—especially for a 17-year-old. If she sticks with acting, there's probably a statue in her future.

As if you couldn't tell from the write-up above, Toni Collette is the easy winner here. It's just a shame that her peers weren't able to recognize her greatness in this. Hard to believe the only nomination she's ever received was for The Sixth Sense 20 years ago. Hopefully another role like this comes along soon and she's properly rewarded.

Best Actor

Nicolas Cage – Mandy

Willem Dafoe – At Eternity's Gate^
Ben Foster – Leave No Trace

Ethan Hawke – First Reformed

Robert Redford – The Old Man & the Gun

While Dafoe did make my field here (barely), the majority of the actual Oscar nominees are a fucking joke. They almost have to be, right? Christian Bale mumbling under several hours of makeup? Rami Malek lip syncing through false teeth? The otherwise estimable Viggo Mortensen personifying a Brooklyn accent to single-handedly defeat racism? (Although, as usual, his dedication to the role is impressive.) To be fair, Bradley Cooper is actually pretty good in A Star Is Born. But this is easily the worst Best Actor field in recent memory. Let's find out why my field is better.

• Dafoe basically made it here by default as the best of the real nominees. I had a fairly strong field of four but was struggling for a fifth to round out the category. I just saw At Eternity's Gate last night and was impressed enough with Dafoe's pensive, melancholy portrayal of van Gogh that I decided to include him here over The Wife's Jonathan Pryce at the last minute.
• Moving onto my field. I'll start with the male equivalent of Collette's snub. Hawke's work in the sublime First Reformed is so obviously better than any other male performance this year that it has me seriously wondering if the Oscar nominees are actually picked based on merit. (Sarcasm!) His Ernst Toller is one of the most empathetic, conflicted, and mesmerizing characters in recent cinema history. He takes what is a captivating character on the page and elevates it to something almost legendary on the screen. His performance will rightly be regarded as one of the worst snubs of all time when Malek eventually wins and is immediately forgotten. (Collette won't suffer the same fate due to the actual quality of the female nominees this year.)
• I don't think any of my other four nominees were ever seriously considered for the real thing, but Redford probably came closest for what he has said is his final film role. The Old Man & the Gun (let me tell you that the ampersand in the title drives me crazy) is charmingly minor, the mostly true story of an aging bank robber who can't quite give up the life of crime even in his golden years. Redford gives a rather muted, low-key performance, but his considerable charisma is still on full display. I had no expectations for the film and was pleasantly surprised at its quality. A fitting note for the silver screen legend to go out on.
• For the complete opposite of Redford's performance, we have Cage as the bereaved boyfriend of Mandy herself. Cage has been mostly confined to the direct-to-DVD space lately (I can't even remember his last noteworthy big screen role)—which is a shame, as Mandy proves he is still a massively talented actor when given a good role. His performance in Mandy is largely wordless, instead relying on a succession of guttural screams, histrionic weeping, and rageful screams—and of course, his trademark crazy eyes. His work here is almost purely emotive, unbridled and unvarnished. There's a legitimate chance Cage has another Oscar in him—he just might need to get another agent first.
• Still inexplicably waiting for his first Oscar nomination is Foster. He's given Oscar-worthy performances that have gone unrecognized in films like 3:10 to Yuma, The Messenger, and Hell or High Water, and, now, Leave No Trace. Foster has a special talent for playing military veterans, which is again on display in Trace, where he plays an Iraq War veteran who has taken to living deep inside a public park in Portland with his teenage daughter. Watching him first struggle to avoid the outside world, and then try to find his place in it is heartbreaking and revelatory. He is one of my favorite working actors and I hope he finds the breakthrough role that will get him the recognition he deserves.

There was ever only one real contender here—Ethan Hawke. Again, his work was just so head and shoulders above any other male performance this year. Perhaps this obvious snub will lead to him becoming a cause célèbre in future years. Maybe for the fourth Before Midnight movie?

Best Score

Keegan DeWitt – Gemini

Daniel Hart – The Old Man & the Gun

Dickon Hinchiffe – Leave No Trace

Ben Salisbury and Geoff Barrow – Annihilation

Thom Yorke – Suspiria

This is the only category with no overlap with the real Oscars—just like it was last year. Terence Blanchard (BlacKkKlansman), Nicholas Britell (If Beale Street Could Talk), two-time winner Alexandre Desplat (Isle of Dogs), and Childish Gambino protégé Ludwig Göransson (Black Panther) all did fine work, and Blanchard and Desplat made my personal longlist. But their scores were all a bit... traditional for me, especially given the more varied work by the five I went with, as we'll see below. (Note: I did not, probably not surprisingly, see Mary Poppins Returns.)

• The biggest name on my list, and the one that probably had the best chance to be nominated for the real thing, is Yorke for his haunting score for Suspiria. It's a moody and discordant work, full of screeching strings, mournful piano, subtle electronic elements, cryptic chanting, and his own vocals on several tracks. Yorke's work is even more impressive given that music is as important to the internal world of the film as it is to the atmosphere of the film itself. Jonny Greenwood has already made a name for himself in the world of film scores—hopefully Yorke follows suit.
• Annihilation is the other horror (or horror-adjacent) film in this category, but Salisbury and Barrow's work is drastically different than Yorke's. It's even more atmospheric, with all kinds of ominous, ambient sounds, but it's also grounded by a captivating central guitar melody. It's not as intentionally intrusive as Yorke's score, but it's just as key to creating the mood of the film. I know I had the guitar melody stuck in my head for several days after first seeing the film. (Not to mention the Crosby, Stills & Nash song.)
• The similar verdant settings lets us segue nicely to Hinchliffe's Leave No Trace score. Musically, they're quite different though, with Hinchliffe's work built less around ambient sound (although there are elements of it) and more around an intriguing combination of violin (fiddle?) and electric guitar. The resulting sound is akin to a fusion of bluegrass, folk, and prog rock at times. It's subtle enough to accent the film's emotional beats and powerful enough to fill it's many wordless moments.
• Along with Annihilation, Gemini was another early-year favorite of mine, and DeWitt's sleek, ultramodern score was a big reason why. It's got a very "Drive soundtrack" vibe to it, which couldn't be any more in my aesthetic wheelhouse. There are tons of shimmery synth lines, syncopated drums, and even smooth, sweet saxophone. It's all very "L.A. at night"—which makes sense, given that that's the film's milieu. While I quite enjoyed the film's self-aware neo-noir vibe, it didn't wind up making my year-end top-10—although its score (clearly) made my year-end list.
• When watching The Old Man & the Gun, it's hard not to notice the score—it's (seemingly) playing over every single shot in every single scene, like a cool, jazzy stream flowing freely between every frame. While that's not technically true (the score runs 58 minutes against the film's 93-minute runtime), I couldn't quite shake that initial impression. Nor would I want to—Hart's driving piano melody, noodling guitar lines, and insistent string arrangements refuse to leave your head in the best possible way. That it provides the score to such a charming final film for such a charming lead actor is just a bonus.

This came down to Hinchliffe and Hart, and in the end, Daniel Hart's free-flowing jazz score takes the (fake) trophy. It's not only a perfect accompaniment to the film, but also to just about any activity involving headphones. I've listened to it a ton while grading, for example. I look forward to checking out some of his other scores. Ditto everyone else on this list save Yorke, who I don't think has done any others (yet).

Best Adapted Screenplay

Debra Granik and Anne Rosellini – Leave No Trace

Armando Iannucci, David Schneider, Ian Martin, and Fabien Nury – The Death of Stalin

Spike Lee, David Rabinowitz, Charlie Wachtel, and Kevin Willmott – BlacKkKlansman^

Phil Lord and Rodney Rothman – Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Haruki Murakami, Lee Chang-Dong, and Oh Jung-Mi – Burning

Like the score category above, I have no qualms with the actual Oscar nominees. Buster Scruggs is minor Coens, but it explores the various shades of their dark humor well (even if the best of the shorts is all but wordless). Can You Ever Forgive Me? also tends toward the cynical, but Holofcener makes just the slightest turn toward tenderness by the end—and it works wonders. Jenkins once again shows his facility for compassion with Beale Street. Finally, most of the problems with the A Star Is Born script come from the source material—and Jackson Maine and Ally are both pretty great characters. Any one of these nominees would be a fine winner...

• ...but the Oscar is almost certainly going to go to Lee and Co. for BlacKkKlansman. I liked the movie enough to nominate it here—especially for the powerfully crosscut final act and the somberness of the credits sequence—but I'll be glad to stop writing about it for two reasons: 1) the stylized capitalization of the title drives me insane (especially as someone who uses caps lock instead of shift to capitalize), and 2) I couldn't get over why they didn't just use the Adam Driver character on the phone after the first phone call. I don't care how it was in real life, I just couldn't get over that detail.
• The Death of Stalin was a dark horse contender for an Oscar nomination, and Iannucci and Co.'s script just makes the cut here. It's not as beautifully vulgar and ferociously acerbic as In the Loop, but it's close—and it's probably just as timely even though it takes place almost 70 years ago. The way it abruptly switches from black comedy to almost gleeful nihilism in the last five minutes was one of the first memorable cinematic moments of 2018.
• Burning is another film with a stunning ending—and, unlike Stalin, one not rooted in the source material. Lee and Oh take the basic skeleton of Murakami's story—awkward relationship triangle, lots of cooking/smoking, a guy who likes to burn structures—transport it to South Korea, and add layers of social commentary, mystery, and sexual tension that were absent from the original short story. The result is one of the films I thought the most about in 2018—and one I can't wait to revisit.
• With Granik and Rosellini's Leave No Trace script, we're four for four on downers in this category. I guess 2019 was just that kind of year. But while it is certainly melancholy, Leave No Trace pulls off the tricky feat of portraying Foster's Will as a good father while showing that McKenzie's Tom is probably better off without him—of making you understand why he wants to leave civilization behind while showing that he still desperately needs it. It's a fine line, and Granik and Rosellini's script toes it perfectly.
• At least there is one feel-good nominee in the bunch—Lord and Rothman's Spider-Verse script. I mean, it features a character named Spider-Ham! But it also solved the Spider-Man franchise's origin story problem... by simply adding more of them. Way more of them. The overlapping origin story structure of the movie wryly and elegantly deconstructs that most basic of comic book movie tropes to great effect. It also does so with more heart and genuine charm than the past several MCU/DCEU movies combined. Spider-Verse was one of the most purely joyful cinematic experiences of 2018.

Although all the nominees were quite good in their own way, this wasn't a particularly close category: Haruki Murakami, Lee Chang-Dong, and Oh Jung-Mi take this one for their beguiling and enigmatic work. Did Ben or didn't he? I still have no idea, and I have my doubts whether a second viewing would shed more light or put me further in the dark. I can't wait to go back either way.

Best Original Screenplay

Ari Aster – Hereditary

Bo Burnham – Eighth Grade

Rafael Casal and Daveed Diggs – Blindspotting

Boots Riley – Sorry to Bother You

Paul Schrader – First Reformed^

The Academy nominated two great scripts (First Reformed and The Favorite), a decent script for a great film (Roma), and two turds (Vice, a small one, and Green Book, a big ol' steaming one). The Favorite just missed out here because I'm not sure what it was trying to say—and I'm not sure the film does either. The strengths of Roma are in the performances and visuals, not the writing, but I'm okay with it getting nominated. Vice is perhaps the most overwritten film of the year—McKay tried to capture the magic of The Big Short again but failed. And Green Book... man. While I can't say I hate the movie, the writing is massively overstuffed with clichés and didactic lines/scenes. I don't think it will win, but it had better fucking not.

• Unfortunately, I don't think the only nominee I have in common with the Academy will win either. Schrader's First Reformed script is spare, challenging, and incredibly powerful. On my first viewing, I bristled a bit at the number of issues it tried to tackle—suicide, alcoholism, environmentalism, extremism, the corporatization of religion. But on my second viewing I realized that they're all just signifiers for the crises of faith the various characters are going through. This modern world is a hard place to live, Schrader seems to be saying, a place without easy answers—just like the film itself. I still don't *love* the abstruseness of the ending, but it fits the film. I'd love to see Schrader pull the upset on Sunday, but, again, I don't think it'll happen.
• I didn't expect to see Aster's name among the nominees on nomination morning, but I was nonetheless disappointed. His script for Hereditary is taut, multilayered, and rife with meaning. The film works on two levels: as a family drama about mental illness passed down the generations, and, of course, as a straight-up horror movie about demonic cult worship. The script allows for a reading of the film that works on either level. Is the cult/demon an allegory for mental illness? Or is the discussion of mental illness a red herring to distract the audience (and certain characters) from the existence of the cult/demon? Either reading works—or, perhaps, both. This is almost as impressive a debut feature as Jordan Peele's Get Out last year.
• My other three nominees are also debuts. Let's start with the pair of Oakland-set films. Casal and Diggs's script for Blindspotting starts off as a fairly standard tale of an ex-con trying to reintegrate into society—issues with his job, his ex, his old friends. But, quite slowly, the film builds to a stunningly poetic denouement on interesectionality in the intersections one of the cities at the forefront on the national conversation we've been having the last several years. The lack of Oscar buzz wasn't surprising—this was one of the more underseen films of the year.
• Sorry to Bother You had a bit higher viewership ($18M box office vs. $5M for Blindspotting), but it was talked about way more due to the, uh, ABSOLUTELY BATSHIT place the film goes in the third act. I won't spoil it here, but, holy shit, there was not a more strange cinematic experience in 2018 than seeing what lay behind the olive door. The film admittedly went off the rails a bit at that point, but what came before was a whip-smart workplace satire for the age of social justice and social media. There will be many eyes on what Riley does next. (Although hopefully there isn't as much ʞɔoɔǝsɹoɥ... or maybe hope for more?)
• Burnham's script for Eighth Grade is probably the outlier here, much like Spider-Verse was above. While definitely not all sunshine and rainbows, it is decidedly more upbeat than the rest of the nominees here, as it doesn't feature suicide, demons, racial tension, or equisapiens (don't ask). Instead, it features the relatively normal daily goings on of an eighth grade girl. But Burnham's writing exposes just how terrifying being that age—and gender—can be. The "Truth or Dare" scene, for example, is almost as scary as anything in the year's best horror films. Like The Favourite, the film seems to grasp at—but ultimately falls short of—any kind of deeper meaning, but not all films have to. I have a feeling this came up just short for an Oscar nomination, which is too bad—it's better than most of the nominees.

As much as I want Schrader to win the Oscar, he comes up just short to Ari Aster here. The multiple levels, the dollhouse/miniatures device, the thematic richness, and the fucking car accident scene—it's just an impressive, impressive debut. I'm already looking forward to Midsommar.

Best Director

Ari Aster – Hereditary
Panos Cosmatos – Mandy
Alfonso Cuarón – Roma^
Luca Guadagnino – Suspiria
Karyn Kusama – Destroyer

Like most categories, I only have one nominee in common with AMPAS here (Cuarón couldn't have been a more obvious pick this year). Three of the other four were well deserving—Lee, Lanthimos, and Pawilkoski, in that order. Lee masterfully knew when to drop a punchline and when to put his boot to your neck; Lanthimos drew probably the best performance from a cast in 2018 and crafted a marvelously entertaining and caustically hilarious film around them; and, while Cold War didn't quite work for me as a whole, it was nonetheless made with style and vitality to spare. As for McKay, while I (again) didn't hate the movie as much as most critics, it was even more over-directed than it was overwritten—did we really need the shot of an actual stack of teacups when one of the characters speaks metaphorically about them? Yikes. Hard to believe me made the field. He was never considered here.

• As I said above, Cuarón was an incredibly easy pick here. His hand is in every frame of Roma—in the expert mise en scène, the exquisite black-and-white cinematography, the delicate long takes, his command of the largely amateur cast, every emotional beat. (Also, too, in the pleasantly meandering first 90 minutes, it must be said.) He seems likely to win his second Oscar on Sunday (although Lee could play the sentimental spoiler), and he'd be more than deserving.
• None of my other four nominees was anywhere near a real Oscar nomination—three horror movies and a woman. We'll begin with the latter. Kusama has been a bit of a chameleon in her career, directing a sports drama (Girlfight), a sci-fi actioner (Æon Flux), and then a couple horror movies (Jennifer's Body and The Invitation). With Destroyer, she tries her hand at the L.A. crime movie... and she knocks it out of the park. The film has a deceptively complex structure that only reveals itself in the final minutes (although astute viewers might pick up on it earlier—I did, but not fully), and Kusama juggles the multiple timelines and emotional throughlines adroitly—all anchored, of course, by Kidman's powerful lead performance. I don't know what's next for her—it could be literally anything based on her filmography—but I'm in, whatever it is.
• Guadagnino is another director who seems to be able to shift between genres with ease. His last and best-known film was 2017's stylish and sincere coming of age/gay love story Call Me By Your Name. So, of course, he follows it up with a remake of the 1970's Italian horror classic, Suspiria. It's nothing like CMBYN—grim where CMBYN was joyous, drab where CMBYN was colorful, female-centric where CMBYN was male-dominated. It's also, dare I say, better than the original—more coherent, technically (far) superior, more emotionally resonant and genuinely disturbing. (If not as balletic in its scares and set pieces.) After two viewings, I still don't *quite* think either the WWII or Cold War stuff works, but everything within the halls of the Tanz Dance Academy is incredible—especially that ending. (It's just as impactful the second time, by the way.)
• A director who seems to stick to what he knows is Cosmatos. Like his debut, Beyond the Black Rainbow, Mandy is heavy on atmosphere, light on plot, and unique in its presentation—though that's selling the madness that is Mandy far short. Watching Mandy is like watching a two-hour heavy metal music video starring a crazy-eyed Nic Cage battling his way through a Bosch painting that also happens to be melting. From the deliciously dark cinematography to the monolithic Jóhannsson score (R.I.P.) to the deliriously heightened performances to the brooding, oppressive atmosphere, this film could only really be the work of one mind—Cosmatos. Probably more so than anyone in this category, I'll be fascinated to see what he does next. (Although hopefully it has less killing female characters to kickstart the plot, yeah?)
• Last but not least is Aster again. As impressive as his script was, his feature debut behind the camera may have been even better—it's truly a masterclass in horror direction, right up there with Friedkin and Carpenter. The best horror movies have a deliberate build escalating to sustained tension and culminating in outright terror. Aster nails all three stages in Hereditary—the early introduction of the history of mental health issues, subtle revealing of the cult imagery, the car accident, the seance, the goddamn bedroom scene, the fucking attic... all leading to "Hail, Paimon!" I haven't seen a horror movie this good in a LONG time, and I probably won't again anytime soon. It's a masterwork of the genre.

I thought long and hard about going with Cuarón here, but I just haven't been able to get Ari Aster's movie out of my head ever since I saw it (twice now). I can look on Cuarón's work and admire it, but the visceral reaction I had to Hereditary is the most memorable cinematic experience I had in 2018, which is why it is the winner here... and (spoilers) below as well.

Best Picture

8) Leave No Trace

7) First Reformed

6) Burning

5) Mandy

4) Roma^

3) Suspiria

2) Destroyer

1) Hereditary

Obviously, after taking Best Actress, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Director, Hereditary wins Best Picture as well. And that brings us to the end of my 2018 fake Oscars. I'll save my spiel about the actual Best Picture nominees for my official Oscar predictions (coming up soon), and I've said plenty about these films above. My top eight (to match the eight Best Picture nominees) is a good blend of genre and prestige, which is perhaps the simplest way to sum up my cinematic aesthetic. You can check out the rest of my favorite movies of the year—as well as every other movie I saw in 2018—on Letterboxd. Now, before the band plays me off, thanks for reading! I probably shouldn't be, but I'm looking forward to the real thing in a few days.