Oscars 2022: The Verdict
And so Oscar season is over for another year. With Will Smith and Chris Rock's infamous clash taking up a majority of the post-awards discussion, it's easy to forget that... movies were also celebrated during this chaotic ceremony!
In an earlier post, I listed the nominees with my favorites to win in green, and the projected winners being in red. And now it's time to see how close I came to actually figuring this mess of a show out. The actual winners are in light green.
BEST PICTURE
Dune
Drive My Car
Belfast
The Power Of The Dog
West Side Story
King Richard
CODA
I was dead wrong on that one, not gonna lie. Wasn't displeased with CODA winning Best Picture, though, as it was a genuinely nice little movie.
BEST ACTOR
Andrew Garfield (tick, tick... BOOM!)
Benedict Cumberbatch (The Power Of The Dog)
Javier Bardem (Being The Ricardos)
Denzel Washington (The Tragedy Of Macbeth)
Will Smith (King Richard)
Didn't quite foresee the slap but it seemed clear to me that Will Smith was going to pick up the Best Actor reward so I'll take that successful prediction.
BEST ACTRESS
Jessica Chastain (The Eyes Of Tammy Faye)
Olivia Colman (The Lost Daughter)
Kristen Stewart (Spencer)
Nicole Kidman (Being The Ricardos)
Penélope Cruz (Parallel Mothers)
Again, dead wrong on that one. To be fair, I didn't both with that Tammy Faye movie because those make-up effects just looked bizarre but I will give it a go now. Maybe I'm missing something.
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Flee
The Mitchells vs. The Machines
Raya And The Last Dragon
Based on the poor selection here, Encanto was the obvious choice. I'm not exactly Nostradamus for this one.
BEST ORIGINAL SONG
No Time To Die (Billie Eilish, FINNEAS)
Dos Oruguitas (Lin-Manuel Miranda)
Somehow You Do (Diane Warren)
Be Alive (Beyoncé, DIXSON)
Down To Joy (Van Morrison)
Speaking of obvious choices, here's another one.
BEST DIRECTOR
Jane Campion (The Power Of The Dog)
Kenneth Branagh (Belfast)
Ryosuke Hamaguchi (Drive My Car)
Steven Spielberg (West Side Story)
Paul Thomas Anderson (Licorice Pizza)
Ok so I didn't get this one right but, to be fair, Power Of The Dog? REALLY???
INTERNATIONAL FEATURE FILM
Flee
Drive My Car
Lunana: A Yak In The Classroom
The Hand Of God
The Worst Person In The World
What can I say? Nailed it.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Kirsten Dunst (The Power Of The Dog)
Ariana DeBose (West Side Story)
Jessie Buckley (The Lost Daughter)
Aunjanue Ellis (King Richard)
Judi Dench (Belfast)
Didn't expect West Side Story to actually win anything this year but I was happy with Ariana DeBose picking up the Oscar. I was rooting for her.
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
Encanto (Germaine Franco)
Don't Look Up (Nicholas Britell)
Dune (Hans Zimmer)
The Power Of The Dog (Jonny Greenwood)
Parallel Mothers (Alberto Iglesias)
Another favorite of mine won? Hell yeah Hans Zimmer. Making me look so smart right now.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Troy Kotsur (CODA)
Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Power Of The Dog)
J.K. Simmons (Being The Ricardos)
Ciarán Hinds (Belfast)
Jesse Plemons (The Power Of The Dog)
Aw, man. This one hurts because my pick was actually Troy Kotsur but I forgot to update this post after seeing Power Of The Dog. Plemons was barely in that movie, why was he even nominated?!
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Ascension
Writing With Fire
Flee
Attica
Summer Of Soul
Huh. I did way better with these predictions than I thought I would, honestly.
LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM
The Long Goodbye
Ala Kachuu - Take And Run
Please Hold
On My Mind
The Dress
BEST ANIMATED SHORT FILM
Robin Robin
The Windshield Wiper
Affairs Of The Art
Boxballet
Beast
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
The Lost Daughter
Dune
Drive My Car
The Power Of The Dog
CODA
In retrospect, yeah, this one makes sense.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Nightmare Alley
Dune
The Power Of The Dog
The Tragedy Of Macbeth
West Side Story
This was another nice surprise. While Dune really deserved to win this one, and it was my favorite, I had a feeling the Academy would shun the film entirely. Glad it didn't.
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Don't Look Up (Adam McKay, David Sirota)
Belfast (Kenneth Branagh)
Licorice Pizza (Paul Thomas Anderson)
The Worst Person In The World (Joachin Trier, Eskil Vogt)
King Richard (Zach Baylin)
I'll be honest, Belfast was not on my radar. Like, at all.
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Dune
Free Guy
No Time to Die
Shan-Chi and the Legend Of The Ten Rings
I mean, the selection was a bit weak but of course Dune won. As it should've.
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Nightmare Alley
Dune
Cruella
Cyrano
West Side Story
I would've given it to Dune but Cruella just made sense for this category.
BEST SHORT DOCUMENTARY
When We Were Bullies
Audible
The Queen Of Basketball
Lead Me Home
Three Songs For Benazir
BEST FILM EDITING
Don't Look Up (Hank Corwin)
Dune (Joe Walker)
tick, tick... BOOM! (Andrew Weisblum, Myron I. Kerstein)
The Power Of The Dog (Peter Sciberras)
King Richard (Pamela Martin)
This was not an award I expected Dune to win seeing as so many people complained about its length and the editing in Tick, tick... BOOM! was pretty snappy but HELL YEAH.
So, to sum all of this up it looks like I got a minority of these right. Out of the 17 categories I voted in, 6 were spot on guesses and 6 were way off while the rest were my favorites to win. Some pleasant surprises in there that made me pretty happy, and some disappointments.
Until next year, here's hoping the movies (and a genuinely good host) take center stage again instead of silly Three Stooges-esque shenanigans and piss-poor attempts at comedy.
Correct RED predictions: 6
Correct GREEN predictions: 7
Correct MIXED predictions: 10
Incorrect predictions: 6