Another year, another Academy Awards. There is something in the air about films over the last 12 months. Independent film has triumphed, national cinema output and the publics’ voracious appetite for foreign film is glorious, and a notorious head to head summer blockbuster brought people back to the cinema in droves for the first time since before the pandemic.
- Poor Things
FFTake: Yorgos Lanthimos is on a stunning role at the moment, his daring creative choices are like nothing the audience has ever seen. This has a real chance at scooping the top prize, and if not, has a great chance in directing, acting and screenplay categories, likely to be a big winner this year.
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Production Companies: Film4, Element Pictures, TSG Entertainment
Distributors: Searchlight
2. Anatomy of a Fall
FFTake: Anatomy of a Fall examines the fall, but not the fall out – that’s your job. Justine Triet’s direction is outstanding (how was the snow white but also blue but also clear but also deceptive?), and her command over material that does not conform to typical courtroom tropes is commendable and avoids spoon feeding the viewer. The Palme D’oR winner from last year is a deserving nominee in this category.
Director: Justine Triet
Production Companies: Les Films Pelleas, Les films de Pierre
Distributors: Le Pacte
3. Oppenheimer
FFTake: Some people have labelled this a “history channel” movie in that it could have been made for TV such is the relatively linear nature of the film. I would argue that it’s more nuanced than that, partly down to the post-Manhattan project courtroom sequences bringing you on another track, but largely down to Murphy’s performance.
Director: Christopher Nolan
Production Companies: Syncopy and Atlas Entertainment
Distributors: Universal Pictures
4. Killers of the Flower Moon
FFTake: It is unlikely that this will take the top spot for Best Picture, despite the central story the kind of bait that the Academy is swayed by. What is more likely is a Best Actress win for Lily Gladstone, in fact it’s almost guaranteed.
Director: Martin Scorsese:
Production Companies: Apple
Distributors: Apple
5. Past Lives
FFTake: There is a strong, outside possibility that this lovely, slow burn of a film will take the top spot at the Academy Awards this year. It benefits not only from being distributed by A24 (the reigning champion that won Best Picture last year in a landslide for Everything Everywhere All at Once), but this film deeply affected people on a human level. The themes of acceptance, regret and the beauty and pain of the human experience of connection has managed to captivate audiences all over the world.
Director: Celine Song
Production Company: CJ Entertainment
Distributor: A24
7. Barbie
FFTake: Unlike the excellent marketing campaign that preceded it, the film wasn’t even fun to watch. The one element it should have delivered on was comedy and it fell flat – in a packed theatre there were virtually no belly laughs. But most of all, it was Noah Baumbauch and Gretta Gerwig that surprised me the most – former indie filmmakers, turned Hollywood Golden Gooses. Their gorgeous human-driven repertoires that speak to the individual are so at odds with this society-bashing drivel.
Director: Greta Gerwig
Production Company & Distributor: Warner Bros.
7. The Holdovers
8. American Fiction
9. Maestro
10. The Zone of Interest
FILM FOR THOUGHT 