The Academy Award nominations will be announced tomorrow, with the ceremony set to commence at the end of March. This is far too long to wait for the ceremony, I agree; moving a full quarter into the following year before we honor the best of the previous year is very stupid but unfortunately, The Academy has yet to ask my opinion. I stand ready to give them said opinion should they ever call. 2021 was a weird year for movies because 2021 was a weird year overall. Many of the movies we looked forward to (at least those of us who are movie nerds deeply invested in the film release calendar each year) were disappointing and the box office was a mess. Even still, I saw a big bunch o’ movies in 2021 because that’s what I do. Overall, I liked what the year had to offer. And one (of the very few) positive byproduct of the pandemic is the accessibility of more and more quality films on the various streaming services. I love movie theaters and I worry about the future of the industry but I won’t lie and tell you that I don’t like having the option to watch the new big movie in my home office at midnight rather than having to find time to go to the theater for each and every movie.
As always, I don’t have an Oscar vote but that doesn’t stop me from putting together a fake ballot every year. You’ll find said ballot for 2021 below, with my five (or ten) nominees for each of the eight “big” awards (my winner in bold), as well as the movies and performances that just missed the top five.
I will also say that, while I never set out to have a ballot that lines up with the views of the Academy and often have my own choices, I’m usually in the same ballpark as the powers that be in the movie world. In a normal year, there might be a movie or two that gets some praise I don’t agree with or that I love but the Academy doesn’t. This year, however, there are a number of movies and performances that are stacking up nominations across the award circuit, that I very much didn’t jive with. I found Belfast to be a bit tedious and underwhelming, couldn’t get into Tick Tick Boom, and borderline hated both Don’t Look Up and Being the Ricardos, all of which are seemingly guaranteed to feature prominently when the nominations come down tomorrow. To each their own, of course, but I can’t feeling like some of these movies are getting award consideration because we expected them to be great and not because they actually are.
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Paul Thomas Anderson, Licorice Pizza
Wes Anderson, The French Dispatch
Fran Kranz, Mass
Mike Mills, C’mon C’mon
Michael Sarnoski, Pig
Final Cuts: Encanto (Charise Castro Smith, Jared Bush, and Byron Howard), The Harder They Fall (Jaymes Samuel and Boaz Yakin), Swan Song (Benjamin Cleary)
This category is mostly a toss-up for me this year, with a big jumble of very good movies made from very good scripts but nothing that absolutely must win for me. Pig was a big surprise and much of that is due to Sarnoski’s subtle writing and direction. Kranz put forth one of the more actor-forward scripts I’ve seen in a while and those actors shined because of it. Mills’ dual conceits, a sister in need leaves her child with her estranged brother and the brother’s profession, work seamlessly together. And PT Anderson delivered perhaps his most likable and accessible script in years. I’m giving Wes Anderson the edge here simply because I enjoyed his film the most and the vignette storytelling works perfectly for Anderson’s many quirks.
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Jane Campion, Power of the Dog
Joel Coen, The Tragedy of MacBeth
Sian Heder, CODA
David Lowery, The Green Knight
Jon Spaiths, Denis Villeneuve, and Eric Roth, Dune
Final Cuts: The Lost Daughter (Maggie Gyllenhaal), Nightmare Alley (Guillermo Del Toro, Kim Morgan), West Side Story (Tony Kushner)
Of the two scripted categories, Adapted was a bit stronger for me this year (after a few years of the inverse) and thus, I had a hard time choosing. Green Knight didn’t fully connect for me the way I have come to expect with a Lowery movie but I think he deserves credit for translating a 14th century poem into a beautiful film. I’m always interested when Campion pops up with a movie (since it happens so sporadically) and it is the expert structure of the script that makes the twist in the final moments of Power work so well. Coen’s adaptation of the Scottish play owes much of its success to the set design and acting but tightening up MacBeth without sacrificing even an ounce of its story and power is an achievement. And, as I’ve said a million times, Dune is an unfilmable book that was translated and adapted much better than I could have ever dreamed. For me, Heder gets the win by a nose for assembling one of the most joyous, heartfelt films of the decade.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Bradley Cooper, Licorice Pizza
Idris Elba, The Harder They Fall
Mike Faist, West Side Story
Jason Isaacs, Mass
Troy Kotsur, CODA
Final Cuts: Ciaran Hinds (Belfast) Kodi Smit-McPhee (Power of the Dog), the male cast of The French Dispatch
This is always the deepest field and 2021 was no different as my “shortlist” was something like 30 lines long. Cooper is only in Licorice for maybe five minutes but he’s like a firecracker set off in the dead of night and his energy is contagious to the rest of the movie. The Harder They Fall is the coolest movie of the year and Elba is the perfect villain for the movie. Faist was lively and charismatic, making West Side Story’s male lead, Ansel Elgort, look silly by comparison. Isaacs is the lead for much of Mass and delivers some of the film’s most gut wrenching moments. But I don’t think I’m ever going to forget the strength and grace of Kotsur’s performance as the trying-to-figure-it-out dad in CODA nor the moments he shares with his on-screen daughter, Emilia Jones.
Note: I had Jason Segel’s performance in Our Friend as a lock for the five spots before realizing that he is ineligible since the movie technically debuted in 2019 (though it wasn’t available for non-festival goers until 2021). Segel rules and deserves more acclaim for his dramedy work.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Jessie Buckley, The Lost Daughter
Ariana DeBose, West Side Story
Anne Dowd, Mass
Naomi Harris, Swan Song
Marlee Matlin, CODA
Final Cuts: Rebecca Ferguson (Dune), Frances McDormand (The French Dispatch), Cate Blanchett (Nightmare Alley)
This was a strong, deep field this year, rivaling the Supporting Actor group in a way that doesn’t often happen. Good work, Hollywood! Buckley, as the younger version of Olivia Colman, matched one of the greatest living actresses wonderfully and set the stage for her older counterpart beautifully. Harris drew many more eyes in No Time to Die and (unfortunately) Venom: Let There Be Carnage (I won’t hold that trainwreck against her here, although…) but her soft, quiet performance in Swan Song rivals that of her Oscar-nominated turn in Moonlight. At least in terms of the performance side of things, DeBose was the heart of West Side Story for me in a career-altering way. And from August on, I had Matlin penciled in as a lock to win this category for her magnificent turn as the change-resistant mother in CODA. It’s the last ten minutes of Mass, however, where Dowd jumps to the top of the race for me, her character’s quiet, barely contained resolve, finally bubbling over into an admittedly showy but nonetheless harrowing monologue.
BEST ACTOR
Mahershala Ali, Swan Song
Nicolas Cage, Pig
Benedict Cumberbatch, Power of the Dog
Will Smith, King Richard
Denzel Washington, The Tragedy of MacBeth
Final Cuts: Bradley Cooper (Nightmare Alley), Jonathan Majors (The Harder They Fall), Joaquin Phoenix (C’mon, C’mon)
2021 was a banger for leading performances (both male and female). It was very, very hard to cut the category down and leave out Phoenix, Majors, Cooper, and more. Swan Song is somehow (completely unfathomable to me) Ali’s first lead performance in a movie and he comes in strong with a dual-role. Cumberbatch was less showy than some of his contemporaries here, reminding me of his range and talent outside of the Marvel movies and Sherlock. I didn’t love King Richard overall but it was soooooo good to see Smith do something worthwhile and his work here is excellent. I’ve never been the biggest Cage fan but I think Pig contains his best performance in at least 20 years, if not the best of his entire career. But, for me, the best of the bunch (and maybe by a long stretch) is Denzel letting everyone know that he is, still, after all, Denzel Washington. He dominates MacBeth in a way that very actors could do in a role that would be career-defining for anyone with a lesser resume.
BEST ACTRESS
Jessica Chastain, The Eyes of Tammy Faye
Jodie Comer, The Last Duel
Alana Haim, Licorice Pizza
Emilia Jones, CODA
Rachel Zegler, West Side Story
Final Cuts: Stephanie Beatrix (Encanto), Olivia Colman (The Lost Daughter), Kristen Stewart (Spencer)
As mentioned above, this was a great year for lead performances. There are a couple of actresses I left off my ballot who might’ve won my (fake) vote in a lot of years and picking a winner here is almost a five-way coin flip. Chastain has had some weirdly bad performances of late but absolutely crushes every aspect of Tammy Faye Bakker. The Last Duel wasn’t my jam (at all) but Comer, already a TV super star, outshined her male counterparts, (Matt Damon, Adam Driver, and Ben Afflect) by leaps and bounds. Zegler is a star in the making and perfect in West Side Story. Jones brings such honesty to CODA, centering the movie and giving it its backbone even while occasionally being overshadowed by her supporting cast. In a toss-up, though, I’m going with the most surprising performance which, for me, was Haim. When Pizza was announced, I could not have guessed that Alana would be the star of the movie (considering she’s not even the star of her own band) but she gave us one of the most fun, comedic, and poignant performances of the year.
BEST DIRECTOR
Joel Coen, The Tragedy of MacBeth
Sian Heder, CODA
Jaymes Samuel, The Harder They Fall
Steven Spielberg, West Side Story
Denis Villeneuve, Dune
Final Cuts: Paul Thomas Anderson (Licorice Pizza), Jane Campion (Power of the Dog), Nia DaCosta (Candyman)
I struggled greatly in trying to cut my list down to eight and then the final five. I didn’t set out to do this but it turns out this is a great mix of some of the biggest names in filmmaking and some of the brightest up-and-comers and I love that. Heder made my favorite movie of the year and the one that melted me into a large puddle of tears. Samuel made the coolest movie of the year. Coen adapted an iconic play in tremendous fashion. Villeneuve made the unfilmable film and (if I’m being honest) I’m hedging my bet here a bit, fairly or unfairly, in expecting Dune 2 to be even stronger. I picked Spielberg because I love him dearly (#SpielbergUp #SpielbergStrong #SpielbergNation) and, in much the same way as Denzel did with MacBeth, I felt like West Side Story was Spielberg reminding us that he’s Steven Spielberg. It’s a masterclass in filmmaking from a technical and narrative standpoint and honestly, I’m just really happy to see that my favorite filmmaker still has his fastball. So he gets my vote. Sue me.
BEST PICTURE
C’mon, C’mon
CODA
Dune
The Harder They Fall
Licorice Pizza
Pig
Power of the Dog
Spider-Man: No Way Home
The Tragedy of MacBeth
West Side Story
Final Cuts: Candyman, Encanto, The French Dispatch, Mass, Swan Song
I drew the line for Best Picture consideration right at 20 movies, some big and accessible, some small and underseen. As mentioned, I don’t know that there were any truly great movies in 2021 but the depth of “good to very good” movies made it tough to narrow it down to ten. I’ve mentioned almost all of these movies herein so I won’t go on about each of them. Spider-Man: No Way Home is likely to be the “controversial” choice here compared to the rest, considering its box office domination and mainstream success. But, for me at least, it’s not here because it was the biggest movie of the year, it’s here because I felt it was also one of the year’s best and for all the complaints about the Disneyfication of our lives, I want to appreciate and honor the studios when they make an ambitious blockbuster, like Avengers: Endgame or No Way Home. CODA gets my Best Picture vote, unsurprisingly; I cannot overstate how beautiful, heartfelt, and joyful this movie is and how much I hope people will see it. In a tight race with no true leader in the clubhouse, “favorite” is my go-to tiebreaker so Coda it is.
VIEWING GUIDE
Since many of my choices this year had limited theatrical runs (and because of, like, everything in life right now), here’s where you can watch all of the movies mentioned herein.
APPLE+
CODA, Swan Song, The Tragedy of MacBeth
DISNEY+
Encanto, West Side Story (soon?)
HBOMax
Dune, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, King Richard, The Last Duel, Nightmare Alley
HULU
Nightmare Alley, Pig
NETFLIX
The Lost Daughter, The Power of the Dog, The Harder They Fall
THEATER ONLY/NOT YET AVAILABLE TO STREAM
Licorice Pizza, Spider-Man: No Way Home
VOD
Belfast, Candyman, C’mon C’mon, The French Dispatch, The Green Knight, Mass, Spencer