The Big Picture - The 2022 Oscar Predictions: Who Will Win and Who Should

Episode Date: March 24, 2022

It’s almost time for the 94th annual Academy Awards, so Sean and Joanna Robinson are making picks in all 23 categories. Don’t fill out your Oscar ballot until you’ve listened. Host: Sean Fennessey Guest: Joanna Robinson Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Matt Bellany, founding partner of Puck News, and I'm covering the inside conversation about money and power in Hollywood. With my new show, The Town, I'm going to take you inside Hollywood with exclusive insight on what people in show business are actually talking about. Multiple times a week, I'll talk to some of the smartest people I know, journalists, insiders, all of whom can break down the hottest topics in entertainment to tell you what's really going on. Listen now. I'm Sean Fennessey, and this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about the Academy Awards. The 94th Annual Academy Awards are just days away, so we are here to make some bold predictions on all 23 categories. We're going to choose them all.

Joining me to do so, the great Joanna Robinson. What's up, Jo? Oh, hi. I'm so excited. We're almost here. It's almost time. Almost here. It's been a long, long, long journey. This is one of the latest dates in Academy Awards history. I'm very grateful that we are here. This long run has led to a true two-horse race. So before we start getting into our predictions, I just thought we should start with Coda versus Power of the Dog. It's been all the talk in the aftermath of the Critics' Choice Awards, the SAG Awards, the DGAs, and now the PGAs took place last Sunday.

And Coda won. Coda won the PGA Award, predicted seven of the last ten awards. And all of a sudden, this long shot that Bill Simmons mentioned on this podcast a month ago that you, I think, argued quite considerably for three weeks ago, feels like it could be a reality. Where's your head at with Coda versus Power of the Dog? Well, I do want to say really quickly, just so that people know, I was on the Coda Surge before I knew Bill was.

Just so you guys know that i'm not your flag trying to curry favor with the boss on this one um uh yeah i i think that um i don't know i feel like it's gonna happen and it's been interesting to watch people finally watch it i've heard from a lot of people a lot of ringer verse listeners that I'm sorry, ringer, ringer, the larger ringer verse listeners, um,

that they are finally getting around to it. And I think that's interesting. Cause I think there were a lot of hot feelings going around about whether or not Coda was cinema quote unquote, without people actually watching the film. And I think, you know, this is something that bill tweeted at you a couple of weeks ago,

I think, which is just sort of like, if power of the dog is the front runner, it's because people haven't seen Coda. That's not true for everyone. There's certainly people who have seen Coda who don't think it rises to the level of like artistic level of what they would like to see in a best picture. And I'm here for some of those arguments. think this surge is undeniable and uh and and makes the category unpredictable which is more fun than just saying okay here comes power of the dog to win all the top prizes you know i might be one of those people who's saying i'm not totally sure coda would be a great historical best picture

winner but i completely agree with your latter point which is this is fun well you know we don't know what's going to happen on sunday and i'm so relieved. And, you know, I think you and I both have pretty solid track records in terms of predicting some of these award shows. It's gotten easier and easier over the last 10 years as we've gotten more and more precursors. We've got more and more odds. We've gotten more and more awful anonymous ballots from voters being published in the trades.

But still, the fact that there is what feels like more or less a 50-50 bet right now for Best Picture is great. And honestly, some of the more memorable awards shows are where there is a 50-50 like this. I talked about this on Bill's show earlier this week. You know, the idea of La La Land versus Moonlight. I mean, that's an all-time moment in the history of the broadcast. So I feel like it's a good thing for the show. CODA, I will say, boy, they're running some campaign.

They were at the White House. The cast of that film were at the white house last week or earlier this week and so they're pulling out all the stops and seem to be playing the game very well i'm there's a i have a little bit of nascent skepticism about apple as the new powerhouse of movies and what this means because especially because i feel like they're also going to be contending pretty significantly when the killers of the flower moon comes along from Martin Scorsese at the end of this year. So it's kind of fascinating to think about them as a new, like strong entrant,

as opposed to the scrappy upstart. Do you think this means anything in the Netflix, Apple, you know, constellation battle between the old studios and the new streamers? Well, again, I think I mentioned this a couple weeks ago when I was talking about how

it's interesting to watch this Netflix almost get there year after year. They might get, you know, might be proud of the dog and they might finally get their best picture Oscar, which they are so thirsty for that they have poured so much money into various campaigns over the years. So this might be their year.

However, there is some perverse pleasure I take. Again, you can't think of Apple as an underdog, but like for someone else. And it reminds me actually of the Emmys. It reminds me of the year that Hulu won best drama for The Handmaid's Tale on one of the years that Thrones took like a bye year. And Netflix was just sort of like Hulu came out of nowhere

to grab that uh emmy that netflix had not won yet but it's not like hulu then went on to become the dominant you know emmy contender uh and in fact you know handmade still was continuously nominated but it's not like even that show maintained what it what it was that one So I'm not, I'm not ready to call like one year when, uh, you know, the, the new era, the new rain. Uh, and I, I think, you know, Netflix, Netflix will get there eventually, if not this year, like sometime soon, but it is fun to have this, they have an excellent taste. I mean, the fact that like to Coda, which I really like, um, uh, in fact, I, I, I love Coda and I hear all the arguments against it but i do love that film and then like tragedy of macbeth incredible artistic achievement you know what i mean so

whoever is uh and i should know but whoever is sort of calling all the shots on on their film acquisition wolf walker is a film that they had last year i also really loved it has excellent taste so i don't know i'm excited to see what they what they do next but i have heard from some people that they haven't seen coda simply because they're like i'm exhausted with how many you know services i subscribe to and i just can't add one more and i'm just here to say if that means you haven't watched ted lasso yet maybe you should just get an apple subscription watch ted lasso watch severance no one at apple paid me to say this Lasso yet. Maybe you should just get an Apple subscription. Watch Ted Lasso. Watch Severance. No one at Apple paid me to say this. And watch these great movies.

I strongly co-sign the Severance note. I'll just say this is exactly what they want. Koda was an acquisition out of Sundance. And it was released, I would say, somewhat quietly in August of 2021 without a lot of fanfare after it had huge fanfare coming out of Sundance and it was released I would say somewhat quietly in August of 2021 without a lot of fanfare after it had a huge fanfare coming out of Sundance I mean it basically swept Sundance grand jury prize best director you know performance like the whole nine and certainly the audience award because it's such a crowd pleaser and it's now it is a it's it's a lighthouse for Apple TV plus subscriptions you know it is it's it's a clear sign that you have to see this movie if you're interested in the academy awards even a little bit because it's now enter the front runner conversation and that's a good thing and netflix

obviously is in a different place completely i think in many ways one of netflix's big challenges as a company is that everyone has Netflix now. And checking out a movie on Netflix isn't special. It isn't a new experience. It's actually kind of old hat. It's been around for 10 years. And we kind of accept it as the wallpaper of our streaming entertainment. And frankly, a lot of their content has started to feel like wallpaper over the last three or four years in a pretty serious way. And so because of that, I think the narrative has shifted so much on that company that it's not so much that they are the insurgent that is disrupting theatrical. It's that they are the heavyweight that has killed theatrical.

And so it's kind of a tricky situation. There has to be some sort of sacrificial lamb in this radical shift we've made in the way that we consume stories. But if it doesn't win for Power of the Dog, that's like five years in a row in which they could have won and they aren't going to win. That's a pretty tough streak. And making on paper all the right moves, backing all

the right filmmakers. And some great films too. Great films, yeah. Roma, Marriage Story, Irishman, they've made a lot of really good movies. So it's not about that. It's more just the way that sometimes these races shake out it'll be interesting to see we'll get our official predictions at the very end of this episode for for best picture though I think I have a feeling I know where you're gonna land on this one I'm gonna hold mine I have I have not shared any of my predictions yet now I I'll make it clear to you though that I always get best

picture wrong so bear that in mind I usually I usually get like 19 out of 22 right and then end up getting best picture wrong so that's my history here's what usually get like 19 out of 22 right and then end up getting best picture wrong so that's my history here's what i think and i i promised you before we started recording that i was gonna like sort of talk to you about this the thing that i know about you is that you like to win right so you're gonna you're gonna want to come out of this podcast having predicted the highest number of of winners and obviously that's like in theory what any prediction game is about i found over the years that it kind of bores me at a certain point to like always back the the safest bet. And that sometimes I like to plan a flag on a wild card code like this sort of code of search being an example of that.

But just to get my hopes up about something, even if, you know, it doesn't make it is't make it is, is a more fun way for me to watch, to be emotionally invested and not just a, Oh, well, all the precursors were right. And we're right at the end of the day, if I'm just sitting there like rooting for something that I care about, that makes me more invested in watching the show. So I played that game once upon a time. Um, I played, I played the, I'm going to just pick something. Cause I feel like it'd be really great if that thing won. And, uh, that was when I chose Get Out as a possible winner. And that was a bold choice by me. Yeah.

And it had no chance of coming true. And I got it wrong. So I don't do that anymore. But Jordan Peele had a big moment at that, you know, at that Oscar. Yeah. But as usual, you know, he won the Cool Guy Award. He won Best Original Screenplay. The cool people always win that award. And they don't win win best picture and that's just the world in which we live

we're gonna talk about that today but um what i what i was gonna say is that it's a mix i'm not they're not all wild cards for me and not all emotional picks there are some that i'm just sort of like but the ones that i'm i'm sort of towing the line of what everyone thinks, they're usually awards that I feel are deserved, much deserved. Okay, before we get into the actual categories, I want to talk a little bit about the telecast and a couple of pre-predictions for you. Much consternation about the way that they're managing this broadcast. A lot of bad announcements about presenters. Obviously, you and I, a couple weeks ago, went over the fact that they are truncating and not broadcasting live, eight categories. There's a real sense that whether it's ABC or the folks producing the show or some combination of those two are degrading what we

like about this show. I'm hopeful that we're actually overreacting and that this might turn out to be a fun show. I want a fun show. I think despite all the doom saying, I want to have a great time. I love this show more than anything else. So that being said. I want a fun show. I think despite all the doom saying I want to have a great time. I love this show more than anything else. So that being said, I am a little bit I'm pretty skeptical and I

want to ask you some questions from some predictions about what we think we'll get from the show. Okay, because a lot of these things I think will help determine

whether we come out of this on Sunday night and you and I will be live on Sunday night after the show saying like pretty good job. Will Packer and clap nice work ABC. night, and you and I will be live on Sunday night after the show, saying like, pretty good job, Will Packer, hand clap, nice work, ABC, hey, maybe you were onto something, you had a good call. Or we saw that this was a car crash 100 miles away. Why didn't you buckle up your seatbelt? Because we knew this was a mistake. So first things first. Yeah.

I'm always a bit down on the idea of spending a lot of time on musical performances. We've had five musical performances announced so far for this show, including two songs from Encanto, one of which is nominated, and then three other nominees. The one person who will not be performing is Van Morrison, famous anti-vaxxer Van Morrison, who is apparently on tour and will not be appearing at the Academy Awards. So his song from Belfast will not be represented. Do you think we're going to have more musical performances than that? Or do you think they're going to stick to just five?

I think it's probably just going to be five. However, this is a perfect example of what you were talking about a couple weeks ago when they made the decision. And again, I agree with you. I hope we're overreacting. But when they made the decision to shunt certain awards into an hour pre-tape, the point you made was that we'll then be judging every single other decision against that decision. So when they announced that they're doing We Don't Talk About Bruno, which is bafflingly not the song nominated from Encanto, but is wildly popular. And they're like, this is the first live performance, all that.

That should be a fun, cool celebration of the movie's thing to have happen the awards but the main reaction i saw is like oh okay you're gonna take time for this but not for you know insert your favorite uh maligned you know category and so it's it's constantly gonna be a math game um and and because they've got four performances and i I agree with you, there are years when the performances is just not there. And you're like, why are we watching this? Or the songs are boring. This is a good crop of nominees, though, right? You've got Billie Eilish and Phineas.

You've got Reba. I love a Reba performance. Reba doing Diane Warren. Yeah. I mean, there's, there's some great options here. Beyonce ever heard of her? So like I, uh, there are some years where you're just sort of like, uh, we're just going to get through this, but this is a really good crop. I do think they'll probably cap it at five. What do you think? I'm grateful for that opinion. Cause I hope it's true. If it's more than five, I'm going to be mad. I'm just telling you right now, brace yourself for Sunday. What else could they possibly do, do you think? I don't know. I mean, this show has a weird history with its relationship to music. I mean, what if Lady Gaga showed up and performed? On the one hand, how fun, a Lady Gaga performance. On the other hand, Lady Gaga is not nominated and House of Gucci was shut out of this Oscars. And so do we need her to sing at the Academy Awards? Probably not. But like

would you be stunned if they introduced that? I wouldn't be. No, but that being said, two of the best musical performances at the Oscars ever, maybe three if you count the Sound of Music thing that she did, have been Lady Gaga. Maybe if they just ran back shallow.

Maybe if just Cooper came back and they just did shallow. Remember if they just ran back shallow. Yeah. Maybe if just Cooper came back and they just did shallow. Remember how they just walked up the stairs and the camera's swooping around them? That's one of the best performances ever. I feel like I,

hopefully I think I'm representing Amanda in this opinion, but yeah. Okay, next one. Now, against my better judgment, I love montages. I just want to see images from movies.

I'm like a four-year-old when it comes to this. Show me thing I like. And so I always am pro montage, but montages tend to create show bloat. They tend to stymie momentum on the broadcast. How many do you think we're going to see here? Are you counting In Memoriam as a montage? Sure. Yeah. Let's include that. I would say four. Any guesses as to what we're going to lean into because we know movie lovers unite is the theme of this show the the preposterous theme so and the result there's also been the um the fan vote you know the the fan favorite vote which it seems like is going to result in camilla cabello's cinderella you think so i think it's going to be zach snyder's army of the dead if If it is that, I honestly might enjoy that.

Both hilarious, honestly. I would celebrate Army of the Dead. But I would put those more in the next section we're going to talk about, right? Which is honoring the people. In terms of a montage, usually, I think a reason you like montage is because usually they focus on a craft, a specific craft, which is, you know, your proposal for fixing the Oscars was like, make it more about the craft of filmmaking. It would be ironic to do any sort of craft based thing, given's going to be super populist because that is what they're going for. That's what Will Packer has said that they're going for. And I don't know that that's necessarily a bad inclination.

There's a ton of blockbusters from history that we would love to see you know honored i the um the montage they did two or whatever the whenever the last dolby theater oscars was when i was there in the room and they did a montage that was just about music in the movies and they got to like the footage from almost famous and i almost started crying in the room i was so excited uh so yeah i i love a i love a montage what do you do you have any predictions for what it might be i think i just filibustered and didn't say anything so no you just you breaking down at almost famous footage is like me breaking down at the card counter footage you know i'm just like thank god how do we get a card counter montage going at the Oscars this year? I don't know what to, I mean, I could see something that's just like heroes come in all shapes and sizes. So then you get a chance to show us like Spider-Man, but also Richard Williams.

You know what I mean? Like there's a way to kind of cross reference what we've seen at the movies this year. You know, we see Timothee Chalamet in Dune, but we also see, I don't know, WandaVision. Something that allows us to create a sense of unity amongst the storytelling that also speaks to the common moviegoer. Yeah, yeah. To include the superheroes without making it feel like solely a superhero segment. The thing I'm more worried about... Well, let me let you ask your next question. Okay. So my next question is, how men on the street or quote regular people segments do you think we'll see?

You know, Jimmy Kimmel famously went to a movie theater during the telecast once upon a time. That's an example of what we're talking about. Chris Rock, when he was hosting the show, famously would interview people coming out of movies and ask them their opinions about things. And then they would broadcast that. Some of those worked. Sometimes they don't given the

theme this year i have a sense that we're going to be hearing from people who are not in the movie industry more than once how many of those you think we'll see um again especially so the thing that i'm worried about is bits right because we've got three hosts uh with comedic chops amy schumer regina hall and juana sykes And they've talked about the way in which they are segmenting the show, kind of yes, kind of no. There'll be times when one host is up, when a pair of them are up, sort of ebbing and flowing in that way. But it's something that I'm a little worried about. I mean, especially when you hear Amy Schumer say something like, well, I wanted to get Zelensky on the phone for the Oscars. And obviously, she's not the one in

charge of what the bits are going to be, but I'm a little worried that it's going to be bit heavy in a way. Like, and if a bit dies, uh, that is, that is one of the toughest things, but a bit, a bit can soar like an Ellen DeGeneres selfie moment or something like that, you know? So not my favorite Oscar moment, but certainly a really popular one. So I would say given the hosts, um, man on the streets, because I, I would kind of consider the popular,

it's not the popular Oscar, but the, the, the, the people's choice Oscar thing, fan favorite, fan favorite, one of those segments.

Right. So again, I would say three total. And I really hope they don't do the one where they like bust people in to the dolby and have them wander around surprise you remember that year yes that wasn't great um five musical performances four montages three man on the street bits no awards yet so with that in mind what do you think is the total runtime of the show in minutes? Maybe I need to knock a montage and a man on the street. Well,

if you're programming an ABC, you might have to, but if you're me, you want more, more, more. Right. Um,

I think, you know, so looking at the longest ever was four plus, right. And usually they come in around three and a half. Um, and I think given the dictate from ABC, I think Will Packer's

dream is that they come in at three. I think that's what he wants. I think that's what cutting all these awards are about. So I am going to say they're going to try to come in under three. Hit three. What do you think? So you think like

179 minutes i mean another question about that is ad breaks um which have only gotten more and more frequent as the years have gone on with the oscars so what do you think i'm really getting bummed out about this i mean i want the show to be four hours i don't care just just no i remember you want an all-day super bowl yeah i'm gonna sit down take an edible about 8 a.m just luxuriate in all the pre-game for hours and hours i think one thing i am gonna do is get on on on green room joe you're welcome to join me on green room if you want but i'll probably do a green room thing like one hour before the show starts while watching the red carpet or what have you and also the other thing i wanted to ask you about

that is related to that is so we're just to find out who won awards in that first hour because people are just going to like send notes to their publicists and then it's going to get tweeted out into the world. That sucks. It doesn't suck. It's a big reason why I'm anti all of this. And when I interviewed some of the, you know, a couple of years ago, I talked about how I interviewed a bunch of people

who were in the categories that they were thinking about at commercial breaks. And one of the objections was, how do I scramble to the phone fast enough to call my mom before someone tweets about this? Do you know? And I can't. Terrible. That sucks. I'm really annoyed by that. Yeah.

Though I will say, and we'll talk about her again later, but sometimes Jessica Chastain's earnestness is too much for me, but her whole, like I'm skipping the red carpet to sit in the theater while, you know, my hair and makeup, uh, team for my movie are potentially going to win an award. I love that. I love that from Jessica Chastain. So I do too.

I've decided to not undermine her at all in her quest to win this Oscar because I support her and her work. And, uh, she seems like she's trying to be a decent person. So'm down um so last year the uh the oscar viewership was in the neighborhood of 10 and a half million viewers that's very bad that is a 58 decrease from the previous ceremony now part of that is because there were significantly fewer planned films released in that calendar year.

And there was also a lack of interest in award shows. And also the streaming model has completely upended broadcast television. And also movies have been completely upended by streaming and all of the other caveats. Yada, yada, yada, yada. Nevertheless, those were really, really bad ratings. There are some people who think this show will continue to fall. And there are some who believe that it is due for a solid or even remarkable uptick just your prediction what what do you think the final numbers are going to be for this broadcast are you a remarkable uptick guy are you i'm not giving i'm

not revealing anything i want to hear your point your point of view um i think it's a tiny bump is is the best we can hope for in the neighborhood of what 12 million 11 thereabouts is what i would think that would be considered a failure i think um i just don't know that they've made the case i mean this is the thing that you and amanda were talking about for weeks on end which is a sort of like making the case for the oscars to feel super relevant and that's what they're trying with having comedian hosts and having a fan favorite moment and all that sort of stuff. But I think if you're talking about Coda and Power of the Dog, two fantastic films, they're still not widely watched films, I would dare say. So, you know, this was the case for Dune and other things.

So, yeah, I would say, what do you think? Now will you tell me? I'm going to take a rare optimistic point of view on this. I'm going to say, perhaps too boldly, that we're going to get back

to 16 million people because sports is quieter right now. There's no football that's active. We're in that dead zone of the NBA season where it's not quite the playoffs, but we're at the end of the year. So a lot of fans have checked out on things.

There is not an uber hot Sunday night show right now. Winning time has some audience, but I would say it is not the massive breakout hit that we've seen. I think, honestly, if Euphoria was counter-programming the Oscars, it would probably take a chunk of its audience. So it's set up in a way to succeed on the margins with the casuals, which is what they're worried about. They're not worried about the core base. And I think in terms of courting casuals, I think the idea of starting with, I think it's the plan right to start with We Don't Talk About

Bruno in the way that. It would be a good way to kick off the show. In the way that Timberlake opened the show a couple years ago. And I think that if that hits social media, you know, that thing, you could get people going, oh my God, what, the Oscars are on? Oh, they're doing this. That might be interesting to, you know, to kick off with a viral moment that they could push out on social and get people's attention, even if they're a half hour late to the ceremony. I think that's a smart strategy. Okay, last pre-prediction before we get into it.

Yeah. This is perhaps the most vital. Will you, Joanna Robinson, professional awardser wow yeah podcaster yeah cultural savant will you walk away from this telecast and say to me when we get on the mic i liked it there are so many wild card factors here um don't hedge joe i'm not angry actively angry about any of the front runners okay it's not gonna be like a green book year and a Bokimian Rhapsody year when I come off just like, what are we even doing here? So, you know, it's got that in its favor. And having, you know, read and listened to Will Packer's various interviews that he's given, like, I know that a lot of thought went into him trying to make a show that feels fun. That can sometimes feel extremely forced,

but, you know, Will Packer is a good entertainer. Tends to know what people like. I want to like it, so I'm going to say yes. I'm going to like it. I'm going to really try to like it. I'm going to try not to be too sour gravy about what they're doing to some of these other categories. And I just really want to like it.

How about you, Sean? No, I don't think I'm going to like it. Okay. Okay, let's take a quick break. And when we come back, we're back. We're back, Joe. We're going to start with our predictions. We're going to start with who...

We're going to start with the shorts. And the way that we're going to do this is we're going to identify who we believe each of us will win and who should win. So the shorts are admittedly the categories, I think with the lowest penetration among amongst the viewing audiences. In fact, some of these films are still difficult to see, although they have gotten significantly easier in the last five years with the onset of streaming services and particularly Netflix, which has been pretty aggressive in trying to dominate some of these categories. We're going to start with documentary short. Lo and behold, Netflix has three of the contenders

in this category, which is pretty wild. And you can go out and watch all three. And maybe I'd recommend that you do so. I think it's a pretty solid slate. I don't know how much you've kept up on these. Have you had a chance to check out the shorts? I always watch all the shorts every year. And I love the shorts.

Not all of them equally, but I love having watched them. It's a great way to sort of get an early insight into burgeoning talent and yeah so i've seen them all yeah in documentary short here are the five nominees audible that's a netflix film lead me home also a netflix film the queen of basketball which comes to us from the new york times op docs department three songs for benazir which is a netflix title as well and when we were bullies which was just acquired by hbo max and apparently will be streaming at the end of this month oddly after the ceremony which i can't say i fully understand so yeah who will win okay so here's my formula for shorts um having spent years trying to analyze what wins in the shorts. My sense is that not most of the voters don't watch all the shorts.

That's my sense. And I think that a lot of times celebrity, like a celebrity producer or a star in the short goes so far. You won't even believe it. Or an issue that we talked about this before with CODA, like sort of an issue that Oscar voters can feel good for having backed or supported. And then the one other thing is like, did a school based in LA make this short? And that has happened before because, you know, it's like, you know, your friend's kid made this movie, so you're going to vote for it. This year, I would say Audible,

which is Netflix's short, one of three, is a front runner. It kind of goes hand in hand with some of the Dakota sentiment that we've seen. And that feels like the front runner to me. How about you? I'm going with The Queen of Basketball, which is the NYT film, but for the same queen of basketball which is the nyte yeah no it film but for the same exact rationale which is that the executive producers on this movie among a few

others are steph curry and shaquille o'neal and what how wonderful to give to nba champions more trophies uh kobe bryant won an oscar i mean that's the thing is that sometimes that really works in their favor i'll also say that the queen of basketball, which is about, um, uh, Lucia Harris, who was a highly accomplished women's basketball player, um, in the 1970s, who actually was drafted by the new Orleans jazz, but turned down the opportunity to play in the NBA, um, is an incredible character. It's a very accessible film. It's been on YouTube for months and months. And also,

Ben Proudfoot, who is the director of that film, was nominated last year for A Concerto is a Conversation, which was also one of my favorite documentary shorts. Oh, it was so good. I loved that one. So he makes these really hyper-focused mini-profile movies about unique figures that we don't really know a lot about in our culture so my gut is the queen of basketball here but i i don't underestimate the power of netflix in these categories so i think audible is a good pick but if steph curry has been out there you know promoting this uh then then that's possible um strength there yeah the uh the other spoiler that i see possible here is a lead me home.

Because you talk about that one a little bit. Yeah. Because it's about, you know, homelessness in Los Angeles. And I, again, I just feel like,

you know, the privileged class enjoying their privileges who live in Los Angeles and vote on these awards might feel like they're doing something important by boosting the signal of a film. That's about an epidemic in their hometown. Very interesting you mentioned that because I was watching the LA mayoral debate yesterday because there is a hotly contested primary coming in June, five different candidates. And Rick Caruso, the very successful developer, former real estate attorney, this is his signature

issue is homelessness in the city of Los Angeles. And he is gaining a significant amount of traction with the favored class, I would say. Gwyneth Paltrow may or may not have hosted a fundraiser for Rick Caruso's campaign here. So lead me home, potentially. Also a serious contender here, if that's an issue that is on the minds of people here in LA, which is where many of the voters reside. So you're going Audible. I'm going the Queen of Basketball. What should win? What was your favorite? Honestly, the one I enjoyed the most was the Queen of Basketball. Same. Yeah, that would be my pick. I think it was the most kind of purely entertaining, had the best character at the center of it. Okay, next short, best animated short. Historically,

one of my favorite categories, really hard one to pick. I didn't love the options this year, honestly. It's a mixed bag. I'm an Aardman stan, so an Aardman movie being present here made this a pretty easy one for me to determine how I felt about it. The nominees for the category are Affairs of the Art, Bestia, Box Ballet, Robin Robin, and The Windshield Wiper. robin robin as i mentioned is comes from ardman and is available to watch on netflix everything else is either not yet available or you need to rent i believe uh robin robin also has a celebrity voice cast um which is

not always the case with these animated shorts it's a long animated shorts 30 minutes um you know unusually long um but i think robin robin is clear lead i mean i'm i also love ardman i don't think this is my favorite thing that ardman has done but i think the the identifiable brand of the animation studio plus a celebrity voice cast plus netflix is like the winning form and there isn't a strong enough counter to it. So it's also an interesting, cause it's not quite claymation stop motion animation. It's almost like felt mation, you know, like felt motion stop motion animation.

But it's an interesting one. It was my favorite and I do think it will win. Although this is a category that I just, I never really feel good about. And I never really know, even if there's a category that I just, I never really feel good about. And I never really know, even if there's a celebrity aspect to it, I'm always a bit bewildered by how the choices are made. And some of that may be dictated by what you were saying,

which is that not everybody watches all of these. And some of them also, unlike say the best animated feature category, you sometimes get a pretty transgressive, like Bestia, for example. It's a very odd film. Wild, yeah. And a pretty surprising

inclusion here which is not necessarily a bad thing i like a weird movie as much as anybody but um it's not your standard like pixar disney and you know sony animation like it's there's there's always more weird stuff in the mix here yeah the animated shorts though like i remember one year there were like three they were about. Like often there's one that's heavy about grief. This is just an odd one in that it's so graphic and it's not like this is a children's category by any stretch of the imagination, but you know, and,

and particularly since Robin is so like sort of children friendly, but bestia is a, is a really wild entry. Um, in terms of my like favorite, um, it was actually Box Ballet. Gaining some traction right now.

Box Ballet. That one is a little bit harder to see at the moment. And I don't know if that will hurt it or not, but don't, I guess that's a good backup pick. I think so. I think it's a good second choice after Robin Robin, but.

Okay. Last shorts category, best live action short. The nominees are A La Cachou, AKA Take and Run, The Dress, The Long Goodbye, On My Mind, and Please Hold. I will admit I have not seen all of these. So some of them harder to track down than others. I think the clear front runner on here is The Long Goodbye because it has Riz Ahmed. It's Riz Ahmed's short.

And it also is an quote-unquote issue film about the way in which immigrants are treated in this country. So I think that's the clear front. And also the way that the Academy sort of embraced Riz Ahmed last year for a movie that I loved, Sound of Metal. So I think they would be happy to give him an Oscar in this category. What do you think?

Completely agree. I think this is borderline a lock. Yeah. It's issue-driven. It has a star. It's extremely relevant. And it's someone who was recently nominated. So you put all those things together.

Feels like the right fit. Okay. So we're out of the darkness and into the light. These are categories now that more people will have some opinions on. Sure. Let's start with best makeup and hairstyling. You mentioned Chastain will have a butt in her seat to view whether or not her team from the eyes of Tammy Faye gets a win.

Do you think they will get a win? This is actually a really tricky one. It's been like when you look at precursor awards for this, it's been kind of all over the map. And like Coming to America, which is nominated in this category, picked up some wins elsewhere. Cruella has been picking up some wins. I still think it has to be Eyes of Tammy Faye. And I think Chastain's frontrunner status in the Best Actress actress category we need to talk about how that happened but like that is only the fact that her performance is so aided by this extremely dramatic um makeup

job on on her film i think really puts us at the front and i think you know a good recent example of that is is ma rainey like ma rainey winning the makeup category when Viola's performance was much discussed that season. I think it really boosted a film that otherwise didn't get a ton of love elsewhere. So I think Jessica Chastain may have won her makeup team this Oscar. Also, they're great work in the film. What do you think?

I think you're right. I think we've actually seen on social media the work that that team did as opposed to some other films where maybe we don't see it as clearly. Something like Dune, we haven't seen necessarily exactly how they came to do some of that makeup and hairstyling

for, say, Javier Bardem's character. That's a character that probably had a significant amount of makeup and hairstyling. I will say it's not my favorite The eyes of tammy faye um i actually think my favorite in this in this category is cruella that's the one that i probably would want to cite i feel like what what they've done with emma stone is they've literally turned her into a cartoon character it's kind of a remarkable transformation that they give her among other characters in that film and cruella is hotly tabbed in another category here but for it hasn't really picked up steam for this one really for me so will win it my will win feels like tammy faye but my should win

i kind of feel like house of gucci uh as much as i've been recently railing against like prosthetic dependent performances of like you know uh svelte hot actors like Jared Leto. I think that he is unrecognizable in that film. And it's a prosthetic that you can't see the seams on. As opposed to say the prosthetic that they do on Stellan Zarsgaard in in dune which i think is sort of like the source of of dune's major contention this category is the baron harkonnen but that's that just looks more grotesque i think it's harder to do i just made this person look like another human i mean i think the batman is possibly a lock for next year for what they did to colin farrell so i think

i would i would put Gucci here, but I still think it's going to be Tammy Faye. Okay, next category. Speaking of Dune, best visual effects. Now, this is where we get into the Dune dominance below the line, I think. The nominees in this category are Dune, my absolutely loathed free guy,

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the ten rings no time to die and spider man no way home now you know i haven't i haven't listened to the big pig commentary on free guy but are you promising me that it's just you dunking on it for two hours no i'm really sweet i'm i'm like i'm comparing it frequently to the bridge on the river Kwai and favorably to the Truman Show. No, I'm dunking on it. Oh, man. That movie is very bad. It's not that it's bad. It's actually like perfectly well made and fine, but it signals something very rotten in our culture.

I just think it looks awful. So like the fact that it's in the visual effects category is wild. There's, you know, I can coast on some Ryan Reynolds charm as the case may be. I used to. I've just, somewhere along the line we lost touch. We fell out of love.

Bobby has shared a note that the free guy commentary is mostly just Chris making jokes that absolutely kill the rest of us, which is honestly fair. That's accurate.

That's mostly why we do those is to let Chris roam free. Love that. What do you think is going to win this category? It's Dune and it should be Dune. Agree.

Sandworms? Come on. Yeah, when the Shai-Hulud comes up from under the sand and you get just like a long shot of the gaping maw and it doesn't look plasticky or pixely. It just looks incredible. And I am usually very critical of CG in that regard.

And I just think it looks amazing. It looked amazing in IMAX. It looked amazing at home. It looked much more amazing in the theater, but it looked amazing everywhere. It's got to be tuned. The visual effects in that film

are really, really, really, really good relative to the rest of what we get in these tentpole films. Okay, next category, Best Costume Design. The nominees are really really really good relative to the rest of what we get in these tentpole films okay next category best costume design the nominees are jenny bevan for cruella massimo cantini perini for cyrano jacqueline west for dune louise sakera for nightmare alley and paul tazowell for west side story what are you leaning these are great These are all very beautifully costumed films, but Jenny Bevan's work on Cruella is just the sheer tonnage of costumes.

They had to make for those films, incredible, incredibly designed gowns, the trash gown that they made. There's just like a bunch of like high concept costumes in that film. Yeah. And Jenny is just i mean she's a legend she's one of my favorites for folks who don't know she's the mad max costume designer who walked down the aisle in the in the cool leather jacket the year that she won for that

so she's she's a master and cruella not a tremendously great movie but like what a looker that movie was especially in the costume department so yeah jenny i'm just gonna throw some some energy behind nightmare alley in the should win category i think cruella will win so if you're putting money down on it go for it i don't know a ton about louis sakara's work uh in general but i just think nightmare alley is one of the absolute visual knockouts of 2021 hugely underrated at least if you care about the construction of movies. Maybe you don't love that story

or how it's told or you don't click with Del Toro's tonality but we'll get to production design in a minute but the way that all of those movie stars

that appear in that film are costumed and the way that they're shot and the settings that they're placed in makes it such a kind of intoxicating movie. I have a little something

planned for Nightmare Alley coming in April so hopefully a fun episode. We'll see down the road. Well, as an alley cat myself, I am for the love there. And I mean, I also want to shout out West Side Story because it's really tough to live in the shadow of the original costumes, which are so iconic.

And I like the way that they took some departures, like putting Anita in this beautiful yellow dress as opposed to the iconic purple dress that Rita Moreno wears. But there are some connections, like the dress that Maria wears to the dance is the white with a little red, all of that. So I thought that that was sort of, and like Cyrano, also a movie that I didn't love, love, but I think the costumes are amazing. And Dune as well. I mean, I don't think there's a bad nominee in this batch here. I agree.

It's actually a very, very good category, which in a category that is not necessarily always the best chosen. This one they did a really nice job with. Okay, best sound, the new best sound. I guess this is the second year. You had asked me actually a couple of weeks back, this is the first year, but it's actually the second year. Someone corrected me on that,

that they have combined the two sound categories to just one. And here are the nominees belfast dune no time to die the power of the dog and west side story belfast uh nominee is kind of weird it's bizarre uh no time to die i suppose i don't know sometimes with these sound categories you feel like they're going with like the most sound um you know uh this is another should be dune will be dune uh you know agreed we're going to talk about some other sounds that come out of dune in another category but i think the the soundscape the you know again the soundworm the sandworm the like clicking and the all of it i just there's i have rarely felt so immersed in a world the way that i felt coming out of dune so uh yeah i love that that malapropism sound worm yeah i'm gonna log that

one uh okay you just mentioned sometimes the category rewards the most sound this is a category that often rewards the most editing. That's best film editing. Here are the nominees. The deeply editing-centric Don't Look Up from the editing god, Hank Corwin. That guy loves a cut.

Joe Walker for Dune. Pamela Martin for King Richard. Peter Sibaris for The Power of the Dog. And Myron Kirstein and Andrew Weissblum for Tick, Tick, Boom. Interesting set here. This is a category that is widely considered very indicative of the strength

of a film if the film does not have a best film editing nomination. It's believed that it's going to be a tough road to best picture. You'll notice that there is no coda in this category. I find that fascinating. I don't have a super strong feel for this one, Joe, because King Richard won the Ace Eddie Award a few weeks ago and I didn't see that coming.

And so now, The Power of the Dog is the ostensible best picture favorite. Does it have, is editing really its strength in its story? I don't, I think there's a strong case to make for it and I might make it right here,

but I'm a little bit stumped on this one. What are you thinking? I think, I think King Richard was an interesting win at the ACE. Like I think when you think about dramatizing a game of tennis, which shouldn't be hard. You know, plenty of people tune in to watch high stakes tennis, but I think there's something to be said for that between sports and war movies. I feel like those two things tend to, you know, feel like flashy, interesting edits. I think Tick, Tick, Boom is, I mean, I don't think it's a front runner, but I think editing wise,

Tick, Tick, Boom is actually pretty interesting. I think Power of the Dog has some precursors in its favor, but again, I think, I think Dune deserves to run these, these craft categories.

I, I think it deserves this Mad Max glory glory in that regard if it's not going to get best picture so i i will i'm going with my heart i'm saying dune to win and that dune should win do you mind if we just look at some some previous best film editing winners yeah because this is a it's an unusually important category like i I said. So the winner last year was Sound of Metal. The winner the year before that was Ford vs. Ferrari. Before that was the apocalyptically bad Bohemian Rhapsody victory. One of the least well-edited movies of that year.

Most embarrassing. Yeah. Prior to that, I think a handful of really good winners, Dunkirk, Hacksaw Ridge, Mad Max Fury Road, and Whiplash, all films that I would say that's editing is actually their strength. Actually, Gravity as well before that was one of its strengths too. So a very interesting category that is obviously the technical craft is considered significantly more than what's the front runner at the time.

A Best Picture winner hasn't won in this category since the hurt locker in 2009 so for that reason i think your dune pick is right and i'm going with dune as well as the will win the should win i think that there actually is a very good case for the power of the dog but i think it's not the case that people want to hear i think that the deliberate nature of this story and the number of insert shots and the number of like calmly delivered suspense in this movie is its greatest power it's just it's not usually the kind of movie that wins here so i don't expect it to win despite how many nominations power the dog has because what wins is mad max fury road or dunkirk something as big and loud and complex and has lots of moving parts and many characters.

And Dune obviously fits the bill there. But I do think that there is something to say for the quality of the work that Sabaris did in Power of the Dog. I think it's such an interesting aspect of the Oscars that we always look to the editing category when talking about Best Picture. That that correlation is something we talk about every single year and yet how infrequently the best picture winner wins that category pretty fascinating i don't know what that's about ultimately it feels like a little bit of like i don't know i think i think old wives tale is now an inappropriate thing to say but what's a what's a version it's like a

it's a canard you know it's something that is we we've come to accept um and not actually mean anything, especially if Coda wins. When Coda wins on Sunday, we're going to be like, we don't have to worry about film editing anymore. That's interesting. And also, given how important we think it is when talking about Best Picture, again, it's bizarre that this is one of the categories they chose to do the pre-tape for. It certainly is. Okay, best production design. I know exactly where I'm going with this. The nominees are Dune, Zuzana Zippos and Patrice Vernet, Tamara Deverell and Shane Viau for Nightmare Alley, Grant Major and Amber Richards for The Power of the Dog,

Stéphane Deschamps and Nancy Haig for The Tragedy of Macbeth, reina d'angelo and adam stockhausen for west side story i would say also terrific collection of nominees in this category um these are five of the absolute best looking movies of 2021 who's gonna win i mean i think well i i don't know what you're gonna say but i think this is another great place to make a case for nightmare alley but um i i have to again go with dune because i just think sensing a trend i uh like when you think about the palace uh you know and the and the and the intricate murals and all the little details of again that made this world feel so immersive i think you can't argue with the production design of Dune. There have been some odd winners in this category in years past. And I think actually Tragedy of Macbeth would be an interesting one to win in this category. But I think if you're

looking at historical production design, I'm always going to tend to... There's something incredible about historical design, but fantastical design, which is what Dune is, that's another level. Because you have to think not just about recreating something iconically and perfectly, but like how to make something new feel like it's practical enough that it could exist in a world, but unfamiliar to us in our day to day. And I think that Dune nailed that perfectly. I think that's really well put i think that's the thing is everything in that world that we've never seen before and don't know feels lived in feels real feels worn and that's that's a tribute to the amount of thought that goes into it so we both think dune's gonna win i i you know nightmare alley is the one that i would choose here um in because it is, it's noir period on steroids.

You know, it is a very self-conscious representation of its influence and done in a way that is so extravagant. I think especially of the sequences between Cate Blanchett and Bradley Cooper in that office, which is, is, is like a,

it's like an MC Escher painting. It's just an extraordinary level of design and Chrome and wood. And it's just so beautiful. But also the carnival design i love you know yes like speaking of lived in and grungy yeah yeah like the opposite of uh it's like what you want burton carnival to look like burton's gotten too shiny and this is like a nice sort of like broken in circus i love what's your who should win then in this category? Sticking with Dune? I still Dune.

I know I promised that I was going to like go wild here, but I'm just running the board on Dune. You're a Dune stan, huh? I loved Dune. It was very good. I think it was incredible. You know I agree. Best Cinematography.

Here are the nominees. Greg Frazier for Dune. Dan Lauston for Nightmare Alley. Ari Wegner for The Power of the Dog. Bruno Delbanel for The Tragedy of Macbeth, and Janusz Kaminski for West Side Story. These categories

are good. Yeah, yeah. This is a good, this is a really good one. This is why it's stupid that they are truncating so many of these categories, because I'm like, this is where actually the good stuff is. If you like movies, they actually got a lot of these right this year. You know, there got a lot of these right this year. You know, there's a lot of great contenders. And we kind of want to learn more about how Artie Wagner did what she did or how Greg

Frazier does. You know, did a lot of people go see the Batman? Because Greg Frazier shot the Batman too. Like this is a guy who is filming some of your favorite movies. Help us understand how these things fit together. Anyway, rant over. Who's going to win here? Because you mentioned the Batman, I think because of the Batman, Greg Frazier has, has the push here. I think he was

in the front, uh, of the race, but I think Ari Wagner, who is a, is a great talent. And also we should mention that like women are, I think she's only the second woman ever to be nominated in this category. Um, and she. And she's really, really interesting. I've read a bunch of interviews with her. I think she's fascinating. And I'm really excited to see what she has. So she's like right there with me. And then, of course, Kaminsky's work, you know, especially in the various viral West Side Story clips that we've been talking about, Kaminsky's work has been – everyone has been abuzz about it.

And Amanda rightly called Kaminsky out when we were talking about West Side Story the first time. But I think because of a superhero film, adding a sort of plus one to his CV, it's going to be Greg Frazier. What do you think? Totally agree. It's going to be Dune. We've now said Dune's name like eight consecutive times here in this conversation. I think Dune will win. My pick would probably be West Side Story.

I feel like this is the closest that Kaminsky and Spielberg have gotten to that magical original union that they had. And maybe it's because the source material was the most appropriate, but I feel like there's been something a little bit kind of predictable and shimmery about the last handful of movies that they've made.

And this felt like a cut above. I felt like between the camera work and the way that they conceptualized what this kind of was it sort of post-war New York looks like. It just it felt more special. I mean, let me look at it feels closer to like the minority report catch me if you can era of those guys and i feel like when we talked about you know spielberg films at the end of that west side story episode we were talking about how it's been a while maybe since we've loved loved loved a spielberg film and that this felt like a return to form and minority report is the last time i love love love, loved a Spielberg film.

And I think I'm going to reuse a word I recently used, but plastic. It almost feels plastic or just too gloss, too much gloss. And there's plenty of gloss. This is like Candy Colored Musical. You know, it's bright. It's poppy. But you also start in the rubble in a way that felt just sort of very real. It felt like, you know, I just talked about Burton and his shyness,

but it felt like Spielberg just got a little too seduced by digital effects, you know, Ready Player One being the absolute nadir of all of it. But I think West Side Story, I don't know, I just thought just thought it looked amazing okay we've gotten through 10 categories so far some would say the 10 least interesting categories i wouldn't say that some people would say that sure we're starting to ease into the mid-tier with a little bit more intrigue although this one that we're talking actually wait did you say who should win for this past category i apologize is it still dune you still go with greg frazier he's still are you wet i mean come on but ari's right there she's okay you really you really showed out for dune are you on the wb payroll for dune are you campaigning for the film they're paying me in spice okay best original score is

our next category the nominees are nicholas pertell for Don't Look Up, Hans Zimmer for Dune, Jermaine Franco for Encanto, Alberto Iglesias for Parallel Mothers, and Johnny Greenwood for The Power of the Dog. What's going to win here, Joanna? Look at these big pick guests on here. Yeah. Listen, to the surprise of no one,

I'm going to say Dune, Hans Zimmer. You and I had talked about this a little bit, like that Donnie Greenwood is definitely in the conversation and high up there and is definitely doing the work that you see someone do a year that they want to win an Oscar. But I don't think you can get away from the fact that Hans Zimmer created a new instrument just to, and that there were bagpipes in space.

I mean, i don't know a beautiful beautiful uh score one that i actually just mondo is not paying me to say this but mondo just put a vinyl uh version of it up for sale today and i snapped it up so how exciting yeah let me just see how many nominations does hans have total two 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12. This is his 12th nomination. He won in 1994. He's likely to win here. I'm going with Dune and Hans as the winner.

The Power of the Dog and Johnny Green would be my personal pick. I thought that that was a pretty fascinating pivot away from some of the work he had done previously. New instruments, slightly new tonality. He's always kind of reinventing. Traditional classical sounds. It's only his second nomination.

They were a little slow on the uptick. To recognize his work. You know. I think you could certainly make the case. That there will be blood. And the master. And a handful of other films. That he worked on were worthy.

But it wasn't until Phantom Thread. That he got nominated. This is his second nomination. I'm willing to bet. That the next thing he does. Lands him a win. Depending on the field field but he just happened to run into the the dune machine the goat um and you know and and to johnny's credit he also he did another great notable score last year in spencer so you know he did incredible score in that film so you know

he's got he's got two great films running behind him. But yeah, Hans. Okay, that's the last time I'm going to say Dune. I just scanned through the rest of the categories and I'm like, I'm not going to say it again. So we're done.

We had a solid 12 minutes there where you just said Dune 800 times. But that's okay. Best original song. Dune is not being recognized here. Here are the nominees. Be Alive from Beyonce,

Knowles, Carter, and Darius King. That's a song from King Richard. Dos Oreguitas, which is from Lin-Manuel Miranda and Encanto. Down to Joy, we mentioned the Van Morrison's absence at the show. That song is from Belfast. No Time to Die from Billie Eilish and Phineas O'Connell from No Time to Die. And Somehow You Do from Diane Warren and the film Four Good Days, which I'm told is a real film that I've

not yet seen. Although I guess it's available on Hulu have you seen it yet that's how i feel most years that diane warren is nominated that i'm like for a film i have not heard of but here's diane again um love love you diane a staple of this category um yeah so if you had asked me a couple months ago i would have said billy eilish is going to win an os Oscar this year. I just think it's, you know, bond themes are often popular and I think it's a great song, but in Kanto did us,

did a musical surge in a way that actually don't think we've seen. I think it's even, it's bigger than Moana was right. We haven't seen it since like frozen. So, um, even though just sort of get this as the ballad, uh,

is not the most popular song, I think it's probably like the fourth most popular song from Encanto. They often nominate the ballad, right? Because it feels more legit. I don't know. But I think Dos Oroguitas is going to win. I think we don't talk about Bruno should win. Like, even though it wasn't nominated.

I think it should be the song that is the movie song of the year obviously so yeah what do you think well I think No Time to Die is going to win and I think it should win it's the song I like the most out of the nominees I will say all controversies aside with Van Morrison I don't

really agree with any of his politics on the recent conundrums around the world the movie music moment one of the movie music moments that I love Morrison. I don't really agree with any of his politics on the recent conundrums around the world. The movie music moment, one of the movie music moments that I love the most was from his 70s song, Jackie Wilson said, when that song plays in Belfast and we see the young star of the film

in class turning and looking and sort of in slow motion at his classmates and there's this moment of incredible exultation. That's my favorite part of the movie. It's such a great moment. It's such a great moment. It's such a great movie moment. And I wish that that song, which is 50 years old, could have been nominated in this category.

And of course it's not. So I'm going to give it to Billie Eilish, who is perhaps the utter cultural inverse of Van Morrison. Is there a person in our popular culture less like Van Morrison than Billie Eilish and phineas you don't remember the time that van morrison dyed his hair lime green yeah and i mean like the good case for for billy and all of this is that she you know she was towards the front of the oscar ceremony a couple years ago she sang the in memoriam song you know like she's someone that the Academy likes a lot. I just think Encanto is too strong to beat.

But I wouldn't be mad if Billie Eilish and Phineas had an Oscar. Certainly. And it's certainly one of the better Bond themes that might win an Oscar. Yeah, I mean, didn't Sam Smith win a few years ago? I mean, that wasn't good. That was a garbage song.

Alright, let's go to the next category. Best international feature. Some good nominees here. Not a perfect category, but close. Drive My Car from Japan, Flee from Denmark, The Hand of God from Italy. A film we barely talked about on this show,

but I actually did like quite a bit. Lunana, A Yak in the Classroom from Bhutan, and The Worst Person in the world from Norway. What makes this imperfect to you? I thought Lunana was real mid. I thought it was really mediocre and it's a great story about how this film was made and the story of the film on paper is very good

but I thought a hero was just absolutely sublime. The Asghar Farhadi movie and I know that he's been recognized many times in this category. I think he's a multiple time winner but you know like Lunana is a nice movie but there's just no way it has any of the depth and complexity that something like a hero had so I would have preferred to have seen that there there are some other international films that I preferred Memoria for example that's not here there are a handful of other movies I liked a lot that are

not recognized nevertheless um it seems like this one's pretty locked up. Wouldn't you agree? Yeah. This is drive my car. It's time to shine, but it, I think it's, I agree with you.

There's some misses in this category and there always are. There are, there are years when the country doesn't nominate its best film and you're just sitting there baffled that that happens. Um, but drive my car, flee and the worst person in the world, and drive my car flee and the worst person in the world and especially drive my car and the worst person in the world have really had like very

strong years i really liked flea a lot um and the hand of god is a really interesting one because it's it's a great film um but also netflix pushed it really hard in terms of this you know the award swag that i get sent to my house I have so much hand of God swag so if you're listening and you're dying for hand of God

like beautiful art book I can hook you up because I have many I think Pablo Sorrentino is a very divisive filmmaker and I think that

the hope was that this was because it is such a personal story and such an autobiographical story that there was a hope that it was going to connect such a personal story and such an autobiographical story that there was a hope that it was going to connect the same way that like a Roma connected

from an international filmmaker. And it never really took off in that way. And I think part of it is because Sorrentino is much more idiosyncratic than Cuaron. He's a little bit more mischievous. He's certainly much more sensual and sexual in his storytelling. And this story is off kilter, I would say.

But it's a really interesting movie. And I would love to talk to Sorrentino one day. And I recommend people check it out if they liked Youth or if they liked The Great Beauty, which was recognized in this category a number of years ago. I got to say, who should win? For me, it's still the worst person in the world. That was my second favorite movie of the year. And as much as I love drive my car and I I'm so thrilled by drive my car being recognized.

I just like the worst person in the world more. And I know it's not going to win. So why be afraid to just say, Hey, more love for this movie that I dug. You're going to drive my car though. I assume for, for who should win.

Okay. Best animated feature uh this is a tricky one here you feeling good about this just from a financial perspective how much money you putting on this one it's a complicated one right like so it's incanto flea luca the mitchells versus machines and ryan the last dragon so three disneys two non-disneys mitchells is is in a little it's having its own little search right um Mitchell's is having its own little surge, right? It's like a counter-surge to the Encanto surge. I felt like Mitchell's was in first place for five months.

Encanto did fine at the box office and then went to Disney Plus and topped the Billboard charts and everybody was like, Encanto is, as you just said, the new Frozen. Yeah. And then since then, I think Mitchell's won at the Annie Awards. Yeah. And Mitchell's has won some critical awards. Michael Rionda, the director of the movie,

has been incredible on Twitter. He has this incredible Twitter thread right now about the tips that Lord and Miller gave him throughout the making of this movie to amplify the story. It is exactly what I'm talking about when I'm like, help people understand how you make movies.

Filmmakers never do this. They never show you little choices that are made. So I think that they're in the process of trying to regain momentum. I'm not sure if they're going to get it back though. Well, and I think, you know, the instructive lesson here for Mitchell's is Into the Spider-Verse,

another, you know, another Lorne Miller-associated joint that had an unexpected surge. Disney has such a stranglehold in this category that usually I am rooting for a non-Disney film. I mentioned last year Wolfwalkers was my heart's fondest wish, etc. However, I didn't love Mitchell's's versus the machine as much as some some people did um and i really want it's the kind of film i really want to be rooting for but i just i didn't connect with it um and i loved some of disney's offerings this year um luca i actually loved the most out of the three dis. That's the one that didn't connect for me. I didn't really get it.

That's so interesting. Okay. We'll talk about. I thought Raya was actually kind of underrated. Raya was underrated. Raya was absolutely underrated. It's a weird year for Disney. And again, I usually root for non-Disney just because, you know, Disney's doing fine.

But it's nice to support these other, especially films that look different. There was a couple of years ago, there was like a different form of animation. It was the year that Isle of Dogs was nominated. There was an Aardman, like there were different forms of animation in like all five movies. And I really loved that because there's something that animators called disney face right which is just sort of this like feels like a copy paste kind of big eyes look that all of their films have and it's nice to celebrate variety that being said i think kondo will win and my heart would go for luca and i hate to be a disney show here but that's where i am another

you know we talked about this a little bit with with jane campion speech this question of like it is there a political error that that someone could make to fumble the bag um right at the end here and the controversy around disney and lgbt um you know certain lgbt issues and laws and the way in which michels and machines versus machines is kind, their campaign is kind of taking advantage of that. Not in a hugely cynical way. I think that they do celebrate what they want to celebrate, but they're really pushing what I would say is very little LGBT content in that film and sort of pushing it up against the conversation around Disney right now. But I don't know if that's enough to beat the juggernaut that is Encanto. What do you think?

I think Encanto is going to win. That's my will win. I would prefer Mitchell's one. I think there's just there is a verve and a slight kind of like code breaking style to that movie that even if it isn't always effective i just i'm on board the kind of lord and miller approach to redefining what these movies can be now that doesn't mean that i don't love the traditional approaches but like even turning red to me is a more radical reinvention of the pixar identity than the some of the films that we have here and some of the Disney films that we have here. So I just,

I didn't really love Encanto or Luca and Raya was more just like, I thought that was pretty good. And it seemed like no one cared. This isn't my favorite slate of Disney. And it has less to do with the politicization of some of the stories over the last few weeks. It's more just like they've had much better slates in the past. Yeah.

I think for me, like, uh, I saw, like they've had much better slates in the past yeah i think for me like uh i saw i see the lord and miller stamp on something and i expect um a certain level of storytelling and since this was more like graced by lord and miller rather than made by lord and miller i think i went in with the slightly wrong expectations of it but mitchell's risen machine is a movie about filmmaking right essentially so you know you may have understood why I dug it more than most

okay let's go to the next category best documentary feature I think it's pretty widely understood that this one's locked up however we get twists in this category from

time to time so before we go count our chickens here are the nominees Ascension Attica Flea Summer of Soul and Writing with Fire now Now, I just mentioned this to Bill when I spoke to him earlier this week. Aside from one moment at the Director's Guild of America Awards in which Attica somewhat shockingly took the award for Best Documentary,

it's been Summer of Soul all the way down. Summer of Soul debuted at the same Sundance that Coda debuted at. And the day I saw that movie, and full disclosure, a friend of mine is one of the producers of the movie, but the day I saw that movie, I was like, this is going straight to Oscar town. People are going to fucking love this. This is an unbelievable unearthing

of footage, incredibly well-assembled, spirited, some of the greatest musical performances you'll ever see. Lock it in. And yet, the Oscars like to Oscar, so I assume you're going to say Summer of Soul will win. spirited some of the greatest musical performances you'll ever see lock it in and yet the oscars like to oscar so i assume you're gonna say somersault will win yeah i mean i assume you're talking about your best friend questlove no i mean i think no no i'm just kidding i'm kidding um i think that similar to what we were talking about in the shorts category i think the celebrity of questlove as a director of the film and the fact that it is a fantastic film means Summer of Soul has us locked up.

Again, as you said, despite one sort of aberration on the road to success here. But I'm not sure I would say that's what I would pick. I think I would pick Flea only because I just think it's so interesting. Summer of Soul is a phenomenal entry into a genre we're familiar with. And then Flea, because it's animated documentary, I just thought it was so different and interesting. What do you think? I never really clicked with Flea.

I know I'm on the outside looking in on that one. I watched that film at the same Sundance where we were talking about here with Coda and Summer of Soul. It's an important story. Is it a great film? For me, it was not. There was something,

I don't want to say predictable, but there was something kind of formulaic that felt, even though the way that the story was told as an animated piece to sort of shield the identity of the person telling or sharing this very intimate story about the challenges of growing up where they grew up and moving and leaving their country. I was,

I was never like, where's this going? I think I felt like I had a sense of where it was going from the moment I sat down to watch it. And that's true of a lot of films that you see at film festivals where you're like, I know where this is going. And maybe I hold that against films too much, and I know that this has been a hugely acclaimed film, but I haven't spent a lot of time on it on

the show because I just never really connected to it. It is kind of historically recognized in all three of these big, you know, these sort of like the international feature, animated feature, and documentary feature categories. That unto itself is a major achievement, but I don't think it's going to win in any of the three personally um i think summer of soul is very worthy here i thought ascension was pretty uh pretty incredible achievement in terms of um documentary conceptualization about how to tell a story about a country without necessarily uh writing a radical script about what that's what that country is doing. It's almost entirely like a visual essay about the organization of China, how China is organized and how its culture dictates this mechanistic top-down execution of manufacturing. But it would be very unlikely for a movie like that to win.

So I'll stick with Summer of Soul and it should to win too okay adapted screenplay I'm real stumped on this one man yeah this is a really fun one this is where I'm voting with my heart oh interesting okay so the nominees here are Coda the film was written by the director Sean Hader Drive My Car from Ryosuke Hamaguchi and Takamasa Oh Dune Eric Roth John Spates and Denis Villeneuve The Lost Daughter from Maggie Gyllenhaal and The Power of the Dog from Jane Campion. All right. I think this is where the Academy should give The Lost Daughter love. I think you and I talked about this, I think, out of the indie spirits, sort of how it felt like people want to honor this film and Maggie Gyllenhaal's accomplishments.

As we started this conversation, you were talking about how the cool kids win adapted screenplay. I think the front runner, conventional wisdom says Jane Campion, Power of the Dog, right? But I think there could be a Maggie Gyllenhaal surprise here.

Not that Jane Campion won't and shouldn't get her laurels. She will elsewhere. But I think I like to spread the love despite me saying Dune 12 times in a row. And I think that The Lost Daughter deserves to be recognized here in Maggie Gyllenhaal. Her first time out of like the acting chair and look what she did. Incredible accomplishment. So I'm going to put will win, should win, Lost Daughter.

Love your boldness. I think the Lost Daughter should win. I think it's the best screenplay, particularly the best adaptation out of this quintet. I think Coda's going to win here. It could. It really could.

I never would have guessed that a month ago, three weeks ago, two weeks ago, a week ago. And I've come all the way around on thinking that this is where Sean Hader's going to win an award because she's not nominated for director. And this is the closest thing to recognizing that work. Do I think Coda is the... I think it's probably my fifth favorite in terms of scripts for all these films.

I think that the work that had to be... Because if Coda is based on a previous film, I believe a French film. Yeah, French film. And these other adaptations. Yeah, it's a close adaptation. It's not like she went way off the mark. Very similar to the source material. All four of the other stories are based on novels

or short stories in the case of Drive My Car. Dune is a very tough translation. I mean, that's an incredible work that they did on that story, considering how arcane and confusing that book can be at times. And The Lost Daughter features significant changes to the story.

And I think the boldness of Gyllenhaal's decisions there deserves to be recognized. And then, you know, Campion is Campion. And Campion did also change some stuff too, as you noted in our conversation about that movie a couple weeks ago. So I just think that

there's a Coda wave, and this could be a result of the Coda wave. All right. Original screenplay. Here are the nominees. Belfast, Kenneth Branagh, Don't Look Up, Adam McKay and David Sirota, Licorice Pizza, Paul Thomas Anderson, Zach Balin's script for King Richard, and the worst person in the world from Joachim Trier and Eskil Vogt. What's going to happen here? I thought I was, I'm truly confused by a couple of things in this category. I mean,

I guess I shouldn't be confused about Belfast because it was like, it was a best picture front runner for a while. Like I shouldn't be confused by it's here. I just don't think it's a very good screenplay at all. And I, I actively hated don't look up and I i'm like angry that david serota has a nomination and i'm angry that he won a wga award um so and i swear this is not just pandering to you licorice pizza pta should win licorice pizza pta do you see his reaction to

winning critics choice awards no they did something weird and critics choice awards? No, they did something weird to the critics choice awards. I don't know if you, um, at the Chris choice and at also the indie spirit in the vein of shunting some of these awards to the pre-tape first hour that they're doing here, they just announced some awards during commercial breaks without like a clear plan. And the critics choice was even perhaps more baffling.

They just put the nominees up on a screen and would just sort of highlight the winner without anyone reading the names off in the room at all. And so PTA just like won for licorice pizza. And there's just this great reaction of him just being like, oh, oh, I guess I just won an award. Anyway, so PTA, licorice pizza. That's what I would say.

What do you say? You think PTA is actually going to win this award? I'm not toying with you. I do. I think it's going to happen. What do you think is going to happen? Do you dare not dream? Well, I felt really confident that he was going to win for months and months.

And I was really happy for him. And I think it would be great recognition of a really unusual script. You think Don't Look Up is going to win? well the WGAs just completely threw me for a loop and now actually what I think is going to win is Belfast because Belfast was not eligible at the WGAs

and so it wasn't competing in that race and in a heads up between Don't Look Up and Licorice Pizza Don't Look Up won which indicates a real weakness on the part of Licorice Pizza and licorice pizza don't look up one which indicates a real weakness on the part of licorice pizza and licorice pizza is not nominated for a lot of other awards it's also you know i made i made a slight gaffe when i spoke to bill about it earlier this week but there were only two best picture nominees that have not yet streamed um one of those is licorice pizza like

have enough people even seen licorice pizza? I honestly don't know. And honestly, like it has been through the trials of controversy around certain storytelling choices in that movie too. That may be held against it. I don't know. I obviously would love for PTA to win. I think he is not just one of the great filmmakers of his time, but literally one of the great writers of his time. But Belfast is, they got to give it something. It's kind of where my head is at with that right now. I'd be really disappointed if Belfast is, they got to give it something. It's kind of where my head is at with that right now.

I'd be really disappointed if Belfast won this category. Like I would prefer King Richard or the worst person in the world over Belfast. I would too. My fourth pick here. Obviously my should win here is like a pizza. Yeah. Feel free to throw that one right in.

It's really interesting because I think that, um, uh, I don't know. I don't know. This idea of like cool kids win this category then again you know like brana is beloved by the academy but is the the academy is not even the same academy it was when it was like loving on kenneth brana before so i just um

yeah i'm i'm sticking with pta okay and in my ideal world Maggie Gyllenhaal and Paul Thomas Anderson the cool kids win the screenplay category that would be a sick winner's circle I'm into that um I just I'm just protecting my heart anyway let's go to the next category uh best supporting actress the nominees are speaking of my heart Jesse Buckley for The Lost Daughter oh my god Ariana DeBose for West Side Story, Judi Dench for Belfast, Kirsten Dunst, The Power of the Dog, and Anjanue Ellis for King Richard. Who's going to win?

I think if there's any spoiler here, it's Anjanue Ellis, possibly. There's just been a lot of chat on the ground in terms of the on-the-ground campaigning. She's just been in rooms. And I think Will Smith also in every single award

has been really boosting her but I think Ariana has this like easily locked up locked up agreed this is one of the most

predictable categories of the night yeah Jessie Buckley is my should win I think that's a pretty overlooked performance this year

I was quite delighted to see that she was recognized by the Academy because she was not recognized in a lot of precursor awards so it was a bit

of a surprise I think clearly you and I have a lot of admiration for The Lost Daughter. We'll see if it gets any love on Oscar night. Is she your should win or you got somebody else?

Anjanue? Kirsten? Jesse Buckley's my should win. Yeah. Great. Love to match with you on that. Best supporting actor. Kieran Hines from Belfast.

Troy Kotzer from CODA. Jesse Plemons from The Power of the Dog. J.K. Simmons from Being the Ricardos. And Codyoda, Jesse Plemons from The Power of the Dog, J.K. Simmons from Being the Ricardos, and Cody Smith-McPhee, also from The Power of the Dog. Who's going to win? It's a will win, should win Troy for me.

I love his performance. Like say, and I think even people who are like, I'm not sure Coda should win Best Picture. I don't need to speak for them, but I think a lot of people, it's tough to fault this performance. It's core to some of the biggest, most emotional moments of the film center on his character. We talked a lot about Cody Smith-McPhee and how much we loved sort of like re-evaluating his performance of Power of the Dog in last week's episode.

So Cody would sort of be my like second place behind him. And I don't even know what J. what JK Simmons is doing in this category, but, um, but it's Troy, Troy for me. What about for you? Well,

I'll say this. I don't think he should get it for this film, but I, Mance Raider does deserve an Oscar. I love Kieran Hines. What a great, what a great actor. Have you ever turned something on and Kieran Hines has been in him and like,

ah, shit, I don't want to watch this. Like every time he's in something, I'm interested. I think he's one of the great actors. I think Belfast has obviously fallen back a bit in the race.

And so it's not, he's not even in contention. Yeah. I think without question, Troy Kotzer will win. If he doesn't, I'll be quite surprised. There's a good case

for Cody Smith-McPhee's performance here. Troy Kotzer, I preferred. I think the critical moment of this movie is the you know put your hand on my throat and the back out in the backyard and before her journey to college i mean that's just that's just like scoop your heart out stuff so i'll go troy kotzer should win and will win that's a pretty easy one to predict less easy to predict best actress i just want to go back really quickly to to say that man's raider is a name that i have not

heard in a long time so thank you for dredging that up for me and also karen hines is my favorite jane austen adaptation a great adaptation of persuasion uh where he plays the romantic lead uh the dashing uh captain went. So Kieran Hines, I'm with you in spirit, but Troy's got it this year. All right, best actors. This is such an interesting category. Hit me with the best actress.

Here are the nominees. Jessica Chastain for The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Olivia Colman for The Lost Daughter, Penelope Cruz for Parallel Mothers, Nicole Kidman for Being the Ricardos, and Kristen Stewart for Spencer. Who do you think will win?

What a wild last minute Jessica Chastain search we've seen. You talked about this out of the SAG Awards, how like this, you could see it. And it's just continued strength to strength for Jessica Chastain. This was a sort of, this was a big question mark category. And I think some people were thinking maybe Nicole Kidman for a similar performance, performance right like her performances as lucille ball and jessica

chastain's performance in the eyes of tammy faye are sort of in a similar vein um olivia colman and penelope cruz and nicole kim and already have oscars not that that stopped the academy before um but i think it's chastain's in a walk. I think it's an easy win for Jessica Chastain. I think that people look at her, see an actress with a capital A and are like, she deserves an Oscar. This is a passion project for her. Um, you know, and, and she's just done a great job in, you know, we talked about the power

of speeches and how precursor speeches can really just help an actor cement their momentum. So it's Chastain here. It's not my should win. My should win is Kristen Stewart because I loved her in Spencer and I thought she was incredible. And I thought she's just been doing such good work for so many years now post-Twilight. And I would have loved to see her win for Spencer, which I thought was an incredible answer to sort of the crown's stiffer sort of, you know, this is just such a looser, interesting character at a interpretation and adaptation. So I thought Kristen Stewart was the strongest performer in this category, but I'm not mad about Jessica Chastain having an Oscar. Same. I'm going with her for Will Wynn as well.

I like the idea of Kristen Stewart. I probably, if I had to choose, would choose Olivia Colman. Because I think in the grand scheme of the Olivia Colman archetype, the work that she's doing in The Lost Daughter is actually most different. It's kind of one of her least empathetic, least warm, most kind of like psychologically embattled characters in a while um and i really like what she did in it and obviously you can tell that i'm a big lost daughter fan because i've now picked it for should win in three categories that it's nominated in

but this is a really funky category because it feels like the two leaders are nicole kidman and jessica chastain and those are probably the two most traditional, least interesting performances to me. That being said, not feeling super confident about this. There's not a ton of precursors in this category. BAFTAs was all over the place with Best Actress. None of these women were represented here. We don't have the surge that a Golden Globe speech could provide in a category like this. SAG was great for Chastain, but that's still a pretty small show. So I have no idea. Honestly, if Penelope Cruz won, I wouldn't be shocked. I'd just be like, oh, that's surprising. But this was a weird category

and has been for months. So we shall see. I get a little frustrated when the Academy nominates the same people over and over again. That being said, I kind of believe that every Olivia Colman and every Mahershala Ali performance should be nominated. He should have been nominated for Swan Song. Like, I will never, ever object to seeing them in the roster. We're on the same page. It's a very similar thing where, like, every time they show up in a movie, I'm more than happy to watch what they do. So, could see a lot more for Colman in the future for sure. Okay, best actor. Javier Bardem for being the Ricos benedict cumberbatch for the power of the dog

andrew garfield for tick tick boom your beloved tick tick boom joe will smith king richard and denzel washington for the tragedy of macbeth who's winning well will has played this perfectly will will is winning i again like jessica chastain i'm not at all mad that will smith will have an Oscar. I don't know that this is my favorite Will Smith performance. What is? Yeah. Suicide Squad?

Wild Wild West? I think it's Hitch. For some people, that is their favorite. But I think that it's a textbook perfect campaign. Um, but my should win is Andrew Garfield. Ridiculous. Boom. Um, that's bold.

I, sorry. I mean, with much love to Benedict Cumberbatch and, and, and everyone else, I just think that Andrew Garfield absolutely crushed it in many regards last year. And I just repeat listen to and repeat watch Tick, Tick, Boom. And I think he's phenomenal in it. So, yeah. Will win as Will Smith and should win as Will Smith. That's my take, Your Honor.

It's a good. I mean, it's hard to argue. It's likely to happen. I think this feels. And if it doesn't happen, there's going to be some chaos. It will be tough. Tougher, I think, even than what happened with Chadwick Boseman and Anthony Hopkins last year.

Because even though Chadwick was a sentimental front runner, Anthony Hopkins had been winning some things that it was in the water. And a lot of people, I think saw Chadwick, a Chadwick Boseman win is like a, a sort of like posthumous honoring of his, of his body of work rather than like a, a strong love for Ma Rainey. But I think,

you know, yeah, if Will Smith doesn't win, uh, basically just quieting. I think about how decisions are made in that category too. Um, we shall see.

Okay. Best director. Paul Thomas Anderson for Licorice Pizza. Kenneth Branagh for Belfast. Jane Campion for The Power of the Dog.

Steven Spielberg for West Side Story. Ryosuke Hamaguchi for Drive My Car. Will win. Who? Jane. Agreed.

Jane Campion will win. Has not really been anything to indicate that it's ever been anyone but Jane Campion all the way down. Should win is interesting. Who are you choosing here? I think I'm choosing Jane because, you know, we're going to talk about Best Picture in a hot second. But I think that this sort of, similar to what we're saying about Will Smith, this taking a moment to honor a larger body of work for someone,

I think Jane Campion actually absolutely deserves to have an Oscar. And, you know, she, she has talked in many different places about how she almost gave up on film. Like she was almost done retired, uh, before she decided to make power of the dog. So that tells me that there maybe aren't a ton more movies in her, maybe. Or maybe we're about to see a Campion renaissance. But I think this is her moment. And if she doesn't win here, I don't know that she's going to win. And I would like her to have an Oscar. So Jane Campion.

I'm throwing my weight behind Hamaguchi for Should Win, which is not really anything against Campion. But I think what recommends that movie is all the decisions that hamaguchi made as a filmmaker to kind of combine some of these stories and to literalize what feels like a very kind of like elusive almost like hyper real set of storytelling um and also the fact that he is operating on his own terms as a storyteller like there is absolutely zero conventionality to that story. And his control and sense of pace is part of what makes it such a special piece of work.

So I'll roll with Hamaguchi there. That takes us to Best Picture. Now, I'm going to force you to rank these again. We've got 10 films that are nominated for Best Picture. Here are the movies. The movies are Belfast, Coda, Don't Look Up, Drive My Car, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, and West Side Story. So how do you want to do this? You want to just go through 10 to one? Just a power, like a power ranking, not an emotional ranking, but just sort

of like a clear headed Sean fantasy. I want to make the right pick about where things stand. Well, I want you to do the Joanna Robinson clear headed. Here's how I think the voting will turn out from 10 to one, like not your heart, not your 10 favorites, but like, what is the film that's going to get the least number of votes?

What's the film that's going to get the second least number and all the way down. All right. All right. So number 10 is nightmare alley. Uh, unfortunately I think, um,

it doesn't deserve to be number 10, but it is number 10. Yes. I agree. I think number nine, I don't know. Like, you really mess with my head with your don't look up take a couple weeks ago. But I, yeah, I'm going to, oh, number nine, Drive My Car, maybe, is where I would put that. Number eight, Belf, number eight, licorice pizza. Agree, yes.

Yeah, sorry. I'm trying not to lose track of anything. You've got your hands on your ears. It's like you're like an air traffic controller right now just trying to make sure you're getting all the frequencies correct here as you make these decisions, which are deeply critical.

And we're in hour two of this pod and no one's really even gotten this far. And yet you're focusing very deeply. No one's listening anymore. Okay. Fair enough. All right. Number six. I'm on number six,

right? No, you're on number seven. Nightmare Alley. Drive my car. Licorice pizza. Then what? Okay.

Uh, then it is, um, uh, God, Belfast. Okay. Then it's Belfast for me then it's

Dune for me okay I like what you're doing here then it's Don't Look Up then it's maybe a tick too high for that one

but okay it's not where I want it but you know um four left then it's West where I want it but you know. Four left. Then it's West Side Story. Then it's

King Richard. Then it's Coda. Dun dun dun. Then it's Coda then it's Power of the Dog but that's not necessarily telling me

that the Power of the Dog is going to win because of the excellent case you laid out about the preferential ballot. Okay. Well that means

who will win and you're sticking with Coda. Coda. I'm going to say the power of the dog is going to win. I love this for us. One of us is going to be in shambles and tears on Sunday and one of us is going to be victorious. So I think that's great. A great place to be.

My should win is actually Dune. I lied. I said it one more time. I'm sorry. But I do think to your point about, to your point about making this a populist Oscars, like Dune should win best picture. It's a phenomenal technical achievement. Tell you what,

I agree with you. Let's do it. We're both should win Dune. What would be better for the Oscars? Do you think Dune part two will win? Oh, a real return of the King moment? Maybe.

I think it depends how good it is. I hope it's phenomenal. My power of the dog take is this. Yeah. I don't think that the CODA surge happened soon enough. I think it happened for sure. I think it happened strongly.

But I think that there's two things working against it. A lack of awareness of the story of that movie specifically, which kind of started, I think that there's two things working against it. A lack of awareness of the story of that movie specifically, which kind of started, I think, for many voters at SAG when they started seeing folks like Troy Kotzer on television. And then the Apple aspect of it, which is a little bit challenging. I really feel like it's like neck and neck,

but the power of the dog has been so dominant it has so much craft support that i think coda is going to be missing some of that craft support long term um that being said sag went with ensemble for coda so if you told me it's coda on sunday night i'm not going to be surprised at all i don't even really i'm not even really protecting any feelings because as you know like i admire the power of the dog greatly, but it's wasn't even one of my 10 or 20 favorite movies of 2021. I think it's a very good film, but, um, there's four or five on this list that I'd prefer to see when best picture, frankly, I think that neither of us would be surprised if one of the other one, right. You wouldn't be surprised if Coda one, I wouldn't be surprised if part of the

dog one, uh, King Richard, I think it has has is having an interesting craft search um is sort of the argument that that's why i ranked it so high um i think that's an argument that some people are making that it could be an interesting little spoiler but i just do think that sentimental second place for coda that it just might be a sentimental second for a lot of people. Though the preferential ballot math as the thing to really bear in mind, because I consider this episode, I consider all these Oscar prediction episodes that we do over the years, how to help someone win their Oscar bet pool, right?

How to fill out your ballot. We watched the short film, so you don't have to. But I think what you have to look at is the the way the preferential ballot works is if something uh someone's number one deeply underperforms then their number two gets counted so you want to look at the least pops like popular options so our nightmare alley voters are people willing to put Nightmare Alley number one? Are they likely to put CODA number two? I don't think so. Ditto drive my car voters.

Ditto licorice pizza voters. Maybe not. I mean, that's an interesting way to look at it. And you raise a very good point because I think actually King Richard Belfast and CODA are in contention for the same sort of sentimental, good-hearted family story vote. And they could cannibalize each other. And those are three films that have not had to have showdowns against one another too frequently.

Now, we've seen it at the PGAs here where they did have a showdown and Coda came out triumphant. We'll see. It's going to be exciting. Are you doing a Best Picture power ranking? Are you going to do that? I like yours.

I would probably move West Side Story closer to something like six. But I like what you did with King Richard Coda and the Power of the Dog. That's basically how I'm feeling the race is shaping up right now. You know, the head of Focus Features came out earlier this week and said, don't count out Belfast. Don't be shocked if you see a surprise. I actually see this as a three horse race. Obviously, if you run folks features,

you need to support your guy. But it was weird to say that publicly. I was like, why? What the? Why was that state being? Why was that served in a press release? Anyhow, for the most part, I agree with how you've got things here.

The truth is we'll never know because they'll never reveal it because the Academy is made up of a bunch of cowards. If you'd like to hear us talk about the work of this cowardly body that I'm also obsessed with,

please tune in Sunday night to The Big Picture because Joanna and I will be here for better or worse. And if there's a Dune victory, we'll be dressed in our, what are the suits called?

Oh, our still suits? Our still suits. Breathing beautiful Harkonnen air Joe thanks for doing this with me you went down the rabbit hole I love this this is this is we're in it now I get tired when we start doing it

like months out but once we're like once it's so close and especially this year is so interesting there's a lot of question marks or maybe we'll feel differently the other side of it once it's so close. And especially this year is so interesting. There's a lot of question marks. Or maybe we'll feel differently on the other side of it. But I'm so excited to talk to you Sunday about all the things we see. We'll turn those question marks to periods. Thanks so much to our producer, Bobby Wagner,

for his work on this episode. See you Sunday night after the Academy Awards. Thank you.