Star Wars: The Last Jedi - 4 nominations

Original Score, John Williams (his 51st nomination, and remember the rabbit hole I went down during Costume Design? John Williams has been nominated against HIMSELF for two movies in the Original Score category 5 times.)

Sound Editing, Matthew Wood and Ren Klyce

Sound Mixing, David Parker, Michael Semanick, Ren Klyce and Stuart Wilson

Visual Effects, Ben Morris, Mike Mulholland, Neal Scanlan and Chris Corbould

Fans of the blog know that I loved Star Wars: The Last Jedi before I even saw it.  I love Star Wars.  I'm obsessed with Star Wars.  I liked the prequels, I like Jar Jar Binks, I'm just all in on the franchise.  So when I say that this film was excellent (with a few plot holes), I'm certainly coming from a biased point of view, but I'm also being honest when I say that it's a really great film.  

This is the second installment of the recent franchise in which scavenger Rey finds Luke Skywalker and begs him to train her in the ways of the force.  Skywalker is reluctant to get back into the Jedi training game.  Having been scarred by his experience training young Kylo Ren who turned to the dark side and who has become the now powerful sith eager to continue Darth Vader's dream of ruling the galaxy.  Kylo Ren is under the tutelage and leadership of the evil Snoke and uses the force for evil and not for good.

Meanwhile, back at the resistance, General Leah Organa (Carrie Fisher, and yes, I did cry almost every time she was on screen, what's it to ya?) is doing her best to keep all of our beloved characters focused on overthrowing the sinister First Order.  

There is much more to the story and there are some terrific newcomers into the Star Wars universe.  But one of the most interesting pieces of this film is the connection between our young Jedi hopeful Rey and Kylo Ren.  They communicate across space and when they are finally together, they join forces to fight a brief battle.  And here's one of the most compelling pieces of the film. The two have fought off enemies together, and they realize that the resistance is heading toward a trap spelling certain destruction by the First Order.  Ren says to her, let's forget about all these people, let them destroy each other and then let's start together afresh and make the world the place we want it to be together.  Now, we know that a moral and ethical person like Rey could never accept the destruction of good people fighting the resistance.  But it is easy to see how Kylo Ren can frame this situation as neither good nor bad, and let's just embrace a fresh reality without good and without evil that is just right.  Lots of morally relativistic questions in this proposal, but it goes to show that good and evil are frameworks that depend on the lens that you look through.  What an important idea in the midst of an excellent piece of entertainment.  

I'd have given this film many more nominations if I were the Oscars Czarina, but in the meantime, I highly recommend seeing it.  The visual effects, the sound, and especially the score are among the finest in film this year.  Yay Star Wars!