If I Was the Only One Who Voted for the Oscars, Vol. 4
“Maybe, with good luck, we’ll find what eluded us in the places we once called home.”
It was an interesting year for film! We’re not all the way back to normal (Paramount refuses to let us have Tom Cruise and Disney refuses to let us have Pixar in theaters), but 2021 certainly weathered a whole hell of a lot that once dismantled the 2020 movie scene. Should it have? Perhaps not. But we have movies anyway and, as such, we have fodder for my favorite piece to write this year and every year: If I Was the Only One Who Voted for the Oscars. This my fourth year embarking on this endeavor (though, I’ve started making a Google Sheet to head back all the way to 1930) and it still always feels so special! I love just thinking about the award show as it should be, in my own mind. And it’s always fun to see how others categorize these, too. This year, you’ll see a Dual Winner for the first time (and some Duel winners, if you know what I mean). You’ll also see three new categories: Best Young Actor, Best Directorial Debut, and Best Ensemble Cast. These are categories that are a part of other, non-Oscar award ceremonies; I’ve always had a proclivity for them. So, I’ve added them here. After all, this is the Oscars as they should be, no?
One last thing. There will be lots of spoilers for the movies of 2021. I can’t necessarily say which movies without spoiling the awards, but some of the winners — by virtue of who they are — are spoilers in and of themselves. Basically, don’t read this if you haven’t seen Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Best Picture
Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar (Lionsgate)
Encanto (Disney)
The French Dispatch (Searchlight)
The Green Knight (A24)
In the Heights (Warner Brothers)
The Last Duel (Fox)
Minari (A24)
Spider-Man: No Way Home (Sony)
Tick, Tick, Boom! (Netflix)
The Tragedy of Macbeth (Apple)
The Best Picture category always comes first because I’ve already revealed the winner in my Best Movies of 2021 article! Yes, Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar has joined the echelon of movies I’ve considered to be the best of the year. Jurassic Park for 1993, The Emperor’s New Groove for 2000. And now, the silliest comedy of the year also winds up being my personal favorite. This is one of the only websites where you can see furniture salespeople-turned-spies on vacation defeat Shakespeare, Sondheim, Spielberg, and Spider-Man.
Previous Winners: The Old Man and the Gun (Searchlight), Avengers: Endgame (Marvel), Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions (Disney)
Best Young Actor
Reyn Doi for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Robyn Elwell for The Lost Daughter
Alan Kim for Minari
Violet McGraw for Our Friend
Millicent Simmonds for A Quiet Place Part II
Now, it’s time for the first new category of the year! I’ve always wished the Oscars would feature this category, as well as the next two (also new for Vol. 4), so I could include them in my own Oscars. But then I realized: What am I waiting for? These are my Oscars. I can have these categories and no one will judge them because no one cares anyway! So, it’s time to celebrate the best young performer of the year. They all have a good claim! Reyn Doi is so funny, Millicent Simmonds has more than proven herself already, and Robyn Elwell made me never want to have children of my own. I did consider giving the win to Violet McGraw on the coattails of my love for her as Young Nell on The Haunting of Hill House. But Alan Kim in Minari? I mean, not only does he have the most substantive role in the film, but he also might be giving the best performance of any other actor in it. Plus, his interviews were so sweet! The awards circuit is influenced by that!
Previous Winners: Not applicable
Best Directorial Debut
Enrico Casarosa for Luca
Josh Greenbaum for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Maggie Gyllenhaal for The Lost Daughter
Lin-Manuel Miranda for Tick, Tick, Boom!
Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson for Summer of Soul
This was a tough one to decide a winner for. Lin-Manuel had the flashiest direction, certainly. Enrico Casarosa might be Pixar’s most exciting new voice since Lee Unkrich. Josh Greenbaum directed my favorite movie of the year! Questlove is a creative force! But of them all, I felt like Maggie Gyllenhaal’s direction was so beyond-its-years confident, controlled, and precise. Her debut feature felt like the Oscar-winning work of a Noah Baumbach or a Jane Campion at their best. She’s just so ready and with it that I knew in a couple years, I’d look back on it as a mistake if I did not award her. She’s almost certainly due to become one of our finest filmmakers, whereas people like Lin-Manuel Miranda and Questlove will not solely dedicate their careers to movie directing. Forget about the meta narratives, though. The Lost Daughter was a great film and Gyllenhaal’s direction deserves a huge share of the credit.
Previous Winners: Not applicable
Best Ensemble Cast
The French Dispatch
The Harder They Fall
Licorice Pizza
The Lost Daughter
The Power of the Dog
There are two things I considered for this category: the batting average of the performances among the cast (The Lost Daughter and The Power of the Dog are probably the best-acted films of 2021) and the sheer volume of the stars (Licorice Pizza has Alana Haim and Sean Penn and Bradley Cooper and Maya Rudolph and Skyler Gisondo; The Harder They Fall has Lakeith Stanfield and Jonathan Majors and Idris Elba and Zazie Beetz). The biggest crossover between the two comes from The French Dispatch. Divided into four distinct segments with performers (both new and veteran to the Wes Anderson oeuvre), each of the stars anchors the film in craft and story. Adrien Brody is employed hilariously, Timothee Chalamet fits into the troupe perfectly, Jeffrey Wright gets the best scene, Owen Wilson has charm. Bill Murray! Jason Schwartzman! Tilda Swinton! Even Henry Winkler pops up! And is it perhaps a way for me to award Saoirse Ronan once more? Who’s to say?
Previous Winners: Not applicable
Best Acting in a Cameo Role
Matt Damon for No Sudden Move
Pete Davidson for The Suicide Squad
Andy Garcia for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Andrew Garfield for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Tobey Maguire for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Putting aside my desperate attempt to slot Bradford How in Worth somehow into this mix, could you even consider Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire as cameos in Spider-Man? Were they perhaps more of supporting performers, as they had multiple scenes in the film? Whereas Andy Garcia and Pete Davidson pop up solely to be funny and Matt Damon has already long been the Cameo King? Maybe. But this might be the only chance to award Tobey Maguire for his portrayal of Peter Parker and I’m not going to pass up the chance. To me, this was what I imagine many felt like seeing Harrison Ford as Han Solo again. I’ll have plenty more to say about Tobey in a separate piece, but considering that the studio has no official still of him in the movie, I’m going to justify this as a cameo.
Previous Winners: Dick Van Dyke for Mary Poppins Returns, Rene Russo for Avengers: Endgame, Michael Keaton for The Trial of the Chicago 7
Best Acting in a Voice-Over or Motion Capture Role
Awkwafina for Raya and the Last Dragon
Stephanie Beatriz for Encanto
Caleb Landry Jones for Finch
John Leguizamo for Encanto
Kelly Marie Tran for Raya and the Last Dragon
Trust me, I also regret not supporting Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse by letting it win and honoring Jake Johnson for it (the greatest voice-over performance ever in film, maybe). I was just so enamored with the princess scene from Ralph Breaks the Internet and Thanos. They were neat! But I understand now. Fortunately, the brilliance of Encanto is apparent to me now. And even though everyone in this category has a solid argument (and I really considered Tran for so long), I just kept thinking of how different Mirabel was from Rosa Diaz on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. Beatriz’s range is incredible.
Previous Winners: Josh Brolin for Avengers: Infinity War, Tom Hanks for Toy Story 4, Jamie Foxx for Soul
Best Visual Effects
Nicholas Bateman for The Green Knight
Stephane Ceretti for Eternals
Dan Glass for The Matrix Resurrections
Paul Lambert for Dune
Chris Waegner for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Let’s be honest. The biggest special effect of Eternals was how hot Gemma Chan and Dick Madden are. Taking that out of the equation, it’s an easy one to award here. All the effects in this category are good and solid, but The Green Knight is expansive and ethereal with the visuals. Implemented at the right moments and never over-the-top, I was awed by what The Green Knight was able to bring to the screen with a fraction of the budget that the other films listed here. Nice job, Bateman.
Previous Winners: Christopher Lawrence for Christopher Robin, Dan DeLeeuw for Avengers: Endgame, Jonathan Dearing for The Invisible Man
Best Film Editing
Myron Kerstein and Andrew Weisblum for Tick, Tick, Boom!
David Lowery for The Green Knight
Joshua Pearson for Summer of Soul
Brett M. Reed for Old
Claire Simpson for The Last Duel
You could make the case for any winner here and I’d be happy with it. Old never let us forget the stakes and the character alignments through the never-too-flashy editing. The Last Duel managed to make the (slightly) same story told three times never feel boring or trite or redundant. The Green Knight was a pure distillation of the passage of time over the course of the hero’s journey. And Tick, Tick, Boom! navigates the dangerous waters of a framing device within a framing device that wouldn’t be obvious to non-Broadway nerds. But really, I respect Questlove and (in this specific case) Joshua Pearson for combing through hundreds of hours of footage to craft a narrative for the Summer of Soul while also never sacrificing the brilliance of the musical performances themselves. It’s impressive documentary editing in the same way Get Back was for television.
Previous Winners: Nicholas D. Johnson and Will Merrick for Searching, Monica Salazar for Honey Boy, Matthew Friedman for Palm Springs
Best Costume Design
Milena Canonero for The French Dispatch
Paco Delgado for Jungle Cruise
Odile Dicks-Mireaux for Last Night in Soho
Paul Tazewell for West Side Story
Malgosia Turzanska for The Green Knight
Maybe if The African Queen never existed, Jungle Cruise would waltz to an easy victory here. But alas, if The African Queen never existed, neither would Jungle Cruise. So you honor the homage, but you don’t award it. Interestingly, the movie that is the more obvious homage (West Side Story, a direct remake) actually dares to do something original with its costume design. Even though the color configurations are about as obvious as the early tribe sorting on Survivor, it’s still impeccably done and with a purpose towards the overall goal of the story. Contrast that with Last Night in Soho, which was a film de facto “about” fashion, but never did anything except produce some super cool costumes. It’s West in a walk.
Previous Winners: Sandy Powell for Mary Poppins Returns, Noma Moriceau for Aladdin, Phoenix Mellow for Sylvie’s Love
Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Judy Chin and Kay Georgiou for West Side Story
Marjorie Durand for Passing
Patt Foad, Barrie Gower, and Daniel Phillips for No Time to Die
Moung Hui Park for Minari
Matteo Silvi and Luca Vannella for The Last Duel
This one was not so easy. Ultimately, it was a distinction between Passing and The Last Duel. I respected Passing for its ability to use contrasting makeup styles (filmed in black-and-white as a consideration, no less), but The Last Duel just knocked me out with the intricacies and accuracies (and inaccuracies, no less) of the hair design across every fragmented fable. If there was one trophy for Hair and one for Makeup, this would be much easier. Instead, The Last Duel just blended both crafts slightly more interestingly (for me) than Passing managed to. Both would be worthy winners, of course.
Previous Winners: Kimberly Kimble for A Wrinkle in Time, Frida Aradottir for Little Women, Anna Cash for Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
Best Cinematography
Bruno Delbonnel for The Tragedy of Macbeth
Janusz Kamiński for West Side Story
Lachlan Milne for Minari
Andrew Droz Palermo for The Green Knight
Robert Yeoman for The French Dispatch
No brainer here. Previous winners have had great cinematography, but this is the first film to win this category that I feel belongs in the all-time pantheon of the art form. Camera movement wasn’t quite as electric as it was in West Side Story, but everything else Delbonnel brings to the Shakespearean retelling is masterful. The composition of every shot is careful and curated. The black-and-white shooting style contributes brilliantly to the film’s intentional sense of minimalism. And that’s all without even considering some of the year’s most beautiful scenes coming from this film (one witch standing on land while an aquatic reflection shows three of them/the full force of autumn entering Macbeth’s castle). It’s really just an overall feat and feast. The Tragedy of Macbeth is the clearest winner of any category in this article.
Previous Winners: Alfonso Cuaron for Roma, Yorick Le Saux for Little Women, Ethan Palmer for Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions
Best Production Design
Nelson Coates for In the Heights
Stefan Dechant for The Tragedy of Macbeth
Jon Hutman for Being the Ricardos
Steve Saklad for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Adam Stockhausen for The French Dispatch
Continuing with Macbeth, I also loved how the production design of the film could vacillate between a minimalist set that one might even see on stage and a soaring vista that reflects the most gorgeous annals of Scotland. And while In the Heights delivered the best bodega ever seen on screen and Barb and Star produced a gorgeously pastel hotel room and Being the Ricardos re-upped some brilliant 1950s aesthetics (and a flawless recreation of the classic I Love Lucy set), the winner is always clear here when a Wes Anderson movie is released. Wes Anderson and Adam Stockhausen think about every millimeter of what the camera can see and they layer every scene and every moment impeccably. The sets, the props, the practical nature. This category exists to honor the work of Anderson and Stockhausen. The French Dispatch is no exception. Just watch the sky when Wes goes wide in any of the segments. There is always something happening.
Previous Winners: John Myhre for Mary Poppins Returns, Barbara Ling for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Jason Kisvarday for Palm Springs
Best Sound Design
Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn for A Quiet Place Part II
Craig Berkey for The Tragedy of Macbeth
Lewis Goldstein for In the Heights
Nia Hansen for Encanto
Paul Hsu for Tick, Tick, Boom!
It was tempting to once again honor Aadahl and Van der Ryn for crafting movies that are wholly and literally about sound and its absence. But to win this twice for the same franchise, I would’ve had to see them challenge themselves. Instead, it was “just” a continuation of the same brilliance we saw in 2018. Alternatively, I felt like Tick, Tick, Boom! was the way to go. It doesn’t necessarily do anything better than the other musicals on this list, but the editing felt smooth and seamless from an audio standpoint. Plus, the overall integration of instruments with voices (both real and imagined), as well as common, everyday noises that standout amidst the stunning music? To pull that off, one has to be so in tune with the musicality of the world around them. Fortunately, Paul Hsu (and Lin-Manuel Miranda, by extension) assuredly are.
Previous Winners: Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn for A Quiet Place, Warren Shaw for Uncut Gems, Craig Jackson for Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
Best Original Score
Alexandre Desplat for The French Dispatch
Germaine Franco for Encanto
Michael Giacchino for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Jonny Greenwood for The Power of the Dog
Emile Mosseri for Minari
Yes, I am aware that Hans Zimmer apparently invented instruments for Dune. But it still felt like a lot of foghorn nonsense to me. Instead, I found these scores much more enticing. Desplat and Greenwood always hit and when a Disney score soars, it’s as good as the greats (see: John Williams). And while I did appreciate Giacchino’s weaving of multiple Spider-Man orchestrals, the Minari score was my favorite of 2021 the minute I heard it. It seems to evoke all the film’s loveliest imagery before you even see it. I’d not heard of Emile Mosseri before seeing Minari, but he’s instantly vaulted into the echelon of my favorite working composers.
Previous Winners: Marc Shaiman for Mary Poppins Returns, Alan Silvestri for Avengers: Endgame, Jon Batiste, Trent Reznor, and Atticus Ross for Soul
Best Original Song
“Edgar’s Prayer” by Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig from Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
“The Family Madrigal” by Lin-Manuel Miranda from Encanto
“No Time to Die” by Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell from No Time to Die
“Surface Pressure” by Lin-Manuel Miranda from Encanto
“We Don’t Talk About Bruno” by Lin-Manuel Miranda from Encanto
I might come to regret the fact that I did not choose a song from Encanto as the winner for this category (after all, I did nominate three of them and vote splitting does not exist when you’re the only one voting). The songs are impeccable throughout Disney’s sixtieth animated film and they might have more staying power, ultimately. But “Edgar’s Prayer” is a revelation. There is a whole oral history for it! It’s when Barb and Star went from an amusing comedy to an all-timer in the pantheon of Dave Wheelroute’s film taste. It’s also the only song on the list that includes the lyric, “Seagull in the sand, can you hear my prayer?” That’s why we go to the movies! It remains my favorite category for that exact reason.
Previous Winners: “All the Stars” by Kendrick Lamar from Black Panther, “Some Things Never Change” by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez from Frozen II, “Húsavík (My Hometown)” by Fat Max Gsus, Rickard Göransson, and Savan Kotecha from Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
Best Documentary
Disney’s FastPass: A Complicated History (YouTube)
Roadrunner (Focus)
Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street (Focus)
Summer of Soul (Searchlight)
Who Are You, Charlie Brown? (Apple)
Going into this year, I thought the documentary about Anthony Bourdain, Roadrunner, would be the runaway victor in this category. But as it turns out, Questlove unpacking the oft-obscured Harlem Cultural Festival was much more riveting. Everyone from Stevie Wonder to Nina Simone appeared at the festival, but it took Questlove and an archival team to share the high-octane musical footage with the world. It should win the real Oscar! The stories of Disney’s FastPass system, Sesame Street, and Charles Schulz were all cool, too. But Summer of Soul is the clear doc standout in 2021.
Previous Winners: Won’t You Be My Neighbor? (Focus), Chasing Happiness (Amazon), Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions (Disney)
Best Animated Feature Film
Encanto (Disney)
Luca (Pixar)
The Mitchells vs. the Machines (Netflix)
Raya and the Last Dragon (Disney)
Vivo (Netflix)
If you haven’t been able to tell, Lin-Manuel Miranda had himself quite the year. He’s partially responsible for two of the films here! Unfortunately, Vivo did not meet the expectations that come from his involvement, but Encanto certainly did. And in a year of a quaint, charming Pixar story in Italy and an expansive, world-building epic from Disney Animation, it’s still Encanto that pulled through. Raya and Luca were delightful, but Encanto is the one that will persist into Disney’s future. Plus, the animation is dynamic, the songs are undeniable, and the entire narrative is just next-level. It’s one of the greats and one I won’t regret awarding!
Previous Winners: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Sony), Toy Story 4 (Pixar), Soul (Pixar)
Best Adapted Screenplay
Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and Nicole Holofcener for The Last Duel
Maggie Gyllenhaal for The Lost Daughter
Brad Ingelsby for Our Friend
Tony Kushner for West Side Story
David Lowery for The Green Knight
This website wasn’t around in 1997 or else I would’ve certainly awarded Affleck and Damon for their impeccable, eternal Good Will Hunting script. Fortunately, in 2021, I am able to award them for the first movie they wrote together since that breakout behemoth. Yet, it’s not just them! As it turns out, Affleck and Damon are still great writers and were also thankfully buoyed by Nicole Holofcener, who wrote the female perspective of The Last Duel’s recycled narrative structure. Kushner, Lowery, Ingelsby, and Gyllenhaal are all top-notch, but The Last Duel was truly a cut above the competition here. The Last Duel, with its ruminations on truth, masculinity, and worth, had something vital to say and it did so on the heels of its quality screenplay.
Previous Winners: David Lowery for The Old Man and the Gun, Greta Gerwig for Little Women, Kemp Powers for One Night in Miami
Best Original Screenplay
Wes Anderson for The French Dispatch
Sean Baker and Chris Bergoch for Red Rocket
Lee Isaac Chung for Minari
Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Ed Solomon for No Sudden Move
The Original Screenplay category is always a fun one at the real Academy Awards and it’s no exception here. Typically, I am always riveted by creative scripts that push boundaries and levy new challenges for the viewers. This time, I had to give the screenplay victory to the film with the tightest, funniest wording. It’s not easy to write comedies, but Mumolo and Wiig are exceedingly deft at it. It’s likely that every page of their Barb and Star treatment is littered with three to four jokes and almost all of them land. That’s a screenplay achievement if I ever saw one, without even referring to the surprisingly tight plotting (with some excellent payoffs, too). Someone had to come up with the “Seafood Jam,” after all.
Previous Winners: Drew Goddard for Bad Times at the El Royale, Rian Johnson for Knives Out, Aaron Sorkin for The Trial of the Chicago 7
Best Supporting Actor
Ben Affleck for The Last Duel
Bradley Cooper for Licorice Pizza
Mike Faist for West Side Story
Tobey Maguire for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Jesse Plemons for Jungle Cruise
Plemons and Cooper are so goofy here! Faist is revelatory! And Tobey, for the first time in the history of these articles, transcended the Cameo category to take Jason Segel’s (Our Friend) spot at the last minute. But the winner is clear. At times, this category can come across like a coronation of sorts. Other times, it’s the spot where venerated veterans finally retain their hardware. This time, it’s Veteran Season for one of our very best movie stars, Ben Affleck. Everyone here is doing great work, but as soon as Affleck seethed foul language through the frosted tip frame of gritted teeth, the award was his. He has more career missteps than most (Pearl Harbor, Reindeer Games, Batman v. Superman). But it’s really heartening to see him comfortable as himself at this stage of his career, even sending up frequent public perceptions of him here. An impeccable actor, a thoughtful Hollywood figure, and a great significant other for Jennifer Lopez to have. It’s the Affleck he was always meant to be and his turn in The Last Duel might be the best performance of his career yet.
Previous Winners: Tim Blake Nelson for The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, Brad Pitt for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Leslie Odom, Jr. for One Night in Miami
Best Supporting Actress
Jessie Buckley for The Lost Daughter
Jodie Comer for The Last Duel
Ariana DeBose for West Side Story
Kirsten Dunst for The Power of the Dog
Kathryn Hunter for The Tragedy of Macbeth
The Last Duel was just an undeniable acting powerhouse, folks. The only reason you won’t see Matt Damon and Adam Driver in the next category is because it was already so damn stacked. Jodie Comer is one of the most thrilling up-and-coming stars we have and her role in The Last Duel is a complicated one. Unlike Affleck, her role in the film’s story has to differ across the multiple perspectives, but those differences can only come from her performance. On top of it, her perspective has to be the most fully authentic of the bunch. She’s hardly victorious by the end, but Comer gives us exactly what we need to understand about her role in the whole story. She’s a gifted thespian. (I did strive to find room for Saoirse Ronan in The French Dispatch, but even I couldn’t justify that minimal screentime in the face of these five women, who thundered memorably across the screen.)
Previous Winners: Claire Foy for First Man, Ana de Armas for Knives Out, Saoirse Ronan for Ammonite
Best Actor
Andrew Garfield for Tick, Tick, Boom!
Dev Patel for The Green Knight
Anthony Ramos for In the Heights
Simon Rex for Red Rocket
Steven Yeun for Minari
You know a category is stacked when I truly could not find room for Denzel Washington’s stoic, understated portrayal of an aging, desperate Macbeth. Denzel was so good! And yet, these five were better, in my opinion. “Better” is the wrong word. I don’t know. They just impacted me differently. Anthony Ramos as Usnavi? There was no stronger choice for the role. Steven Yeun in Minari? Sometimes, leaving a popular show can be the best of things for an actor. And then there’s Dev Patel, finally embracing his due after his 2020 summer star turns were shunted by COVID-19 delays. This is all without mentioning Simon Rex, who delivers a charmingly frustrating and despicable performance in Sean Baker’s down-to-earth Red Rocket. Many compared Rex to Adam Sandler in Uncut Gems because they never expected the guy from Scary Movie to deliver an Academy-caliber scene (let alone film). I counter that surprise with awe because I didn’t even know who Rex was before this! But while all of these actors astonished this year, it’s still Andrew Garfield who left me with the most feelings of witnessed brilliance. As Jonathan Larson, Garfield was required to embrace that classic Lin-Manuel motif of not having enough time for creativity. He’s simultaneously tortured, anxious, and creatively explosive. Throw in some raucous musical numbers, nuanced betrayals of love, and a vehicle all his own and you’ve got a role that was just begging for an Oscar. But it’s Garfield’s deftness and verisimilitude that elevate the role to its fullest potential.
Previous Winners: Robert Redford for The Old Man and the Gun, Adam Sandler for Uncut Gems, Chadwick Boseman for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
Best Actress
Olivia Colman for The Lost Daughter
Alana Haim for Licorice Pizza
Nicole Kidman for Being the Ricardos
Kristen Wiig for Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Rachel Zegler for West Side Story
I know everyone hates Nicole Kidman as Lucille Ball, but there are moments where she truly soared. Olivia Colman may be walking away with her second Oscar at the real ceremony, but not here. Alana Haim proves she might be an EGOT contender one day. And Kristen Wiig plays two comedic roles to perfection. But only one of these nominees was the best part of West Side Story. It’s already an impossible task to imagine remaking one of the great American musicals in the first place. It’s another to take on the lead role and heaps of scrutiny — exacerbated by delays and production standstills and, eventually, a less-than-thrilling box office result. But throughout it all, Rachel Zegler remains untouched and full of promise as a future cinematic star. That’s because her performance as Maria is note-perfect. She is not only the best Maria the show has ever seen, but she has also become the person most synonymous with West Side Story this side of Sondheim and Moreno. She is this story. Zegler’s Maria is full of depth and wit, heartbreak and emotionality. She is the character we were led to believe in and all of the flaws make way more sense under her beyond-her-years empathy for the lead role. Plus, she did this all with Ansel Elgort as a scene partner and it was never short of believable. This category is our clearest coronation yet.
Previous Winners: Emily Blunt for Mary Poppins Returns, Saoirse Ronan for Little Women, Elisabeth Moss for The Invisible Man
Best Director
Lee Isaac Chung for Minari
Joel Coen for The Tragedy of Macbeth
David Lowery for The Green Knight
Ridley Scott for The Last Duel
Steven Spielberg for West Side Story
You know it’s a stacked year when Paul Thomas Anderson, Jane Campion, and Wes Anderson don’t make the Best Director category. Especially since PTA sometimes feels like my favorite director! Other days, though, it’s Spielberg. And some days, it’s Lowery. And Scott, of course, made my favorite movie of all-time. But most consistently? It’s probably Joel Coen, which results in perfect timing because I believe his directorial effort from 2021 was the strongest output from any filmmaker. Yes, I liked other movies more, but from the vantage point of strictly direction, it has to be Coen. His changes to time-honored Shakespeare are valuable while he still manages to hone and shape the original Macbeth to Coen sensibilities. He extracts masterful performances from every actor on screen and he is in control of every single frame of the movie. The Tragedy of Macbeth is many things, but they all begin from the creative efforts of Joel Coen. On top of it all, he didn’t have Ethan for the first time in his career. There is no better time to honor one of our great cinematic luminaries.
Previous Winners: David Lowery for The Old Man and the Gun, Greta Gerwig for Little Women, Pete Docter and Kemp Powers for Soul
The Robert Redford Award for Lifetime Achievement
Ridley Scott and Emma Watson
I wasn’t sure if I wanted to award two people, but I eventually decided I wanted to and these rules are all made up anyway, so who cares? I don’t want to wait until Ridley Scott dies to honor him. Why not celebrate him why he’s still alive? But Emma Watson also essentially retired from acting in 2021, so how can I not honor her, too? The solution is to simply honor both. Because I’m only going to be alive for seventy more years at most and there’s a lot more than seventy-five people I’d like to honor here. So, I’ll do what feels right.
Ridley Scott is undeniably one of the best directors to ever live. Most importantly, to me, he directed my favorite film ever, The Martian. As aforementioned, that automatically catapults him into the territory of My Favorite Director. In addition to his work on The Martian (he was nearly eighty when he made it! And well into his eighties on The Last Duel!), he also directed films like Alien, Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise, Gladiator, Black Hawk Down, and All the Money in the World. If you’re keeping track, those all come in separate, successive decades. This means that Ridley Scott is not only comparable to Steven Spielberg, in that he has crafted a classic in every decade since the 1970s (see: Jaws, E.T., Jurassic Park, Catch Me If You Can, Lincoln, West Side Story), but also to Stanley Kubrick in that his films are so varied and could arguably be considered the best in their respective genres, if not among the all-time best in each category. That’s a remarkable resume! 2021 was definitely the year to honor him because he delivered both The Last Duel and House of Gucci. I wasn’t a big fan of Gucci, but there will be no better year to honor Scott than this one. Thank you for The Martian.
Emma Watson is an actor who is superbly special to me and, I’m sure, to many in my generation. She did not technically retire from acting (she later clarified), but it is quite clear that it is not her top priority and she’s certainly retired from any sort of regular screen presence. With her also becoming the leading champion behind HBO Max’s Harry Potter reunion, this seemed like the time to celebrate her, just as I did with Redford and Curtis when they announced their respective retirements. Emma Watson is known to most as Hermione Granger in the eight impeccable Harry Potter films. She used her clout in those films for such goodwill and worked tirelessly to expand her influence beyond the fantasy realm. In addition to both prongs of her career there, she also starred as Belle in Beauty and the Beast and Meg in Little Women, two iconic characters in films I cherish. This is all without mentioning her memorable cameo in This Is the End, which did as much to break her from the Hermione typecasting as her first major post-Potter turn, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, did. She’s one of the best, most indelible, and — of course — brightest of her age.
On my aforementioned spreadsheet, Ridley Scott has six directing nominations (Alien, Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise, Gladiator, The Martian, and The Last Duel). He has one win (The Martian).
On my aforementioned spreadsheet, Emma Watson has three acting nominations (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1, and Little Women). She has one win (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 1).
Previous Winners: Robert Redford, Richard Curtis, Chadwick Boseman
Best Scene
The Duel in The Last Duel (Fox)
“Edgar’s Prayer” in Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar (Lionsgate)
Lucy at the Table Read in Being the Ricardos (Amazon)
The Spider-Men Meet in Spider-Man: No Way Home (Sony)
“When the Sun Goes Down” in In the Heights (Warner Brothers)
This was a tricky one to select. In past years, there has been a clear winner. This year, not so. These are all at similar levels of stunning to me. The scene from Being the Ricardos is what I wish the whole movie could have been (it featured Sorkin at his best since Steve Jobs). The final duel of The Last Duel is visceral, punishing, and astonishing. Obviously, I’ve also sung the praises of both “Edgar’s Prayer” and Tobey, Andrew, and Tom’s Spider-Men meeting already in this very article. But ultimately, I’m finding myself drawn to “When the Sun Goes Down” from In the Heights. It’s the number performed with magical realism — just like in classic Hollywood musicals — by Corey Hawkins’ and Leslie Grace’s Benny and Nina. It’s not the best-choreographed from In the Heights and not the most thematically-imperative. But it’s the one I think of the most whenever I remember the movie and there’s something about In the Heights that has come to define 2021 for me. I cannot define it, but doesn’t that just make it all the more magical?
Previous Winners: Thanos Snaps in Avengers: Infinity War (Marvel), Portals in Avengers: Endgame (Marvel), Song-Along in Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (Netflix)
Many have said that 2021 was a very strong year for movies. I think that’s definitely true when you compare it to how 2020 went, but there’s still some work to do to get back to where we were towards the end of the 2010s. Fortunately, there are always promising ideas lying in wait and many stellar ones you don’t see coming. That was true of 2021. The French Dispatch, while not Wes Anderson’s best, proved to be worthy of anticipation. Encanto lived up to every promise of modern Disney. Barb and Star was not even in my watchlist at first. And I didn’t know Minari existed until the Oscar buzz. In a way, this is how movies have always been. With each one, we get a little bit closer and a little bit more in love with the ways stories can be told.
Most Nominations
Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar, Encanto (9)
The Green Knight, The Last Duel, Minari, West Side Story (8)
The French Dispatch, Spider-Man: No Way Home (7)
The Lost Daughter, The Tragedy of Macbeth (6)
In the Heights, Tick, Tick, Boom! (5)
Being the Ricardos, Licorice Pizza, The Power of the Dog, Raya and the Last Dragon, Summer of Soul (3)
Jungle Cruise, Luca, No Sudden Move, No Time to Die, Our Friend, A Quiet Place Part II, Red Rocket (2)
Disney’s FastPass: A Complicated History, Dune, Eternals, Finch, The Harder They Fall, Last Night in Soho, The Matrix Resurrections, The Mitchells vs. the Machines, Old, Passing, Roadrunner, Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street, The Suicide Squad, Vivo, Who Are You Charlie Brown? (1)
Most Wins
The Last Duel (4)
Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar (3)
Encanto, The French Dispatch, Minari, Summer of Soul, Tick, Tick, Boom!, The Tragedy of Macbeth, West Side Story (2)
The Green Knight, In the Heights, The Lost Daughter, Spider-Man: No Way Home (1)
See also:
If I Was the Only One Who Voted for the Oscars, Vol. 1
