Everything Everywhere All at Once - 11 nominations

 

Best Original Screenplay Dan Kwan Daniel Scheinert

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Score) Son Lux

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Song) Ryan Lott David Byrne Mitski For song "This Is a Life"

Best Motion Picture of the Year Dan Kwan (producer) Daniel Scheinert (producer) Jonathan Wang (producer)

Best Achievement in Directing Dan Kwan Daniel Scheinert

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role Michelle Yeoh

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role Stephanie Hsu

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role Jamie Lee Curtis

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role Ke Huy Quan

Best Achievement in Costume Design Shirley Kurata

Best Achievement in Film Editing Paul Rogers

Mothers and daughters, amiright?  (For the record, my mother - who reads this blog - is the absolute best.)

Everything Everywhere All at Once is the multiverse movie we needed.  It is weird.  It is wild. And it is spectacular. It is another Best Picture nominee whose entire principal cast is nominated for Oscars, and that's because the performances were just that good, and each person played the same person but like 14 different people as themselves.  Get it?  (Ok, that's fair... confusing is the way the multiverse cookie crumbles.)

Let's see how much of this nearly indescribable film I can describe.  Evelyn Quan runs a laundromat with her husband Waymond.  They are Chinese immigrants who have a daughter, Joy.  Joy is eager to introduce her white girlfriend to her family and especially her grandfather, but Evelyn is reluctant thinking that they are just not ready to learn of Joy's relationship, and minimizes the introduction to be Joy's "friend."  For a daughter seeking connection and to be truly seen and valued for who she is, this is a difficult moment to navigate.  

Meanwhile, the laundromat is being audited by the IRS.  When the family goes to the building to meet with their unsympathetic IRS agent Dierdre, the multiverse is opened to Evelyn, and she learns that every choice in one's history sends that Evelyn down another path with very different outcomes.  We learn of a "big bad enemy" Jobu who is simultaneously experiencing all of her own timelines at once, and Jobu has figured out how to destroy the world with an "Everything Bagel black hole" to relieve herself of her own misery and chaotic life.  Evelyn is endowed with powers to fight the big bad (and that itself is it's own cool explanation), and we are taken on a tour of her many alternate lives only for her to realize that love and acceptance is what is required to heal this crazy situation.  (no spoilers, but these alternate universes produce some VERY creative and fantastic scenes.)

The day I saw this film, I pronounced it the winner of the Costume Design category (THERE IS A SHIRT MADE OUT OF TEDDY BEARS, YOU GUYS), and I thought surely a nomination for Production Design, as well.  With nominations in all of the possible "top of the line" categories, this little film could take the big prize.  This is one you absolutely don't want to miss in any of your alternate timelines.

Mank - 10 nominations

 

Best Motion Picture of the Year Ceán Chaffin (producer)  Eric Roth (producer)  Douglas Urbanski (producer)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role - Gary Oldman

Best Achievement in Directing - David Fincher

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role - Amanda Seyfried

Best Sound Ren Klyce  Jeremy Molod  David Parker  Nathan Nance  Drew Kunin

Best Achievement in Production Design Donald Graham Burt (production design)  Jan Pascale (set decoration)

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Score) Trent Reznor  Atticus Ross

Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling Gigi Williams  Kimberley Spiteri  Colleen LaBaff

Best Achievement in Costume Design - Trish Summerville

Best Achievement in Cinematography - Erik Messerschmidt

Mank is a highly stylized film following the life of Herman J Mankowicz - an aging, alcoholic screenwriter upon whom Orson Welles calls to write Citizen Kane. In the shadow of the rise of Nazi Germany and a controversial gubernatorial race, people read the script and see parallels between the protagonist and William Randolph Hearst, and the comparison is hardly flattering.  Through a relationship with Hearst's lover played adorably by Amanda Seyfried, Mank finds himself introduced to WRH and the fireworks ensue.  And honestly, that's just some of what happens in this overly long, somewhat disappointing film.

Don't get me wrong, I liked it, and I sat all the way through it (which is hardly a selling point). The black and white cinematography was a great choice for creating the setting, the style, and the tone bringing us back to the great black and white films of the 50's.  The costumes, production design, and hair styling do the same.

Have you ever watched a film that is so intentional but so over the top about being a period piece that you occasionally say out loud a real throwback Edward G Robinson-esque, "yeah, see" while the film plays on your screen?  (Just me? Cool cool cool.) If you never have, I swear while you watch this film, you will.  And yet, it's the most nominated film of the year.  

The parts are good - the cast is good, the directing is good, the design elements are good, and yet somehow, the whole is not as good as the sum of its parts.  Unless you feel passionately about seeing all of the nominated Best Picture films (an instinct I certainly understand), I wouldn't prioritize this one.  Instead, just watch Citizen Kane.  Now that's worth it.

To watch the trailer:

BIRDMAN (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) - 9 nominations

Best Picture - Alejandro G. Iñárritu, John Lesher and James W. Skotchdopole
Actor - Michael Keaton
Supporting Actor - Edward Norton
Supporting Actress - Emma Stone
Director - Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Cinematography - Emmanuel Lubezki
Sound Editing - Martin Hernández and Aaron Glascock
Sound Mixing - Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and Thomas Varga
Original Screenplay - Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. & Armando Bo

Birdman is the tale of an actor, known primarily for his portrayal of a superhero, seeking validation by mounting a serious production on Broadway.  At the start of the film he is in rehearsals just days away from opening as he deals with emotional actors,  a nervous lawyer, a recovering drug addict daughter, and a haunting voice of self-loathing and self doubt embodied by his former character, Birdman.  

Michael Keaton gives a vulnerable performance and we understand that this play means everything to him - financially, spiritually, and emotionally.  He has constant hallucinations of superhero powers that range from telekinesis to flight, and each setback in the play slowly chips away at his sanity.  His ex-wife very pointedly tells him, "you confuse love for admiration," and the most powerful Broadway reviewer says, "you're not an actor, you're a celebrity."  All of this while he deals with a nervous female lead (Naomi Watts), an insane but clearly brilliant last minute cast addition in Edward Norton (himself manic and unstable, but hilarious), and a confused and struggling daughter in Emma Stone, who is raw and emotional in her own right.

This is a completely different kind of movie, and that's a tribute to Director, Alejandro Iñárritu, who had a clear vision having produced, directed, and written Birdman.  The screenplay is sharp tongued and quick witted.  It is funny and dark and emotional.

For the technical categories, the cinematography is subtle - I had to watch the film a second time to really ingest the brilliance of the camera work.  Yes, there are lots of shots in dark places with interesting lighting that usually attract the attention of this branch, but the amazing work comes in taking a drama and shooting it like a superhero movie.  I'm not sure that any of the three technical awards will go to Birdman, but the merits of the nominations are clear.

Watch the trailer here: