Well, last night was the Academy Awards ceremony honoring the films from the 2024 film year (even though every other resource will call it the 2025 Oscars because of when the ceremony happened). Unfortunately I was unable to watch any second of it, as I was making a long distance drive from Santa Fe, New Mexico to Glendale, Arizona where I'll be staying in watching baseball spring training. But believe me I was keeping abreast of the winners whenever I can. And for the most part, it seems that most of the winners were what pundits were expecting. The categories that were the biggest surprise, it seems, were the animation categories.
Early on in the season it seemed that Flow was an early favorite for Best Animated Feature, winning a few critics prizes. But then The Wild Robot came steamrolling onto the scene, winning award after award and sweeping the Annies. It got to the point where most people thought that The Wild Robot was a lock, since it was after all a brilliant film despite being a big budget studio film. And yet when the dust settled on Oscars night, the winner turned out to be: Flow!
And then there was Best Animated Short...
The short categories are usually a big confusing mess for Oscar predictors, since they're usually difficult to find and there are very little to no precursors that can guide the thought processes of the voters. Best Animated Short is one exception, since the nominees are usually much more accessible, and more importantly it does have some sort of precursors with awards bodies such as the Annies and the BAFTAs giving out animated short prizes. And when Wander to Wonder won the Annies over two of its direct competitors before capturing BAFTAs shortly after I published my review, I thought the race was over. I thought Wander to Wonder was a lock. As I pointed out in my review (and what I heard repeated in a few other avenues), every Annie winner for Best Animated Short Subject or Best Animated Special Production since 2006 had won the Oscar unless it was to a film that was not nominated at the Annies. And this year the only nominee that was not represented at the Annies was Magic Candies, which while I enjoyed I did not feel was strong enough to get Wander to Wonder a challenge. You'd have to go back to The Moon and the Son to find a film that lost an Annie (to Bill Plympton's The Fan and the Flower which wasn't even nominated at the Oscars) and then won the Oscar.
But the Academy is not the same voting body as the Annies, and as such many people found Wander to Wonder too weird to have a chance at Oscar glory. I saw a lot of people coalescing their predictions around some of the more entertaining films such as Beurk! and Magic Candies. I saw people predict the films that lost to Wander to Wonder at the Annies in Beautiful Men and In the Shadow of the Cypress. And yes, I saw people sticking with Wander to Wonder because of the precursor support. By yesterday it seemed that the Best Animated Short race was a toss-up. And yet when the award was being announced (or in my case when I refreshed IMDb), I saw the Oscar had gone to...
In the Shadow of the Cypress
That's right, just like Flow, the Academy had voted for a dialogue-free foreign independent production full of symbolism and visual metaphors. I thought In the Shadow of the Cypress was certainly a worthy film for the upset, as I had ranked it second in quality. But when I read on Cartoon Brew the filmmakers had some visa problems preventing them from coming to America, I thought that hurt their chances. Evidently not, as not only did they win but they were even able to attend the Oscars and give a cathartic speech. I'm happy for them.
As far as the rest of the ceremony goes, it went pretty much as expected. Anora had emerged as the front-runner with its wins in PGA, DGA, WGA and Mikey Madison winning Best Actress at the BAFTAs. The fact it lost the Best Ensemble award at SAGs to Conclave did give some people pause, but in the end Anora ended up with Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress (for Madison), Best Original Screenplay, and Best Editing while Conclave won just Best Adapted Screenplay. Meanwhile Emilia Perez, the highly panned French musical about Mexico that the public was freaking out because it earned 13 nominations, didn't quite go empty handed to end The Turning Point and The Color Purple's misery. It won Best Supporting Actress for Zoe Saldana and Best Original Song for "El Mal," but it did end up losing Best International Film to another Best Picture nominee, Brazil's I'm Still Here.
The other early Best Picture favorite, Brady Corbet's 3.5 hour epic The Brutalist, was the second biggest winner of the night, but its wins were only in Best Actor (for Adrien Brody), Best Cinematography, and Best Original Score. Dune Part Two, the highly anticipated sequel to Dune Part One, didn't quite capture its predecessor's haul of six wins, but it still did well in winning Best Sound and Best Visual Effects. Wicked also won twice in technical categories, namely Best Costume Design and Best Production Design. The Substance's Demi Moore was an early favorite for Best Actress, but her hopes were dashed when Madison won for Anora, but The Substance still won for Best Makeup and Hairstyling. Meanwhile Kieran Culkin completed his utter domination of the awards season with his Best Supporting Actor win for A Real Pain.
Meanwhile No Other Land won for Best Documentary Feature, The Only Girl in the Orchestra won for Best Documentary Short, and I'm Not a Robot won for Best Live Action Short. I haven't seen those films. In fact I haven't seen many of these films. I was mostly focused on Best Animated Short and I was just pleased that I was able to continue my streak of watching all the nominees for every year since 1946 (darn you Rippling Romance!) It's not as bad as 2022 when the only Best Picture nominee I saw (and have still seen) was Everything Everywhere All at Once, but it's still pretty bad.
Anyways, complete winners list
Best Animated Short: In the Shadow of the Cypress
Best Animated Feature: Flow
Best Picture: Anora
Best Director: Sean Baker, Anora
Best Actor: Adrien Brody, The Brutalist
Best Actress: Mikey Madison, Anora
Best Supporting Actor: Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain
Best Supporting Actress: Zoe Saldana, Emilia Perez
Best Original Screenplay: Anora
Best Adapted Screenplay: Conclave
Best Editing: Anora
Best Cinematography: The Brutalist
Best Costume Design: Wicked
Best Original Score: The Brutalist
Best Original Song: "El Mal," Emilia Perez
Best Production Design: Wicked
Best Sound: Dune Part Two
Best Visual Effects: Dune Part Two
Best Makeup and Hairstyling: The Substance
Best International Film: I'm Still Here, Brazil
Best Documentary Feature: No Other Land
Best Documentary Short: The Only Girl in the Orchestra
Best Live Action Short: I'm Not a Robot
Anora: 5 wins
The Brutalist: 3 wins
Dune Part Two: 2 wins
Emilia Perez: 2 wins
Wicked: 2 wins
Conclave: 1 win
Flow: 1 win
I'm Not a Robot: 1 win
I'm Still Here: 1 win
In the Shadow of the Cypress: 1 win
No Other Land: 1 win
The Only Girl in the Orchestra: 1 win
A Real Pain: 1 win
The Substance: 1 win
A Complete Unknown: 0 wins
Nickel Boys: 0 wins
Also, Captain Celaeno has an Oscar!
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