Joey Magidson
On Sunday, the 98th Academy Awards are being held. We’re finally going to find out the Oscar winners, after a whole season of predictions, as well as various twists and turns. To mark the occasion, we have basically content relating to the Oscars all week, though today…it’s about your picks. Yes, we have an Awards Radar Community Question asking you about how you’d vote. Plain and simple, if you had an Oscar ballot, who and what would you be voting for?
Remember, these are your preferences, not your predictions. You’ll be able to share your own predictions either with my final predictions piece on Friday or in a special Awards Radar Community post on Saturday. Today, it’s about who and what should win in your eyes, not who and what will. That comes later…
For example, these would be my personal picks for who and what should win, as opposed to who and what I’m predicting:
Best Picture – Sinners
Best Director – Paul Thomas Anderson
Best Actor – Ethan Hawke
Best Actress – Emma Stone
Best Supporting Actor – Delroy Lindo
Best Supporting Actress – Amy Madigan
Best Original Screenplay – Sinners
Best Adapted Screenplay – One Battle After Another
Best Animated Feature – KPop Demon Hunters
Best Documentary Feature – The Perfect Neighbor
Best International Feature – Sentimental Value
Best Casting – Marty Supreme
Best Cinematography – Train Dreams
Best Costume Design – Sinners
Best Film Editing – One Battle After Another
Best Makeup & Hairstyling – The Smashing Machine
Best Production Design – Sinners
Best Sound – F1
Best Original Score – Sinners
Best Original Song – Train Dreams
Best Visual Effects – Avatar: Fire and Ash
Now, it’s your turn. Who/what would you pick to win Oscars this weekend, if you had a say? We’re very curious to find out, so don’t be shy about saying so. Stay tuned for my official final predictions tomorrow, as we count the days until the 98th Academy Awards on Sunday…
Who and what would you like to see win on Sunday? Let us know!
Picture: The Secret Agent
Director: Josh Safdie – Marty Supreme
Actor: Wagner Moura – The Secret Agent
Actress: Renate Reinsve – Sentimental Value
Supporting Actor: Jacob Elordi – Frankenstein
Supporting Actress: Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas – Sentimental Value
Original Screenplay: Blue Moon
Adapted Screenplay: Train Dreams
Animated Feature: KPop Demon Hunters
Documentary Feature: The Alabama Solution
International Feature: The Secret Agent
Casting: The Secret Agent
Cinematography: Marty Supreme
Costume Design: Sinners
Film Editing: Marty Supreme
Makeup and Hairstyling: The Ugly Stepsister
Production Design: Hamnet
Sound: Sirat
Original Score: Bugonia
Song: Golden – KPop Demon Hunters
Live Action Short: Butcher’s Stain
Animated Short: Retirement Plan
Documentary Short: The Devil Is Busy
Interesting picks!
Unfortunately, if I was a voter this time around, I’d be doing the thing that I normally criticize voters for occasionally falling into, which is to just shower most of the awards onto one movie (especially since an exceptionally, *ahem*, strident corner of Team Sinners has convinced themselves that their movie not winning literally all of its sixteen nominations this weekend will mean AMPAS is synonymous with the Klan or something).
But when you’re Paul Thomas Anderson and you write and direct my favorite American film of the decade so far, I don’t see myself as having much of a choice. Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing, and Costume Design are no-brainers for me. I’d agonize over having to choose between Amy Madigan and Teyana Taylor for Best Supporting Actress… but I think I would ultimately vote for the latter. I’d be even more conflicted over Best Lead Actor, since I loved Wagner Moura in The Secret Agent and generally don’t like Leonardo DiCaprio all that much but Leo somehow managed to pull off his most accomplished feat of acting since The Departed and the funniest lead performance I’ve seen in a movie since Borat Subsequent Moviefilm. So… I don’t know, I’m still mulling over that one. Since Andrew Scott and Jacobi Jupe didn’t get nominated for Best Supporting Actor, that automatically narrows it down to the men of One Battle After Another for me. Still unsure about that one, too.
But I’d spread the wealth to other films, too! The Secret Agent is my easy choice for the inaugural Best Casting Oscar, and would have been my easy choice for Best International Feature had I not finally caught up to Sirât last week. Speaking of that movie, I cannot imagine anyone seriously arguing that any of the other four nominees is more deserving of Best Sound next weekend than the ruinously effective techno-nightmare soundscape created by the film’s history-making team. Marty Supreme had some valleys but a lot of peaks, the highest for me being how it looked; absolutely dynamite sets and cinematography that I’d love to see win outright. I’m not a Sinners hater, either — I still insist the movie gets a bit plodding and underwhelming whenever it’s not a musical, but whenever it is one, it’s amazing, and should win both Original Score and Song as a result. The Perfect Neighbor is a great documentary, but I actually think The Alabama Solution is even more deserving of the Oscar while the people in charge of the Alabama Department of Corrections are deserving of… well, I’d probably get into some trouble if I say more on that.
Oh, and Rose Byrne would get my vote for Best Lead Actress.
That’s very fair.