James Vanderbilt’s courtroom drama “Nuremberg” may be rooted in history, but it’s also quite possibly one of the season’s most timely and awards-worthy films. Centered on the first international tribunal that put Nazi leaders on trial, the film is a riveting psychological thriller that could be a formidable player across multiple Oscar categories.
What makes “Nuremberg” particularly compelling in today’s political landscape is how it interrogates the very foundations of justice itself. At a time when democratic institutions face unprecedented challenges globally, Vanderbilt’s film recounts historical events and forces audiences to confront uncomfortable questions about how societies reckon with evil and whether justice can truly be impartial when confronting the unthinkable.
At the heart of “Nuremberg” is Russell Crowe‘s towering turn as Hermann Göring, Hitler’s second-in-command. The Oscar winner hasn’t delivered work this commanding since Ron Howard’s “Cinderella Man” (2005). Here, Crowe captures the paradox of Göring’s charisma and monstrosity, portraying a man capable of seducing the room even as his crimes repulse the world. Crowe’s German dialogue, which he learned specifically for the role, adds a layer of authenticity, with his cat-and-mouse exchanges with Rami Malek’s Army psychiatrist Douglas Kelley crackling with intensity. It’s the kind of transformative, fully inhabited performance that could catapult him back into the thick of a very competitive best actor race.
The genius of Crowe’s portrayal lies in how he doesn’t take any shortcuts in portraying Göring entirely. A risky and morally complex character like this serves a crucial purpose: it reminds us that evil often wears a human face, speaks eloquently, and can even be charming. That’s also a credit to Vanderbilt’s complex script, which is based on “The Nazi and the Psychiatrist” by Jack El-Hai.
But Crowe isn’t the only standout. Rising star Leo Woodall, best known for “The White Lotus,” and who is currently starring in another TIFF film “Tuner,” cements himself as a force with his emotional turn as a translator caught in the tribunal’s web. Though he entered the project without speaking German, Woodall committed himself to mastering the language for the role, delivering a performance brimming with resonance and restraint. One scene he has late in the film reduces the audiences to tears, marking him as a dark horse worthy of serious supporting actor attention.
Beyond the acting showcases, “Nuremberg” has the goods to compete in several craft categories. Crisp production design meticulously recreates the claustrophobic cells and tribunal courtroom, while Dariusz Wolski’s camera work transports audiences back in time.
Adapted screenplay is another opportunity with Vanderbilt, best known for scripting “Zodiac” and “Truth,” finding a unique entry point into a well-documented chapter of history by focusing on the psychological duels between Kelley and Göring.
With Academy voters traditionally having shown an appetite in recent years for historical works that double as cautionary tales — such as “Oppenheimer” and “The Trial of the Chicago 7” — “Nuremberg” could also emerge as a sleeper candidate for best picture. But that will require a strong push from Sony Pictures Classics, no stranger to awards races.
The film’s timing is particularly prescient. As democracies face internal threats and international law struggles to contend with new forms of warfare and authoritarian manipulation, “Nuremberg” could be what the Oscars need at this moment.
It’s a film about the past that also has the fierce urgency of now.
Wagner Moura is no stranger to intense roles, but his latest performance in Kleber Mendonça Filho’s “The Secret Agent” may be the one that defines his career, at least to U.S. audiences.
The Brazilian actor, known to American audiences from Netflix’s “Narcos,” won the best actor prize at the Cannes Film Festival for his portrayal of Marcelo, a technology expert swept up in the political turmoil of Brazil’s waning dictatorship in 1977. Since then, the film has been on the festival circuit, making stops at the Telluride Film Festival, and now TIFF, building more buzz and launching Moura into serious contention for best actor.
Set during Recife’s carnival, the historical political thriller follows Marcelo as he attempts to flee persecution while reconnecting with his estranged son. For Moura, the role was both a homecoming and a reckoning.
“It was liberating to do something in Portuguese again,” Moura tells Variety. “The last time I acted in my language was more than a decade ago. To return to my home, to Recife, to work with Kleber — it was like going back to the roots of why I became an actor.”
Moura and Mendonça Filho’s connection dates back nearly two decades, when the actor first encountered the director’s shorts and, later, his breakthrough “Neighboring Sounds.” Moura recalls meeting him at Cannes in 2005, when Mendonça Filho was still a critic.
“He’s my cinematic soulmate,” Moura shares. “He’s deeply political, but also deeply Brazilian. He can take influences from American films of the 1970s — the lenses, the structure — and make it something that belongs only to Brazil. That’s rare.”
That creative fusion paid off at Cannes. “The Secret Agent” was one of the festival’s most celebrated titles, winning best director, the FIPRESCI Prize and the Art House Cinema Award, alongside Moura’s own acting honor. It would be picked up by Neon, and is now getting a full-court Oscar campaign, seeking noms for international feature and even, best picture.
Though Marcelo is the central character, the film’s emotional heart lies in his fractured relationship with his son Fernando. Moura admits he approached the roles in stages, first inhabiting Marcelo fully before considering Fernando.
“I wanted people to feel like they were watching two different people,” he says. “For me, it was about imagining what it meant for a child to grow up not knowing his father. I have three sons myself. My father passed away. That father-and-son theme — that’s what moves me the most as an actor.” He compares the emotional intensity to playing Hamlet in his early 30s. “That was the greatest acting experience of my life. And this film touched the same part of me.”
If Moura’s performance in “The Secret Agent” translates into an Oscar nomination, it would mark a historic milestone. In nearly a century of the Academy Awards, only five Latino men have ever been nominated for best actor — including José Ferrer, Anthony Quinn, Edward James Olmos, Demián Bichir and Colman Domingo. Moura would not only join their ranks as the sixth, but he would also be the first Brazilian ever recognized in the category, coming one year after Fernanda Torres from “I’m Still Here” became the second in best actress, following her mother Fernanda Montenegro 30 years earlier. “I’m Still Here” also picked up a surprise (and earned) best picture nomination, and went on to win international feature, the first for the country of Brazil.
Since “Narcos,” Moura has been selective about his roles in the United States. “Can you imagine the amount of offers I got to play drug dealers after that?” he says, shaking his head. “I felt a responsibility as a Latino actor not to reinforce stereotypes. I want the same kinds of roles any white American actor would be offered. That’s the real fight.”
He recalls constantly pushing for his characters to be Brazilian rather than generically “Latino.” “It’s strange — people rarely think of Brazilians when they say Latino. But I insist on it. Why not Brazilian?” Beyond acting, Moura is stepping behind the camera again. His 2017 feature “Marighella” tackled dictatorship head-on. Next up is “Last Night at the Lobster,” an English-language adaptation of Stewart O’Nan’s novel, produced by Peter Saraf (“Little Miss Sunshine”). The film, which he describes as an “anti-capitalist Christmas movie,” will star Elisabeth Moss, Brian Tyree Henry and Sofia Carson. Set in a Red Lobster franchise about to close during a snowstorm a week before Christmas, the story blends American holiday traditions with European realism.
“It’s about empathy and generosity. There’s no magic from Santa Claus. The magic comes from people,” Moura says.
The themes of “The Secret Agent” — memory, truth and resilience — resonate beyond Brazil. Moura sees echoes between his country’s recent struggles and the United States’ own democratic challenges. “Brazilians know what dictatorship is. Americans don’t,” he says bluntly. “That’s why we were efficient in defending democracy when our institutions were attacked. Here in the U.S., people sometimes take democracy for granted. That scares me.”
He worries about truth itself becoming malleable. “Facts don’t exist anymore. There are only versions, narratives. That’s dangerous.”
With “The Secret Agent” opening in Brazil this November through Vitrine Filmes, Moura stands at a new crossroads in his international career. Still, he remains grounded. “It’s about sticking to your values in tough times,” he shares. “That’s what this film is about. That’s what I want my sons to remember.”
Welcome back, friends and fools, to year FIVE of the Vulture Movies Fantasy League. We are about to turn the corner into a fall movie season that is packed with box-office behemoths, visionary auteurs bringing their latest films into the bosom of awards season, and a whole lotta questions about whether a vampire movie about race in America can play the long game all the way to Oscar gold.
If you’ve played the Movies Fantasy League before, the game hasn’t changed much; if you’re new, welcome to the circus. You can check out the rules for how to play on our MFL hub, but here is the nutshell summary: You select a roster of exactly eight films within a budget of 100 imaginary dollars. Once the scoring phase of the game begins, the films you’ve drafted will accumulate points for achieving milestones in box-office take, precursor awards/nominations, critical approval, and more. The movies we expect to do best will cost more, so your first task will be to manage your budget wisely.
In order to help you make wise choices, we have assembled the following draft guide. Below, you will find a listing for every movie that’s eligible to draft in the MFL this year. You can see how much they cost, the talent behind them, what film festivals they’ve played, and when they will debut to the public, either in theaters or on streaming (if they haven’t already).
Movies begin to accumulate points on kickoff day, September 26. Any movie that opens on that day or after is eligible to earn box-office points. Anything that has already opened, or will open before the 26th, is box-office ineligible and will be denoted as such in the guide. Between September 26 and the final deadline on December 18, you’ll still be able to draft a team, but during that span, you will only be able to draft films that haven’t started accruing points. That means you’ll be limited to unreleased movies that haven’t been nominated for any awards. So you’ll have to decide carefully when you want to draft your roster. We’ll remove movies from this guide when they’re no longer eligible to be drafted to avoid any confusion and disappointment.
It’s going to be an exciting few months, so why waste any time — read ahead and start researching!
Director: Jon M. Chu Stars: Cynthia Erivo, Ariana Grande, Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Yeoh Release date: November 21
Our top point-earner from last season, Wicked, was priced to sell at $20, mostly because there was still a lot of uncertainty around whether the film would bomb with critics (and subsequently awards voters). It didn’t, though, so last year’s success means a trip back to Oz for your fantasy squad won’t come cheap.
➼ Box-office ineligible Director: Ryan Coogler Stars: Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Delroy Lindo Release date: Already released
Sinners is pretty much the only known quantity from the first half of 2025 that you can feel confident will be a major part of this year’s Oscar race. And while you won’t be able to benefit from the film’s hefty box office, the confidence of being able to select a film that you already know critics and audience loved could be worth the price tag.
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Benicio del Toro Release date: September 26
Paul Thomas Anderson hasn’t whiffed with the Academy since 2002’s Punch-Drunk Love (though it’s worth noting that 2014’s Inherent Vice only got a screenplay nomination). Academy members seem to be big PTA fans. Combine that with DiCaprio as a former ’60s radical, plus Oscar winners like del Toro and Sean Penn and breakthrough-ready talent like Teyana Taylor and Chase Infiniti, and things are looking good. Plus, Warner Bros. is said to have pumped up to $175 million into this project, so you better believe it’s going to push hard to get a return on that investment.
Director: Noah Baumbach Film festivals: Venice, Telluride, New York Stars: George Clooney, Adam Sandler Release date: November 14
Baumbach had his big Oscar breakthrough with Marriage Story several years ago; now he’s back with a very Oscar-friendly story about an aged movie star (Clooney) and his loyal agent (Sandler). Oscar narratives abound: Clooney has big “we’re so back” potential, while the already-percolating Supporting Actor campaign for Sandler feels like it’s been in the works for 25 years. This has every indication of being Netflix’s top-tier awards push.
Director: Joachim Trier Stars: Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård Film festivals: Cannes, Telluride, Toronto, New York Release date: November 17
While it fell short of winning the Palme d’Or at Cannes, Sentimental Value did emerge from the festival with buzz as the most likely of the Cannes competition titles to follow the path to Oscar victory recently traversed by recent Palme winners Anatomy of a Fall and Anora.
Director: James Cameron Stars: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña Release date: December 19
The first Avatar made $2.9 billion worldwide and got nine Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director. The second Avatar made $2.3 billion worldwide and got four Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture but not Best Director. Even with that rate of diminishing returns, the third Avatar should still bring in plenty of points. The question is whether this third one can deliver something that puts Cameron back in the Oscar conversation.
Director: Guillermo del Toro Stars: Oscar Isaac, Jacob Elordi Film festivals: Venice, Toronto Release date: October 17
Del Toro has been hot with Oscar ever since The Shape of Water took Best Picture eight years ago. His strange but artful Pinocchio adaptation turned out to be a huge MFL bargain a couple years ago after it ran the table in the animation categories all season. The question is how much Netflix as the distributor will cap Frankenstein’s value. It’s giving del Toro’s film the rare three-week theatrical run as opposed to the customary two, but that doesn’t mean you should expect much in the way of box-office points. Still, given del Toro’s reputation — and the recent performance of other high-end gothic horror like Nosferatu — this should be a strong player across at least the craft awards (production design, costume, cinematography, visual effects) all season.
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos Stars: Jesse Plemons, Emma Stone Film festivals: Venice, Telluride Release date: October 24
With The Favourite and Poor Things, Lanthimos has directed two previous films to double-digit Oscar nomination totals, including Best Picture/Best Director nominations and Best Actress wins for Olivia Colman and Emma Stone. Whether he can do the same with a film from writer Will Tracy (Succession, hooray!; The Menu and The Regime, hmmm) remains to be seen. Plemons and Stone reunite after Lanthimos’s perplexing Kinds of Kindness, but Focus Features is putting out all the indicators that this has big Oscar ambitions.
Director: Scott Cooper Stars: Jeremy Allen White, Jeremy Strong Film festivals: New York Release date: October 24
Last year, Searchlight pushed the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown all the way to major Oscar nominations and a near Best Actor win for Timothée Chalamet. This year, 20th Century Studios wants in on that action with its Bruce Springsteen biopic starring TV’s most intense performer, Jeremy Allen White. Cooper has already put a guitar in one actor’s hands and directed him to an Oscar — Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart — and Strong is already starting to build Supporting Actor buzz after his nomination last year.
Directors: Jared Bush, Byron Howard Stars: Jason Bateman, Ginnifer Goodwin Release date: November 26
Last year, Moana 2 opened on Thanksgiving weekend and racked up $225 million right out of the gate, despite pretty much everyone agreeing the film wasn’t good. The original Zootopia cleared the original Moana’s domestic take by nearly $100 million. That math could really end up working in your favor.
Director: Benny Safdie Stars: Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt Film festivals: Venice, Toronto Release date: October 3
Of the two Solitary Safdie Sibling movies this year, this is the one about MMA fighting. Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt reunite from their Jungle Cruise days to play real-life Ultimate Fighting Champion Mark Kerr (him) and his loyal, understandably concerned wife (her). If Blunt ends up with two Oscar nominations to her name for playing the Wife, that’s going to be wild, but that’s a conversation for another day. This movie is going to be either too middlebrow for awards appeal or the sentimental fave of awards season. (And I could see A24 making it a bit of a box-office hit, too.)
Director: Luca Guadagnino Stars: Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, Ayo Edebiri Film festivals: Venice, New York Release date: October 10
Guadagnino struck out, Oscar-wise, with his two features last year, Challengers and Queer. But this year, he returns with Oscar winner Julia Roberts, Oscar nominee Andrew Garfield, and Emmy winner Ayo Edebiri in a hot-button drama about scandal and the generation gap in academia. Will this be Tár lite or something altogether trashier? It remains to be seen.
➼ Box-office ineligible Director: Edward Berger Stars: Colin Farrell, Tilda Swinton Release date: October 15
Berger has directed two straight films to Oscar nominations in All Quiet on the Western Front and Conclave; he’s trying for his third with this story about a maxed-out gambler (Farrell) who finds himself on the skids in Macau. The trailer looks intense, and Farrell’s part seems juicy. Don’t expect box-office points, however, as Netflix is giving this its customary two-week qualifying theatrical run, where box-office receipts are not usually reported.
Director: Hikari Stars: Brendan Fraser, Akira Emoto Film festivals: Toronto Release date: November 21
One big-time potential crowd-pleaser candidate for awards season is this film from Japanese director Hikari (Netflix’s Beef). It centers on Fraser as an American actor living in Tokyo who takes a job as a stand-in for various roles in real people’s lives. Lost in Translation meets a softer version of Yorgos Lanthimos’s Alps? Could really connect with people.
Director: Chloé Zhao Stars: Jessie Buckley, Paul Mescal Film festivals: Telluride, New York Release date: November 27
Zhao joins the laundry list of Oscar-winning directors releasing films this fall, though she’s looking to bounce back from her Marvel misadventure Eternals. Here, she’s adapting Maggie O’Farrell’s novel, a fictionalized account of William Shakespeare and his wife, Anne, in the aftermath of losing their young son, Hamnet. Yes, that name does look and sound awfully similar to Hamlet. Shakespeare has done well at the Oscars in the past — just ask Gwyneth Paltrow and Judi Dench how they got their trophies — and both Buckley and Mescal are young actors who have been recently admitted into the fold by Oscar voters (she was nominated for 2021’s The Lost Daughter, he for 2022’s Aftersun) and are seeking their first wins. That recipe could add up to a contender.
The year’s second solo Safdie is also a sporting affair, though in this case it’s about ping-pong champion Marty Mauser (Chalamet) and his exploits at the table-tennis … uh, table. This one looks quirkier than Josh’s more blunt instrument (no pun intended, Emily), but Chalamet has scored at the December box office two years in a row now (Wonka in 2023, A Complete Unknown last year). Maybe the prince of Christmas will deliver again.
Director: Joachim Rønning Stars: Jared Leto, Greta Lee Release date: October 10
Red flags exist if you’re looking for them. Rønning’s most prominent titles are a middling collection that includes the fifth Pirates of the Caribbean movie, the second Maleficent, and Young Woman and the Sea. 2010’s Tron: Legacy made decent money but left a lot of its audience nonplussed. But there’s a lot to be said for a visual spectacle (visual effects and sound awards feel like they’re in play), and it’s going to play in Imax for a couple weeks, which should help box-office totals.
Director: Jafar Panahi Stars: Vahid Mobasseri, Ebrahim Azizi Film festivals: Cannes, Telluride, Toronto, New York Release date: October 15
Four of the last five winners of the Palme d’Or at Cannes have gone on to become Best Picture nominees at the Oscars, with two of them (Parasite and Anora) winning. So there’s definitely reason to be optimistic about It Was Just an Accident. Even if the film isn’t as broadly appealing as recent Palme winners, there’s a good chance it follows the awards trajectory of previous Cannes hits like The Zone of Interest.
Director: Kathryn Bigelow Stars: Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson Film festivals: Venice, New York Release date: October 24
Oscar winner Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker) returns to global politics, only this time, the crisis is fictional. The film depicts a U.S. White House scrambling to deal with an impending missile strike on America. It’s been a while since Bigelow was a major player on the Oscar scene, but working off of a script from the screenwriter of Jackie (and, um, The Maze Runner), interest will be piqued.
Director: Bradley Cooper Stars: Will Arnett, Laura Dern Film festivals: New York
Bradley Cooper’s stand-up comedy movie? Bradley Cooper’s divorced-guy movie? Bradley Cooper’s SmartLess movie? (Sean Hayes also co-stars.) Whatever this movie turns out to be, Cooper always makes awards season more interesting.
Director: Bill Condon Stars: Jennifer Lopez, Diego Luna, Tonatiuh Film festivals: Sundance Release date: October 10
Jennifer Lopez doing a full-blown musical from the director of Dreamgirls sounds like it could be a dream come true … or a fantastic nightmare. Either way, it will be a spectacle. In the old days, Lopez would be assured of a Golden Globe nomination no matter how it turned out. The Globes have gotten more buttoned-up lately, though, so we’ll see how it goes.
Director: Derek Cianfrance Stars: Channing Tatum, Kirsten Dunst Film festivals: Toronto Release date: October 10
There was a while there in the 2010s where Channing Tatum was doing daring work with directors like Bennett Miller, Quentin Tarantino, the Wachowskis, and the Coens. Then he seemed to retreat into safer rom-com fare. Perhaps teaming up with the director of Blue Valentine and The Place Beyond the Pines for a film about a thief hiding out in the walls of a Toys “R” Us will get critics and audiences excited once again.
Director: James Vanderbilt Stars: Rami Malek, Russell Crowe Film festivals: Toronto Release date: November 7
Vanderbilt wrote the screenplay for David Fincher’s Zodiac, among others, but the only film he’s directed was the real-life journalism drama Truth that premiered in Toronto before fizzling in awards season. Hopefully history doesn’t repeat itself for this biographical drama/psychological thriller about the trials of Nazi officials after World War II. Malek, who hasn’t been nominated for an Oscar since he won for playing Freddie Mercury in 2018, plays a psychologist who examines the Nazi officials before trial. Crowe, who hasn’t been nominated since 2001’s A Beautiful Mind, plays Hitler’s second-in-command, Hermann Göring.
Director: Dan Trachtenberg Stars: Elle Fanning, Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi Release date: November 7
After making the direct-to-Hulu Predator-universe movie Prey feel like a legitimate blockbuster a few years ago, Trachtenberg gets to take the next film in the series to theaters where it belongs. With a plot that pairs an outcast Predator (Schuster-Koloamatangi) with an unlikely ally in Fanning’s Thia, Badlands could be the horror-inflected large-format movie that succeeds in the window between Tron and Wicked.
Director: Clint Bentley Stars: Joel Edgerton, Felicity Jones Film festivals: Sundance, Toronto Release date: November 7
The buzziest film out of Sundance this year was this lyrical period piece from Bentley, co-writer of last year’s Sing Sing. (That film’s director, Greg Kwedar, co-wrote Train Dreams as well.) Netflix promptly bought it up, which means you shouldn’t expect box-office points, but this kind of movie is an awards play anyway. And Train Dreams could definitely be this year’s indie darling.
Director: Emma Tammi Stars: Josh Hutcherson, Matthew Lillard Release date: December 5
Two years ago, the first Five Nights at Freddy’s took me by surprise, and I dramatically underpriced it before it exploded for $137 million domestic on the backs of its legion of video-game fans. Not this year! If you want those box-office points, you’re gonna have to pay for them.
Director: Rian Johnson Stars: Daniel Craig, Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close Film festivals: Toronto Release date: December 12
Rian Johnson’s two previous Benoit Blanc mysteries were great fun, and both got Best Original Screenplay nominations … and nothing more. That might just be the level for these movies … unless cast members like Close or O’Connor make a particularly attractive case for a supporting performance campaign. There’s also the fact that, with Netflix distributing this one as it did with Glass Onion, you won’t be getting box-office points.
Director: Craig Brewer Stars: Hugh Jackman, Kate Hudson Release date: December 25
Jackman and Hudson — who both have put their musical skills to work onscreen before — play a husband-and-wife Neil Diamond tribute act. Brewer is a talented filmmaker (Hustle & Flow; Dolemite Is My Name) who could absolutely make a Christmas crowd-pleaser like this sing. Doesn’t this sound like a perfect holiday-weekend family-movie compromise? I’d also be willing to bet good money on Globe nominations for one or both of Jackman or Hudson.
➼ Box-office ineligible Director: Joseph Kosinski Stars: Brad Pitt, many cars Release date: Already released
After premiering at the end of June, Kosinski’s follow-up to Top Gun: Maverick has been a bit slept on for just how big a blockbuster it was (a quiet $600 million worldwide). You won’t be able to reap any points for those dollars, hence the bargain price. But this movie will certainly contend for at least some of the technical Oscars come year end.
Director: Kate Winslet Stars: Kate Winslet, Toni Collette, Andrea Riseborough Release date: December 12
Oscar winner Kate Winslet makes her directorial debut with this story of four adult siblings who have to rally around their ailing mother at Christmastime. A star as big as Winslet having her first go at directing a movie is always going to be a big deal, and Netflix releasing this at Christmastime (it hits the platform on Christmas Eve) indicates that it thinks it will be a crowd-pleaser.
Director: Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans Stars: Arden Cho, Ahn Hyo-seop, May Hong, Ji-young Yoo Release date: Already released
Netflix’s big success story of this year so far has been how well it’s done to ride the wave of KPop Demon Hunters. The songs are hits, the sing-along version of the movie was No. 1 at the box office, and it’s probably going to be a major contender for the Oscars for Best Song and Best Animated Feature.
Director: Mary Bronstein Stars: Rose Byrne, Conan O’Brien, Danielle Macdonald Film festivals: Sundance, Berlin, Toronto, New York Release date: October 10
Byrne won the lead acting prize at the Berlin International Film Festival earlier this year, which if nothing else is an indicator of just how impactful her performance is as a mother well past the end of her rope. There’s a pretty wide range of outcomes for this one, but look to the indie awards to give this movie some early points.
Director: Richard Linklater Stars: Ethan Hawke, Andrew Scott, Margaret Qualley Film festivals: Berlin, Toronto, New York Release date: October 17
Ethan Hawke reteams with Linklater for this biopic of famed songwriter Lorenz Hart, who faces one long night of reckoning after the opening of his ex-professional-partner’s musical Oklahoma! Andrew Scott’s performance as Richard Rodgers won a prize at Berlin, and you have to figure one of these years, Scott is going to break through with an Oscar nomination.
Director: Lynne Ramsay Stars: Jennifer Lawrence, Robert Pattinson Film festivals: Cannes Release date: November 7
Lynne Ramsay has been a critics’ darling her whole career, but that’s never translated into mainstream appreciation. But she’s never worked with Jennifer Lawrence before, either. The film’s Cannes reception was a bit inscrutable, but Lawrence playing a young mother battling psychosis is a tempting bit of awards bait.
Director: Edgar Wright Stars: Glen Powell, Josh Brolin Release date: November 7
An adaptation of the Stephen King novel and a remake of the Arnold Schwarzenegger film, The Running Man looks to be a great showcase for Glen Powell’s ever-blossoming star power, as well as a get-right opportunity for Edgar Wright after Last Night in Soho disappointed.
Director: James L. Brooks Stars: Emma Mackey, Jamie Lee Curtis Release date: December 12
The legendary James L. Brooks hasn’t directed a movie since 2010’s disappointing How Do You Know. Fifteen years later, Brooks is back with a story about a young idealist trying to balance a professional life in politics with her wacky family. Whether Brooks can recapture the magic of Broadcast News and Terms of Endearment is one of this fall’s big questions.
Popcorn emoji (🍿) denotes a film that is eligible for box-office points based on its release date.
Anaconda $5 🍿 Him $5 🍿 Gabby’s Dollhouse: The Movie $5 🍿 Now You See Me: Now You Don’t $5 🍿 The Housemaid $5 🍿 Zero A.D. $5 🍿 Dust Bunny $3 🍿 Regretting You $3 🍿 Sisu 2 $3 🍿 Soul on Fire $3 🍿 Eternity $2 🍿 Good Fortune $2 🍿 Trap House $2 🍿
Black Phone 2 $5 🍿 Keeper $5 🍿 The Strangers — Chapter 2 $5 🍿 Bone Lake $2 🍿 Shelby Oaks $2 🍿 Silent Night, Deadly Night $1 🍿
Anemone $5 🍿 A Private Life $5 🍿 Eleanor the Great $5 🍿 Father, Mother, Sister, Brother $5 🍿 Hedda $5 🍿 No Other Choice $5 🍿 Peter Hujar’s Day $5 🍿 The Lost Bus $5 The Mastermind $5 🍿 The Secret Agent $5 🍿 The Testament of Ann Lee $5 🍿 Christy $5 🍿
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey $5 Black Bag $5 Eddington $5 Highest 2 Lowest $5 Materialists $5 Nouvelle Vague $5 🍿 Pillion $5 🍿 The History of Sound $5 The Life of Chuck $5 Caught Stealing $3 Friendship $3 Misericordia $3 Sorry, Baby $3 Steve $3 🍿 Dead Man’s Wire $3 🍿 Cloud $2 Eephus $2 Pavements $2 Splitsville $2 On Swift Horses $1 Preparation for the Next Life $1 Sacramento $1 The Friend $1
Captain America: Brave New World $3 The Monkey $3 Honey Don’t! $3 One of Them Days $2 The Naked Gun $3 The Phoenician Scheme $3 Weapons $3 Drop $2 Presence $2 The Old Guard 2 $2
28 Years Later $5 A Minecraft Movie $5 How to Train Your Dragon $5 Lilo & Stitch $5 Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning $5 Superman $5 Mickey 17 $3 Warfare $3 Thunderbolts $3 The Fantastic Four: First Steps $3 Jurassic World Rebirth $3 The Long Walk $3 100 Nights of Hero $2 🍿
Predators $5 Come See Me in the Good Light $3 🍿 Cover-Up $2 🍿 Sally $3 2000 Meters to Andriivka $2 Diane Warren: Relentless $2 Prime Minister $2 Selena Y Los Dinos $2 🍿 The Alabama Solution $2 🍿 The Perfect Neighbor $2 🍿 Apocalypse in the Tropics $1 Deaf President Now! $1 Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore $1 Orwell: 2 + 2 = 5 $1 🍿 The Voice of Hind Rajab $1 🍿 Zodiac Killer Project $1 🍿 Architecton $1
Elio$5 The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants $5 🍿 Arco $3 🍿 Ne Zha II $3 Scarlet $3 🍿 A Magnificent Life $2 🍿 Dog Man $2 In Your Dreams $2 🍿 Smurfs $2 The Bad Guys 2 $2 The Twits $2 🍿 Pets on a Train $1 🍿
Caught by the Tides $3 Sound of Falling $3 🍿 Sirāt $3 🍿 Parthenope $2 On Becoming a Guinea Fowl $2 The President’s Cake $2 🍿 Left-Handed Girl $2 🍿
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Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale $3 Nirvana the Band the Show the Movie $3 The Ballad of Wallis Island $3 The Man With the Bag $3 🍿 The Roses $3 Ballerina $2 Hurry Up Tomorrow $2 Snow White $2 The Accountant 2 $2 The Legend of Ochi $2 The Wedding Banquet $2 Alto Knights $1 Bring Her Back $1 Companion $1 Death of a Unicorn $1 Echo Valley $1 Fountain of Youth $1 Freakier Friday $1 Havoc $1 I Know What You Did Last Summer $1 I Wish You All The Best $1 🍿 Magic Farm $1 M3GAN 2.0 $1 Nobody 2 $1 Novocaine $1 Opus $1 Sarah’s Oil $1 🍿 Spinal Tap II: The End Continues $1 Straw $1 The Assessment $1 The Conjuring: Last Rites $1 The Electric State $1 The Surfer $1 The Thursday Murder Club $1 Wolf Man $1 The Woman in the Yard $1
Oh. What. Fun. $3 🍿 All of You $1 🍿 Swiped $1 🍿 Ruth & Boaz $1 🍿 The Woman in Cabin 10 $1 🍿
Elon Musk infamously threw Donald Trump under the bus in June when he insisted that the president was “in the Epstein files,” a reference to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. But a newly released interview with Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell might put the spotlight back on Musk when it comes to all things Epstein.
Maxwell, who’s in prison for sex trafficking a minor, was recently interviewed by Todd Blanche, the president’s former personal attorney and now a top official at the U.S. Department of Justice. Redacted transcripts of the interview, along with audio recordings, were published to the DOJ website on Friday.
Brin’s birthday bash
Blanche asked Maxwell about several powerful people, according to the transcripts, including Elon Musk:
TODD BLANCHE: Okay. So I want to just — we went through several individuals yesterday and I want to go through just a couple of more names and ask if you — if you know them. And if you do know them, how you know them. Do you know Elon Musk? GHISLAINE MAXWELL: I do. BLANCHE: And how did you meet Mr. Musk? MAXWELL: I met him in — I don’t remember the year, but it’s going to be in 2010, ’11, something like that, I think, if my memory serves. And I was at an event for Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google. And Sergey had arranged for — it was for his birthday. And we were — or a bunch of us, I don’t even remember how many we were, but not many of us. Maybe — I don’t know. If I say 40, I could be wrong. If it was 30 or 50, I don’t remember. I’m sorry. Went to another friend’s island. Somebody called Mr. Pigozzi in the Caribbean and — not with Epstein, he was not there, to celebrate Sergey’s birthday. And we were there together for, I want to say, three or four days, something like that in my memory. And Mr. Musk was present for that. BLANCHE: And that was the first time you met him, as far as you know? MAXWELL: As far as I remember, yes.
The Wall Street Journal reported in 2023 that Epstein advised Sergey Brin on tax matters in 2007. But Musk and Brin have their own drama. In 2022, Musk denied having an affair with Brin’s then-wife Nicole Shanahan, who would go on to become Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s running mate in the 2024 presidential campaign. Brin divested from all of Musk’s companies after the alleged tryst, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The photograph
Blanche then went on to ask Maxwell about Elon’s brother Kimbal, who was reportedly set up with a girlfriend by Epstein many years ago, according to a report from Business Insider in 2020.
BLANCHE: Did you meet — did you know his brother, Mr. Musk’s brother? MAXWELL: I don’t know if I’ve ever met him. I know that he has a brother and I don’t think I met him. BLANCHE: Aside from that time in — around 2010, on the island in the Caribbean for a couple days, did you — have you seen — do you know Mr. Musk beyond that time? MAXWELL: We met at — I was at the Oscars and we met at the Oscars. BLANCHE: What year was that, earlier or later? MAXWELL: It was post that event, I believe. BLANCHE: And do you know whether Mr. Epstein knew Mr. Musk? MAXWELL: I believe they did. And the only reason I say that is not from my memory, but because I saw — I think I saw — my memory is that in discovery, they were communicating on email. BLANCHE: So you have no personal knowledge of that? MAXWELL: I have no — BLANCHE: It’s just what you’ve — what you’ve seen from the press or from discovery? MAXWELL: And I believe his brother as well, actually. BLANCHE: Excuse me? MAXWELL: Mr. Musk’s brother as well. But I don’t — my — like I said, my memory is not — it’s not as good as I would like it to be. And I just want to say that.
Maxwell seems to be referring to a Vanity Fair Oscars party on March 2, 2014, where she and Musk were photographed together. Musk has previously suggested she photobombed him during that event.
Writing in a tweet from 2020, Musk insisted, “Don’t know Ghislaine at all. She photobombed me once at a Vanity Fair party several years ago. Real question is why VF invited her in the first place.”
But the fact that Maxwell claims they met years earlier, in 2010 or 2011, seems to be new information, provided Maxwell is telling the truth. Prosecutors alleged that she perjured herself, but dropped those charges after she was convicted of sex trafficking.
The President and that other birthday
This new interview will obviously be highly scrutinized, given the number of people who are named. But it’s also important to keep in mind what kind of incentives are at play for Maxwell, Blanche, and Trump. Not only was Blanche Trump’s former attorney, but he was also pretty damn chummy with Maxwell’s attorney David Oscar Markus. Blanche appeared on Markus’s podcast twice, according to ABC News.
Trump has been cagey when asked about Maxwell, even giving a bizarre answer to questions during his first term when she was first sent to prison. During a White House briefing in July 21, 2020, Trump said, “I haven’t really been following it too much. I just wish her well, frankly. I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach, but I wish her well, whatever it is.”
“I don’t know. I haven’t really been following it too much. I just wish her well frankly. I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach and I guess they lived in Palm Beach, but I wish her well whatever it is.” (July 21, 2020)
The Wall Street Journal and New York Times recently reported on a birthday album made for Epstein in 2003 that included friendly letters from men like billionaire Leslie Wexner, attorney Alan Dershowitz, and President Trump. The letter included a line that the two men “have certain things in common,” and reportedly states that “enigmas never age,” ending with the line “Happy Birthday—and may every day be another wonderful secret.”
A photo of the letter hasn’t been made public, but fake versions of the letter have gone viral online. Trump was friends with Epstein for at least 15 years before they had some kind of falling out. Trump defenders insist it was because Epstein was being a “creep” at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, while others believe it had more to do with a real estate deal where the men were competing to buy a property.
It’s extremely unusual for a high-ranking official at the DOJ to personally interview someone in prison. But these are extremely unusual times.
Deep into an evening spent on the set of the Sundance series This Close, Shoshannah Stern and Marlee Matlin started chatting while waiting to resume filming on a long dinner scene. The pair had already bonded as deaf actors. Stern, who also served as the show’s co-creator and executive producer, had found great inspiration in her Oscar-winning co-star. She can’t recall what they were talking about, exactly, but at a certain point, she noticed Matlin staring at her.
“She’s looking at me and she says, ‘You need to direct,’” Stern says.
What was going on in Matlin’s head at that moment?
“It was late at night, and I kept thinking as I was watching her that she’s been around this industry for a while—and it just popped into my head,” she says. “She doesn’t give up easily when it comes to writing. She doesn’t give up easily when it comes to acting. She sets her mind to it. So why not go beyond that, and go up beyond to direct?”
Around this time, producers had approached Matlin interested in making a documentary about her life. She stipulated that she would participate only if Stern—who, again, had never directed before—helmed the film. Years later, Stern’s Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore is critically acclaimed, award-winning, and now playing in select theaters. (It is also available for digital rental or purchase.) The film offers a nuanced portrait of a Hollywood icon through Stern’s bold use of craft and narrative.
Still, that night on the This Close set, Stern didn’t feel remotely ready to take such a project on. She had built her own acting career, playing roles on major series like Weeds and Grey’s Anatomy, before finding her voice as a screenwriter. “I literally had never thought about [directing] before,” Stern says, speaking in American Sign Language beside an interpreter. “I didn’t think I could. I didn’t think I would be allowed to.”
When I later relay this Matlin over Zoom, her face falls. “I’m basically experiencing PTSD as a result of those words being used. A lot of kids who are deaf experience those same words,” Matlin says. “I’m glad that she was able to change her mind about feeling ‘not allowed’ to say, ‘Fuck off. Fuck off.’”
Stern grew up in the Bay Area to a fourth-generation deaf family. Her mother was a stage actor. As a kid, she wanted to follow in those footsteps. This was before the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990, though. “There were almost no captions on TV—so you’re hungry for information, you’re hungry for stories. That makes you very curious,” Stern says. “I’m always asking my friends who can hear, ‘What’s the other table talking about?’ They’re usually like, ‘I don’t know, I’m not listening.’ I would never stop listening, if I could.”
We’re pretty much by ourselves on this warm July day, however, sitting in a quiet vegan restaurant near her Los Angeles home. After she orders her lunch, Stern tells me about the challenges she faced in chasing her dreams. While she planned to study theater at college, her education was supported by the Vocational Rehabilitation program, which helps many deaf people in the transition out of high school. It requires program approval for any major. “You don’t really have freedom. They said, ‘No, [theater] is not a reasonable major to have. You’re not going to be a contributing member of society if you major in theater,’” Stern says. She chose English, while still acting in plays at Gallaudet University whenever she could.
During the winter break before her final semester, she went home and told her parents she was going to quit acting for good. The next day, she got an email from Warner Bros. with an audition offer.
The secretary for Gallaudet’s theater department had recommended Stern to the casting agents on the sitcom Off Centre, created by the Weitz brothers of American Pie fame. “She gave them my email address. I didn’t have an agent—I didn’t have anything. I was a college student,” Stern says. She booked the cheapest flight she could down to LA and completed the audition. Then she booked the part, and has essentially been in Hollywood ever since.
Even when auditioning for deaf parts throughout the aughts, Stern was often the only deaf actor in the room. This was decades out from Children of a Lesser God, Randa Haines’s searing 1986 take on the romantic drama that made Matlin the first-ever deaf actor to win an Oscar. (Troy Kotsur became the second for CODA, which also starred Matlin, in 2022.) Stern bristles when hearing that movie called “groundbreaking,” to say nothing of other milestones achieved by her and her peers before and since. “Stories about deaf people can be groundbreaking. They can,” Stern says. “But I would like to think that it’s because they push perspective, they push the form, they push understanding, they push the nuance.”
With abortion on the ballot in several states in Tuesday’s election, writer and director Nazrin Choudhury’s Oscar-nominated short film Red, White and Blue about a single mother searching for access to an abortion feels as timely as ever. The British-born multi-hyphenate doesn’t always see it that way.
“The upcoming election, in which abortion is such a key topic, means that people talk about this being such a timely subject. ‘It was so timely.’ Sadly, it feels like it’s timeless to me,” she tells The Hollywood Reporter.
“We seem to keep needing to tell this story. I keep trying to say ‘Oh, let’s try and make it so that my story becomes redundant, and we don’t have to make films like this,’” she continues. “But we have to tell stories of ordinary human beings and Americans at that.”
Red, White and Bluepremiered for free on YouTube this week, Majic Ink Productions and Level Forward announced on Monday. “We are getting enormous response and feedback from it,” Choudhury explains.
The film, starring Brittany Snow and Juliet Donenfold and executive produced by Samantha Bee, follows a young single mother from Arkansas, portrayed by Snow, who is forced to cross state lines to find access to an abortion.
The film has been screened throughout the country strategically since its 2024 Oscar nomination, according to a release, with the aim of reaching voters of all political leanings. Getting the film out into the world ahead of Election Day took a village of professionals in film, public relations and more coming together to make it happen.
‘Red White and Blue’ poster.
Courtesy of Majic Ink Productions
On Wednesday, students and faculty from the University of Pennsylvania participated in a national student-led screening and moderated discussion event featuring Choudhury, Black Voters Matter’s LaTosha Brown, Professors Melissa Murray and Kate Shaw of Crooked Media’s Strict Scrutiny podcast and more.
“This event had been planned for a while and was deeply meaningful because I have teenagers who will inherit this legacy,” the writer and director says, explaining that it meant so much to be “in community” with students at UPenn and NYU through a live stream there.
“I think it’s really important because this is the generation that is going to inherit all of our mistakes. I think we need to break the cycle because what happens is we always leave it to them. They have to deal with the messes of their elders,” she explains.
For Choudhury, making this film was both important and deeply personal. She explains that she made the film on her own, asking her children if she could dip into the college savings she had been accumulating. The filmmaker says the team has taken Red, White and Blue to church communities in places like Arizona and Wisconsin. As Choudhury describes it, “Places where you think people would be resistant to having this conversation,” however, she has found people are not unwilling to open up dialogue about abortion.
“Our primary goal has been just to try and figure out which communities to take it to doing these benefit screenings, and then yes, in this final push where our futures as women will be decided at the ballot box” Choudhury begins.
“When the VP, Kamala Harris, says women are bleeding out… as someone who myself was bleeding out, but luckily not in a parking lot, I was in a hospital being taken care of,” she continues. “I just really wanted to make sure that when we landed this film, it was with maximum power, potency and urgency.”
The short film will stream on YouTube through election week. Each view of the film generates a donation to the film’s Purple Parlor Fund, which benefits non-partisan organizations in reproductive rights, justice and the film’s impact campaign.
New technologies led by artificial intelligence and virtual production are profoundly changing visual effects but are still “another paintbrush” in the service of storytelling, says VFX veteran George Murphy.
“Virtual production is not just a tool for VFX; it’s a storytelling tool that allows actors to feel fully immersed in the scene, instead of having to imagine everything against a blank screen,” Murphy tells The Hollywood Reporter, in an interview at the Tokyo International Film Festival ahead of appearing on the Motion Picture Association panel, Filmmaking 2.0: The Evolution of Real-Time VFX for Traditional Filmmakers.
Murphy, a VFX supervisor and creative director at DNEG in London, made his entry into filmmaking with Steven Spielberg’s Hook (1991), a production hailed for its seminal VFX, in particular the use of projected matte painting. Computerized effects were very much in their infancy when he joined Industrial Light & Magic (ILM). He was part of a small team that pioneered digital compositing for films and he quickly recognized the potential of these ground-breaking tools to transform filmmaking.
“At ILM, we worked with Unix scripts and early computer graphics programs, but it was clear that these tools could create more believable, integrated images than anything before,” he says.
Murphy’s background was in another visual medium. “I started out fully intending to be a freelance photojournalist, covering the real world,” he recalls. “In an odd way, it was those skills in capturing reality that prepared me for fabricating worlds that don’t exist.”
Creating those worlds and making them look believable won him an Oscar and BAFTA for Forrest Gump, and has seen him supervise effects on productions including Planet of The Apes, Mission: Impossible, Jurassic Park, The Matrix sequels and Black Sails.
One of the biggest game-changers in recent years has been the development of virtual production, says Murphy. This technology, popularized by The Mandalorian, allows filmmakers to create virtual environments on LED screens in real time, replacing traditional green-screen backdrops.
Murphy experienced the power of this technology firsthand on the set of Murder on the Orient Express back in 2016, where a train car was surrounded by LED screens displaying high-resolution footage of the world speeding by. “The actors didn’t have to pretend they were looking out at a snowy mountain scene. They were immersed in it, and that makes a huge difference in their performance. Things that were going past would actually catch their eyes,” he notes, saying it led to a more authentic feel and therefore immersive experience for the audience as well.
Responsive tools like Epic Games’ Unreal Engine and Unity have also revolutionized the VFX workflow. “These tools allow us to create, edit, and test our work in real-time, which wasn’t possible a decade ago. You can see the result instantly instead of waiting hours for a render,” Murphy explains.
He likens this change to moving from analog to digital photography: “The whole process has become much more flexible and collaborative, allowing us to explore creative choices and see what works best in the moment.”
With AI advancing at a bewildering pace, it is quickly finding a place in the VFX toolkit. For Murphy, AI offers both opportunities and challenges. He points out that AI can streamline labor-intensive tasks like rotoscoping (manually isolating elements within a scene) or tracking (following a moving object or character in footage).
“With AI, we can now accomplish in minutes what used to take hours or even days,” he says. “It frees up artists to focus on the more creative aspects of their work”
Nevertheless, he believes that for all its power, machine learning isn’t a substitute for the creativity and ideation of a filmmaker, for now at least. “AI can process huge amounts of data, and it can imitate styles based on what it’s seen. But it doesn’t experience emotions, so it can’t capture the essence of human storytelling. That’s something only artists who have lived and felt can bring to a project,” he suggests.
Another exciting development for Murphy is the expansion of storytelling across different media and platforms. During his work on The Matrix sequels, he witnessed the potential of what he calls “story worlds.” The Matrix franchise extended its narrative through video games, animated shorts, and comics, allowing fans to explore the story beyond the main films. Murphy sees this approach as crucial for the future of entertainment, as audiences look for ways to engage more deeply with stories.
This “multiverse” approach to storytelling has become increasingly popular, especially with the rise of streaming and interactive platforms. Murphy believes that as technology advances, audiences will be able to interact with story worlds in new ways—perhaps even experiencing them in virtual reality or augmented reality. “We’re only scratching the surface of what’s possible,” he says. “Once VR becomes more accessible, the way we tell and experience stories is going to change fundamentally”
Looking forward, Murphy is enthusiastic about the possibilities that technology opens up but also concerned about the potential loss of craftsmanship.
“There’s an artistry to physical effects, to building something by hand, and that’s still incredibly valuable. It gives you a grounding in reality that’s essential, even in digital work,” he explains, adding that many of the best physical model makers went on to VFX careers.
Ultimately, Murphy believes that technology should serve the story, not the other way around, and remains optimistic about the future of filmmaking.
“These tools are just new brushes in our paintbox,” he says. “They allow us to push the boundaries of what’s possible. But the artist’s hand will always be there, guiding the story and making sure it resonates with the audience.”
“Don’t speak!” Dianne Wiest is unstoppable as the actress Helen Sinclair, one of the all-time great “diva” roles in Woody Allen’s zany gangland comedy Bullets Over Broadway. (This was one of the few Allen films in which he had a cowriter; in this case, it was the humor columnist, playwright, director, and actor Doug McGrath.) With this win, Wiest became just the second woman to win two best-supporting-actress Academy Awards, tying Shelley Winters for the honor.
Anna Paquin — 1994 The Piano (1993)
Just 11 years old when she won (but still not the youngest winner in this category!), Anna Paquin bolted out of her seat in a fetchingpurple hat when Gene Hackman read her name at the Oscar ceremony. Adorable! Then she stood behind the podium in a state of shock, half-giggling, half-hyperventilating. It’s a great moment! Then a little Hollywood kicked in and she started thanking people. If you can believe it, Jane Campion was only the second woman ever to be nominated in the best-director category.
Marisa Tomei — 1993 My Cousin Vinny (1992)
A great performance, a great film, a great and righteous win. We’re saying that because, back in the day, there were some who felt Marisa Tomei’s comedic turn in the admittedly light My Cousin Vinny was some kind of blight on the Oscars. It even spun into a conspiracy theory that the announcement of her name was some kind of accident. Tomei was also a former soaps and sitcom star up against three heavyweight Brits (Joan Plowright, Vanessa Redgrave, and Miranda Richardson), as well as Australian Judy Davis in Woody Allen’s Husbands and Wives. But time has washed all that away—and Tomei has had two more nominations since.
Mercedes Ruehl — 1992 The Fisher King (1991)
Mercedes Ruehl is probably a bigger name to Broadway aficionados than movie lovers, but her turn in Terry Gilliam’s outstanding fantasy-drama The Fisher King was absolutely the right choice for the best-supporting-actress prize this year. She is marvelous as the hard-working video store owner who helps get Jeff Bridges back on his feet after he abandons his career as a talk radio host who inadvertently inspires a killing spree. (Today, someone like that would just say, “Hit like and subscribe!”)
Whoopi Goldberg — 1991 Ghost (1990)
The second Black woman to win in this category (after a 51-year gap), Whoopi Goldberg, who would later host the Oscars four times, was hilarious and touching in the part of the medium Oda Mae Brown in the blockbuster sensation Ghost. As it happened, she was handed her Oscar by Denzel Washington, who had become the second Black man to win the best-supporting-actor prize the year before. Whoopi’s win also added her name to the list of Star Trek alumni who have won an Oscar.
Brenda Fricker — 1990 My Left Foot (1989)
Somehow, Brenda Fricker is the only Irish woman to win an Oscar for either supporting or lead actress. This doesn’t seem right, considering Irish contributions to film arts, but it’s the truth. (There have been wins for Irish women in other Oscar categories, so that’s something, until Saoirse Ronan eventually wins one for acting—she’s got four nominations already.) Accepting her award for My Left Foot (which also got Daniel Day-Lewis his first of three trophies), she thanked the real “Mrs. Brown” and said that “anybody who gives birth 22 times deserves one of these.”
Geena Davis — 1989 The Accidental Tourist (1988)
Perhaps a bit of an upset over Sigourney Weaver in Working Girl (her third nomination and third loss), Geena Davis won the best-supporting-actress prize for her role as the zany dog trainer who teaches William Hurt how to embrace life after tragedy in Lawrence Kasdan’s terrific comic drama. Oscar producers were probably rooting for Weaver, too, as her costar Melanie Griffith (and then husband Don Johnson) were the presenters for this category.
Olympia Dukakis — 1988 Moonstruck (1987)
This was one of three wins for Moonstruck, which also received a best-actress trophy for Cher and best original screenplay for John Patrick Shanley. (Alas, Vincent Gardenia had tough competition for best supporting actor opposite Sean Connery in The Untouchables. Olympia Dukakis was the obvious best-supporting-actress winner as Rose, head of the Castorini family in one of the all-time great romantic comedies. She concluded her acceptance speech by adding, “Okay, Michael, let’s go!”—a reference to her cousin Michael Dukakis, who was running for president at the time (and would lose by a considerable margin).
Dianne Wiest — 1987 Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
She may not have deserved Cole Porter, but she deserved this Oscar win. This was Dianne Wiest’s first of two best-supporting-actress Oscars, both of which came from appearing in Woody Allen films. Hannah and Her Sisters is such a sweeping view of New York City characters that she barely shares any screen time with her costar Michael Caine, who also won a best-supporting-actor award for this film. (Allen won best original screenplay, too, and was nominated for best director while the film was nominated for best picture.)
Anjelica Huston — 1986 Prizzi’s Honor (1985)
With this award, Anjelica Huston became the only person to win an Oscar in a film directed by their parent, in this case John Huston. (Nearly 40 years earlier, John Huston directed his father, Walter Huston, to an Oscar in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Not sure if this double record will ever be broken!) Prizzi’s Honor, an ahead-of-its-time mafia comedy, costarred Jack Nicholson and Kathleen Turner and has one of the most shocking endings in the history of movies.
Peggy Ashcroft — 1985 A Passage to India (1984)
“Mrs. Mooooooooore!” Sir David Lean’s final film was nominated for 11 Oscars, including best picture, but won only two: best score for Maurice Jarre (his third after Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago, all Lean films) and best supporting actress for Dame Peggy Ashcroft, who was 77 at the time of her win, making her the oldest winner in this category. Based on E.M. Forster’s novel, costarring Judy Davis, Victor Banerjee, James Fox, Alec Guinness, Roshan Seth, and others, the film is either progressive for its time or a reactionary ode to the days of the British Raj, depending on your point of view. All can agree, though, that Peggy Ashcroft’s performance as the kind British lady who prefers to travel in comfort is terrific.
Linda Hunt — 1984 The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)
An unusual award in the sense that Linda Hunt (a white woman from New Jersey) plays the part of Billy Kwan, a Chinese Australian man. This would likely not fly today, but 40 years ago it was seen as a brave—and even noble—casting choice. The film is beyond canceled, despite being a stern look at Indonesia’s attempted military coup and democratic struggles during the late 1960s.
Jessica Lange — 1983 Tootsie (1982)
This was one wild night for Jessica Lange at the Oscars. She won best supporting actress over her costar Teri Garr from Tootsie (tough choice!), but also over her costar Kim Stanley in the Frances Farmer biopic Frances. For a brief moment, it looked like Lange might be a double-winner, as she was nominated for best actress for Frances too—but that prize went to Meryl Streep for Sophie’s Choice. Anyhow, despite Tootsie’s 10 nominations (including best picture), this was its only win. That it lost best original screenplay to Gandhi (a terrific movie, sure) is a bit of a scandal.
Maureen Stapleton — 1982 Reds (1981)
A three-hour-plus movie about internecine squabbles between leftists sounds like more of an obligatory chore than a good time, but Warren Beatty’s exhilarating and juicy Reds is absolutely terrific. Part of that is due to Maureen Stapleton’s performance as the community’s den mother (inasmuch as anarchists can have den mothers) Emma Goldman. She had been nominated three times previously (first in 1958, for Lonelyhearts), and when she accepted her award, she said she was “thrilled, happy, delighted,” paused to add “sober,” then said she wanted to thank “everyone she ever met in her entire life.”
Mary Steenburgen — 1981 Melvin and Howard (1980)
Jonathan Demme’s breezy tall tale about Melvin Dummar, a drifter, gas station employee, game show contestant, and American dreamer who claimed that Howard Hughes bequeathed him his fortune, is one of the great movies of this era that doesn’t get enough attention. This shaggy indie included a juicy part for Mary Steenburgen as the put-upon wife trying to keep a family together in the face of a doofus husband.
Now that Anora has hit select theaters, Sean assesses the state of the Best Picture race by running through a long (emphasis on long) list of 26 films that have a chance to be nominated at the Oscars (1:00). Then, Sean and Amanda discuss Anora, Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or–winning drama about a whirlwind romance between a sex worker and the son of a Russian oligarch (30:00). Finally, Sean is joined by John Crowley, the director of the new Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh romance We Live in Time (1:15:00). They discuss, among other things, the qualities that attracted Crowley to Garfield and Pugh, how he chooses to work in film vs. theater, his long-running project of sincere romantic dramas, and more.
Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: John Crowley Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Video Producer: Jack Sanders
Matt is joined by New York Times awards season reporter Kyle Buchanan to preview the 2024-25 Oscar race now that the table is mostly set. Kyle sets the table for a fascinating Oscar season—one without a clear front-runner like Oppenheimer was last year—and highlights the biggest narratives that have emerged, including the movies with the strongest momentum, early 2024 films that could make a last-second surge, and other burning questions (02:09). Matt finishes the show with a prediction about the MLB playoffs (28:28).
For a 20 percent discount on Matt’s Hollywood insider newsletter, What I’m Hearing …, click here.
Dissident Iranian film professionals have reiterated calls to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) to reconsider its relationship with Iran’s government-controlled Farabi cinema org which currently oversees the country’s Oscar submission process.
“In a world where Iranian artists and filmmakers suffer under the oppression of the Islamic Republic government, it is alarming that Farabi, a state-controlled entity known for censorship and repression, is still permitted to select the representative of Iranian cinema for the Oscars,” the Independent Iranian Filmmakers Association (IIFMA) said in a statement.
The org, which made the same request last year, issued the statement in the wake of Farabi’s announcement on Sunday that it had selected In The Arms of The Tree to represent Iran in the best international feature film category at the 97th Academy Awards.
IIFMA was created in 2023 in response to the Woman Life Freedom movement which grew out of widespread popular protests across Iran in 2022, sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody after she was arrested for not wearing her veil in accordance with the country’s strict laws.
“The Academy must reconsider its partnership with Farabi due to doubts about the integrity of their selections. Independent filmmakers face severe repercussions, including imprisonment and bans, for not aligning with the regime’s propaganda,” said the IIFMA.
The statement comes just days after news broke that filmmakers Maryam Moghadam and Behtash Sanaeeha were continuing to be politically persecuted for their film My Favorite Cake, which world premiered in Berlin earlier this year after the directors defied pressure from the authorities to withdraw the film.
The pair, who were slapped with a travel ban last the spring, had their passports returned over the summer but found themselves grounded again in early September as they tried to fly to Sweden where Moghadam has family and also holds nationality.
Other directors caught in the crosshairs of the Iranian authorities in recent years include Ali Ahmadzadeh, who was also stopped from traveling after he refused to pull his film Critical Zone from Locarno, where it won the Golden Leopard, and Saeed Roustayi, who was sentenced to six months in jail in 2023 for showing his film Leila’s Brothers in Cannes without permission, sparking protests from the likes of Martin Scorsese.
My Favorite Cake is among a raft of Iranian features to have played to acclaim on the international festival circuit this year but not taken into consideration by Farabi to be Iran’s 2025 Oscar entry because they do not meet with government approval.
They also include Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, which has since been selected to represent Germany, where the director is currently living in exile having fled a harsh flogging and prison sentence there.
“Despite acclaim at international festivals, these filmmakers are denied the chance to showcase their work at the Academy Awards. It is crucial for the Academy to acknowledge the censorship in Iran and support independent filmmakers,” continued the IIFMA statement.
“The Academy should reevaluate its association with Farabi and advocate for the representation of these filmmakers at the Oscars. The time for action is now to promote artistic freedom and human rights on a global platform,” it concluded.
In the backdrop, IIFMA’s statement adds to a separate, but related, call to AMPAS to create an entry into the best international feature film category giving representation to exiled filmmakers, in a similar way in which the International Olympics Committee has gotten behind a refugee team made up of exiled sports people.
Algeria has selected Chakib Taleb-Bendiab’s child kidnapping thriller “Algiers” as its entry in the 2025 Oscars international feature race.
Inspired by true events, the film is set against the backdrop of collective scars left by the country’s 1992-2002 civil war, known as the Black Decade. It turns on the kidnapping of a young girl that creates tension and suspicion in the Algerian capital. Only Dounia, a brilliant psychiatrist, and Sami, a police inspector, can unearth the demons of the past,” reads the film’s official synopsis.
“Algiers” is the first feature by Bendiab, a writer/director and composer whose short “Black Spirits” – an African Samurai tale set in the Tunisian Sahara performed by French and Japanese actors – made a splash on the fest circuit.
It was chosen to represent Algeria in the Oscars race by a committee within the country’s culture ministry. The ministry in a statement praised “Algiers” as “a major step toward the recognition of the country’s burgeoning film industry on the global stage.”
Taleb-Bendiab in a statement said he “envisioned this film as a raw, human portrayal, faithful to the realities of Algerian life, observed through the lens of a thriller— a genre rarely showcased from our country in the West.”
“Algiers” is a co-production between Algeria, Tunisia, France and Canada. Khaled Chikhi, of Algeria’s Temple Production, is the lead producer; Yasmine Dhoukar (Clandestino) is the Tunisian co-producer; and Canadian filmmaker Patricia Chica (Flirt Films) serves as executive producer.
Mad World represents “Algiers” for international sales.
Palestine: ‘From Ground Zero’
The Palestinian Ministry of Culture has selected anthology film “From Ground Zero” to represent Palestine as its entry in the 2025 Oscars international feature race.
A compilation of 22 short films shot by filmmakers inside the Gaza Strip during the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “From Ground Zero” was spawned by Gaza-born director Rashid Masharawi who founded the Masharawi Fund to give internally displaced artists a platform to express their personal stories amidst the war’s devastation.
Masharawi worked alongside French production company Coorigine Productions and producer Laura Nikolov, who coordinated all the groups in Gaza, receiving the material, and supervising the post-production process.
“From Ground Zero” recently made its North American debut at the Toronto Film Festival.
Nepal: ‘Shambala’
Nepal has selected “Shambhala” as its Oscar entry in the international feature film category.
Directed by Min Bahadur Bham, “Shambhala” – a mystic, sacred realm in Tibetan Buddhism, also an area of significance in Hinduism, which means a place of peace – begins in a Himalayan polyandrous village in Nepal, where pregnant Pema faces scrutiny as her first husband Tashi vanishes on a trade trip to Lhasa. Accompanied by her de facto husband, the monk Karma, she embarks on a journey to find him, evolving her quest into self-discovery and liberation.
The film debuted at the Berlinale and has since played at Sydney, Karlovy Vary and Locarno. It is a Shooney Films (Nepal) production in co-production with CDP (France), Ape&Bjørn (Norway), Aaru Production (Hong Kong), ZK Films (Turkey), Yi Tiao Long Hu Bao (Taiwan) Bangdel and Shakya Production (U.S.).
Bham’s 2012 short “Bhansulli” debuted at Venice. His debut feature “Kalo Pothi” (aka “The Black Hen,” 2015) won the Fedeora best film award at Venice Critics’ Week and became Nepal’s official Oscar entry. The film, produced by Bham, reunites him with his “Kalo Pothi” producer Catherine Dussart, who serves as co-producer alongside Verona Meier, Shuk Fong Chong, Zeynep Koray, Justine O. Bibhakar and Sunder Shakya, with Debaki Rai, Liao Ching-Sung, Roger Huang, Ruben Thorkildsen, Can Aygor and Salina Shakya as executive producers and Rajesh Prasad Khatri, Jeremy Chua and Lee Chi Lin as associate producers.
Kenya: ‘Nawi’
Kenya has selected “Nawi,” which explores the issue of child marriage in rural Africa, as its Oscar entry in the international feature film category.
The film centers on Nawi, whose aspirations of attending high school are shattered when she learns that her father Eree plans to marry her off to a stranger. Despite her family’s need for the bride-price – livestock – Nawi refuses to accept her fate. Her ally in this struggle is her brother, Joel.
The film is directed by Toby Schmutzler, Kevin Schmutzler, Vallentine Chelluget and Apuu Mourine. It is written by Milcah Cherotich. It is produced by Lydia Wrensch, Caroline Heim and Brizan Were. Executive producers are Ludwig Bayern, Steven Haft, Katja Eichinger and Matthias Rosenberger.
The production companies are FilmCrew Media, Startup Lions Assets Kenya and Baobab Pictures.
Senegal: ‘Dahomey’
“Dahomey,” Mati Diop’s immersive documentary that won the Berlinale’s prestigious Golden Bear, has been selected as Senegal’s entry to the 2025 Oscars international feature race.
According to its official synopsis, “Dahomey” explores “real perspectives on far-reaching issues surrounding appropriation, self-determination and restitution. Set in November 2021, the film charts 26 royal treasures from the Kingdom of Dahomey that are due to leave Paris and return to their country of origin: the present-day Republic of Benin. Using multiple perspectives, Diop questions how these artifacts should be received in a country that has reinvented itself in their absence.”
After holding its North American premiere at TIFF, “Dahomey” will screen at Camden International Film Festival and New York Film Festival before debuting in U.S. theaters on Oct. 18.
“Dahomey” is written and directed by Diop with cinematography by Josephine Drouin Viallard and editing by Gabriel Gonzalez. Diop, Eve Robin and Judith Lou Lévy produce alongside executive producers Christiane Chabi Kao and Cotonou. Les Films du Losange is handling international sales.
Georgia: ‘The Antique’
Georgia has selected “The Antique,” a drama about the 2006 expulsion of thousands of Georgian nationals from Russia, as its contender for the Academy Awards best international feature film prize.
The film was directed by Rusudan Glurjidze and is structured as a coproduction involving Georgia’s Cinetech, the Czech Republic’s Cinetrain, Iceland’s Whitepoint Digital and Germany’s Basia Berlin Filmproduction. International sales are handled by MPM International.
The Oscar selection was made by a special committee within Georgia’s National Film Center.
The film had its world premiere at the recent Venice film festival, where its initial screenings were threatened by claims of copyright infringement by Russian and Croatian companies.
Belgium: ‘Julie Keeps Quiet’
Leonardo Van Dijl’s “Julie Keeps Quiet” has been selected as Belgium’s entry in the contest for the international feature film category of the 97th Academy Awards.
“Julie Keeps Quiet” focuses on a star player at an elite tennis academy, whose life revolves around the game she loves. When her coach falls under investigation and is suddenly suspended, all of the club’s players are encouraged to speak up. But Julie decides to keep quiet…
Van Dijl’s debut feature premiered in Cannes’ Critics’ Week, where it won both the Prix SACD and the Prix Fondation GAN. It made its North American premiere in Toronto’s Centrepiece section. Upcoming screenings include Busan and London film festivals.
Tennis champion Naomi Osaka is executive producing the movie through her company Hana Kuma. The cinematography is by Nicolas Karakatsanis (“Cruella,” “I, Tonya”) and the score is by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Caroline Shaw.
The film has been sold by New Europe Film Sales to nearly 30 territories, with deals for North America and Japan expected to close soon.
The film is produced by Gilles De Schryver, Gilles Coulier, Wouter Sap, Roxanne Sarkozi for De Wereldvrede (Belgium), and co-produced by Delphine Tomson, Luc Dardenne, Jean-Pierre Dardenne for Les Films du Fleuve (Belgium), Nima Yousefi for Hobab (Sweden) and Kristina Börjeson and Anthony Muir for Film i Väst (Sweden).
Executive producers are Federica Sainte-Rose and Florian Zeller for Blue Morning Pictures and Naomi Osaka and Stuart Duguid for Hana Kuma. The film was supported by The Flemish Audiovisual Fund, the Centre du Cinema et de l’audiovisuel of the French community in Belgium, the Belgian Tax Shelter, Proximus, New Dawn and Film i Väst.
Van Dijl is repped by 2AM, Ken Lambrechts, CAA and Granderson Des Rochers.
Slovenia: ‘Family Therapy’
Slovenia has selected Sonja Prosenc’s “Family Therapy” as its submission to the Oscars best international film race.
“Family Therapy” follows a seemingly perfect family whose life is thrown into disarray when a young stranger arrives, exposing their hidden fears, flaws and dreams, and unraveling the deep-seated dysfunction in their relationships. It stars Mila Bezjak, Aliocha Schneider, Marko Mandić and Katarina Stegnar.
In a statement, the country’s Oscar jury said the film “addresses the current theme of the hedonistic elite in the modern world, who live their safe and untouchable lives under a glass dome. The film skillfully intertwines the complex dynamics of relationships between the inner and outer worlds, the spiritual and the physical. Through an innovative combination of expressive means, at a high production level, and with the right balance of comedy and tragedy, the creators have succeeded in breaking through the seemingly protective glass that once shielded us from the intrusion of raw reality.”
In an interview with Variety, Prosenc said the film came to be because she was “wondering about this dissonance between our values and our actions, when we are confronted with something in real life.”
Of her main characters, she said: “I think they feel completely disconnected from the rest of society. And they want to feel disconnected. This is a very contemporary state of society in Slovenia. And, of course, worldwide.”
Hungary: ‘Semmelweis’
Lajos Koltai’s period biopic “Semmelweis,” about a Hungarian doctor best known for introducing antiseptic procedures at Vienna’s maternity clinic, has been selected as the Hungarian entry for the best international film category of the Academy Awards.
Koltai was nominated for an Oscar for the cinematography of 2001’s “Malena.”
“Semmelweis,” sold by NFI World Sales, has become the highest grossing Hungarian movie in theaters in five years, attracting more than 350,000 viewers and grossing more than $2 million since its November 2023 release.
Taking place in 19th century’s Vienna, the film tells the story of Ignac Semmelweis, a short-tempered but passionate Hungarian doctor, who delivers babies and carries out autopsies on a daily basis whilst looking for the cause of puerperal fever, the mysterious epidemic that decimates patients in the hospital.
Semmelweis’ boss prohibits him from conducting research into the subject and blocks him at every turn. He also makes a young midwife, Emma Hoffmann, spy on him. However, the relationship between Semmelweis and Emma develops into a romance. When Semmelweis discovers the cause and prevention of the maternity fever, half of his peers discredit him, yet he carries on with the fight to prove his theory at all costs.
Koltai said, “Semmelweis’ life is an example for all of us: a man who always, in all circumstances, followed his own path with a courage that defied death, which could not be diverted by hatred or violence. I wanted to show the viewers that it can be done: Perseverance, determination, dedication and passion bear fruit.”
The film’s leading role is played by young talent Miklós H. Vecsei, playing opposite Katica Nagy. “Semmelweis” was written by Balázs Maruszki. The cinematographer was András Nagy. Music was composed by Attila Pacsay. “Semmelweis” was produced by Tamás Lajos, Szupermodern Filmstúdió and Joe Vida, and was supported by Hungary’s National Film Institute.
Koltai’s film is the third about the life of the physician, after André de Toth’s 1940 biopic and Frigyes Bán’s “Semmelweis,” released in 1952.
The Oscar selection committee included Csaba Káel, government commissioner for the development of the Hungarian motion picture industry and chairman of the National Film Institute, editor Gabriella Koncz, dramaturge-director György Lukácsy, Emil Novák, cinematographer-director and chairman of the Hungarian Film Academy, Ákos Pesti, producer, Zsuzsanna Sipos, Oscar-winning set decorator (“Dune”), and Csilla Szabó, dramaturge.
Czech Republic: ‘Waves’
The Czech Republic has selected drama film “Waves” as its contender for the best international film category of the Oscars. Written and directed by Jiri Madl, the film is set during the 1968 Soviet Invasion of the country and depicts the fact-based story of a group of journalists from the international service of Czechoslovak Radio who were determined to keep independent news flowing.
The film had its premiere at the Karlovy Vary festival and picked up the audience award. It had its commercial release in Czech theaters from Aug. 15 via Bonton, and attracted over 400,000 admissions.
The selection was made by the Czech Film and Television Academy.
The film’s international sales are being handled by Urban Sales.
Cambodia: ‘Meeting With Pol Pot’
Rithy Panh’s “Meeting With Pol Pot” has been selected to represent Cambodia in the best international film section of the Oscars. While based partially on real events (and on the writings of American war journalist Elizabeth Becker), it crafts a fictitious tale of three French journalists attempting to interview Cambodian dictator Pol Pot in 1978. The film premiered in May at the Cannes film festival and had an official release in Cambodia on Aug. 9.
The selection was made by the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts and announced by the Department of Film and Cultural Diffusion.
Morocco: ‘Everybody Loves Touda’
Morocco has selected Nabil Ayouch’s “Everybody Loves Touda” as its candidate for the best international film Oscar.
The film tells the story of a young poet and singer steeped in an ancient Moroccan form of folk song called aita, but forced to perform trashy pop songs in bars filled with abusive men.
“Everybody Loves Touda,” launched in May out-of-competition from the Cannes Film Festival. MK2 Films is handling international sales.
Ayouch produced “The Blue Caftan,” directed by Maryam Touzani, which in 2023 became the first Moroccan film to ever make it to the Oscars shortlist.
South Korea: ‘12.12.: The Day‘
South Korea has picked “12.12.: The Day” an historical, political action drama as its national contender for the best international film Oscar. The film, dealing with a military coup in 1979, was the highest grossing film of last year at the Korean box office and the decision to select it for the Oscars was a unanimous one, the Korean Film Council (Kofic) said.
Directed by Kim Sung-su, the film was released in November last year.
Japan: ‘The Cloud’
Kurosawa Kiyoshi’s “Cloud” has been selected as Japan’s submission for the best international film in the Oscars race. The film will appear out of competition this week at the Venice film festival.
The film is a thriller centered around a young man who resells goods online and who triggers a series of online incidents. These blur the boundaries between the real and virtual worlds.
Despite having long been one of a triumvirate of top Japanese directors (along with Kore-eda Hirokazu and Kawase Naomi), Kurosawa has not previously had one of his films selected for an Oscar run.
Japan has scored strongly at the Oscars. Since the beginning of the 21st century, it has won the best foreign film Oscar twice (for “Departures” and “Drive My Car”) and had one make the shortlist (“Confessions”) and two additional nominations (“Shoplifters” and last year’s “Perfect Days.)
International sales are handled by Nikkatsu.
Kyrgyzstan: ‘Heaven Is Beneath Mother’s Feet’
“Heaven Is Beneath Mother’s Feet” (aka “Beyish Enenin Tamanynda”) will represent Kyrgyzstan in the Best Foreign Language Film category at the Oscars. The Oscar selection was made by the Union of Cinematographers of Kyrgyzstan.
The film is directed by Ruslan Akun and is the story of an adult man whose mental development stopped at age 8 and who continues to live with his mother. In order to make sure that his mother can go to heaven, he takes her by foot on a journey to Mecca.
Last year the Kyrgyzstan submission was ruled to be ineligible as it had released before the qualifying period. No replacement film was offered. “Heaven is Beneath Mother’s Feet” opened in Kyrgyzstan cinemas in March 2024 and has subsequently released in Russia and Uzbekistan.
Germany: ‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’
Germany has decided to submit Mohammad Rasoulof’s “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” which received the special jury prize at Cannes Film Festival, for its Oscar entry. Rasoulof attended the fest while in exile in Germany from his home country of Iran, which had sentenced him to eight years in prison for the political content of his films.
“The Seed of the Sacred Fig” follows a man (Misagh Zareh), who has “just been promoted to be an investigating judge at the Revolutionary Court in Tehran when a huge protest movement sweeps the country following the death of a young woman,” its synopsis reads. “Although the demonstrations increase and the state cracks down with ever tougher measures, Iman decides to side with the regime, upsetting the balance of his family.”
In a statement, Germany’s Oscar committee called the film “a psychological portrait of Iran’s theocracy which is built on violence and paranoia. Mohammad Rasoulof subtly tells of the cracks within a family that are representative of those within Iranian society itself. A masterfully directed and movingly acted film that finds scenes that stay with you. The two rebellious daughters symbolize the courageous women of Iran and their self-sacrificing struggle against the patriarchs of their families and their state. It is an outstanding work by one of the great directors of world cinema and someone who has found refuge in Germany from state despotism in Iran. We are very happy to know that Rasoulof is safe in our country. And we are delighted that he will be representing Germany at the Oscars in 2025.”
Neon is releasing “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” in the U.S.
Lithuania: ‘Drowning Dry’
Laurynas Bareiša’s “Seses” (Drowning Dry), which won best director in the international competition and best performance award for the film’s four leads at Locarno Film Festival on Saturday, has been selected by Lithuania as its Oscar entry.
In the film, Ernesta, her husband Lukas, and her son, together with her sister Juste’s family, are spending the weekend at a country house after Lukas’s victory in a mixed martial arts tournament. The families are swimming in a nearby lake, having dinner, discussing family finances. After an accident, the sisters become single mothers. The film follows the sisters’ life in the aftermath of the tragedy.
The structurally complex, narratively splintered drama marks a confident step forward for Lithuanian cinematographer turned director Bareiša, whose debut “Pilgrims” triumphed in Venice’s Horizons competition in 2021.
The producer is Klementina Remeikaitė for Afterschool Production of Lithuania and the co-producer is Matīss Kaža for Trickster Pictures of Latvia.
International sales are handled by Alpha Violet.
Uruguay: ‘Hay una puerta ahí’
Uruguay has submitted Juan Ponce de León and Facundo Ponce de León’s debut feature documentary “Hay una puerta ahí,” to the the best international feature category of the 97th Academy Awards.
“Hay una puerta ahí” documents the beginning of a friendship between two older men, with one helping the other to die. For nine months, Fernando and Enric recorded every conversation they shared about the subject, conversations had entirely through video chat during the pandemic.
With a slight “The Odd Couple” vibe, Fernando logs on to video chat from a hospital bed, often with a cigarette between his lips, while Enric sits in a well-kept home office. Fernando’s family makes sometimes heartbreaking and sometimes uplifting cameos as together, they face the end of their patriarch’s life.
The film, produced by Mueca Films in Uruguay and A Contracoriente Films in Spain, screened in San Sebastian’s Made in Spain sidebar in 2023 and in Malaga’s special selections section for documentaries.
“Hay una puerta ahí”
Credit: Malaga Film Festvial
Taiwan: ‘Old Fox’
Taiwan has selected multi-award-winning drama film “Old Fox” as its representative in the best international feature category of the 97th Academy Awards. The island’s Ministry of Culture says that it selected “Old Fox” from 14 candidate films.
Directed by Hsiao Ya-chuan, the film tells the morally-conflicted tale of an 11-year-old boy from a modest background. He is torn between the hardscrabble and penny-pinching life of his single-parent father and the allure of a neighborhood landlord, who offers riches and lessons in streetwise pragmatism.
The central performances of child star Bai Run-jin (who previously appeared in “Dear Tennant”) and writer-actor Akio Chen elevate the triangular relationship into a prize-winning effort. The picture had its premiere at the Tokyo International Film Festival before becoming the numerical winner at Taiwan’s prestigious Golden Horse Film Awards the following month. While it missed out on the best film prize, “Old Fox” collected four prizes including best director and best supporting actor for Chen.
“Old Fox”
BIT Production
Latvia: ‘Flow’
Latvia has selected Gints Zilbalodis’ “Flow” as its entry in the best international feature category of the 97th Academy Awards. The animated feature had its world premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival and won four prizes at Annecy.
Sideshow and Janus Films acquired North American rights to the film out of Cannes and are planning a theatrical release this year.
At Annecy, “Flow” won the Audience Award, the Jury Award, the special prize for original music and the Gan Foundation Award for Distribution. It will also screen at the Toronto Film Festival next month.
“Flow” follows a courageous cat after his home is devastated by a great flood. Teaming up with a capybara, a lemur, a bird and a dog to navigate a boat in search of dry land, they must rely on trust, courage and wits to survive the perils of a newly aquatic planet.
The film was co-written by Zilbalodis and Matiss Kaza, with a score by Zilbalodis and Rihards Zalupe. It was produced by Zilbalodis and Kaza, alongside Ron Dyens and Gregory Zalcman. The international sales agent is Charades.
Zilbalodis’ “Away” won the Contrechamp Award for Best Film at Annecy in 2019.
Latvia’s selection was made by the Latvian Selection Committee, a commission of film industry experts established by the National Film Center.
“Flow”
Janus Films / Sideshow
Austria: ‘The Devil’s Bath’
“The Devil’s Bath,” a period psychological thriller which competed at the Berlin Film Festival, has been submitted by Austria as its official Oscar entry for the international feature film race. The film picked up the Silver Bear for best cinematography (for Martin Gschlacht) at the Berlinale.
The film is directed by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, the Austrian filmmaking duo behind “Goodnight Mommy,” which bowed at Venice and also represented Austria in the Oscar race.
Set in rural Austria in 1750, the film centres on Agnes, a young married woman who feels oppressed in her husband’s world, which is devoid of emotion and limited to chores and expectations. A pious and highly sensitive woman, Agnes falls into a deep depression, before committing a shocking act of violence that she sees as the only way out of her inner prison.
The movie is being handled by Shudder in North America. The streamer also picked it up for the U.K., Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. It’s been sold around the world by Playtime.
“The Devil’s Bath” was produced by Ulrich Seidl Filmproduktion, in co-production with Heimatfilm and Coop99 Filmproduktion.
Courtesy of Shudder
“The Devil’s Bath”
Ireland: ‘Kneecap’
Ireland has submitted “Kneecap” to represent the country in the Oscars international feature film category.
The film became a sensation in Sundance, where it was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, and has been amassing plaudits at festivals around the world over the last few months.
From writer-director Rich Peppiatt, “Kneecap” is a raucous semi-autobiographical comedy about the wildly outspoken and hard-partying Northern Irish hip-hop trio of the same name.
“Kneecap” was produced by Trevor Birney and Jack Tarling for Fine Point Films and Mother Tongues Films, with Patrick O’Neill at Wildcard acting as co-producer.
Mo Chara, DJ Próvaí and Móglaí Bap in “Kneecap”
Helen Sloan
Jimmy Kimmel received a Creative Arts Emmy Award for “Outstanding Variety Special (Live)” this evening for hosting the Oscars in 2023. He’s hosted a total of four times, could the shiny new statuette convince him to host a fifth?
“No, the die has been cast,” said Kimmel with a laugh.
The late-night host declined to repeat the gig at the next Academy Awards due to the time commitment preparing for Hollywood’s biggest night. Neither Kimmel nor comedian John Mulaney accepted an offer to host for 2025 with no one else confirmed as of now.
Though he did not address whether hosting duties were completely off the table indefinitely, he has previously said if he returned for next year’s celebration it would’ve been three back-to-back years which was too overwhelming for his schedule both professionally and personally.
In the meantime, Kimmel remains focused on working on his eponymous late-night show ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! as the industry landscape is rapidly changing. On Friday, it was announced that NBC’sThe Tonight Show will no longer have original episodes airing 5 nights a week. ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!, CBS’ Late Show With Stephen Colbert and NBC’s Late Night With Seth Meyers already scaled back to four nights of originals a week starting this season.
“As a group, we have a text chain of all the late-night hosts and we sent all of our congratulations to Jimmy Fallon for getting Friday off,” Kimmel shared backstage. “There is no future for late-night,” he added as the room erupted with laughter.
The 97th Academy Awards have yet to land a host, though it’s not for lack of trying.
ABC is said to have made offers to both Jimmy Kimmel and John Mulaney, both of whom passed on the opportunity, as first reported by Puck News. Fortunately for the Academy and its host network, there’s still plenty of time, with the Oscars not slated to air until Sunday, March 2.
The first outreach had gone to Kimmel, its late-night host, who’s already emceed the Academy Awards four times, including the last two years. (Ironically, his statement upon accepting the offer in 2023 read: “I always dreamed of hosting the Oscars exactly four times.”) Nevertheless, he was the obvious choice, in large part because his last foray was widely praised and because he’s already part of the Disney family. But Kimmel ultimately said no, as he reportedly did hosting this year’s Emmy awards, which will also be carried on ABC.
The decision may come as a surprise to those who know Kimmel to ultimately say yes to most major gigs in the name of being a good partner. After all, he’s hosted the Emmys for ABC three times, he makes an annual appearance as roast master at the Disney upfront and he keeps re-upping his late night contract despite hemming and hawing about being done. But he’s also been vocal in recent years about his desire to have more balance in his life, which played into his decision to take the summers off at Jimmy Kimmel Live.
Mulaney, arguably a sexier if riskier bet, came next. His name has been bandied about as a potential host ever since he won over the Oscar crowd at the Governors Awards earlier this year. In fact, many saw that non-televised gig as an audition of sorts, during which Mulaney clearly passed. (Vulture went so far as to publish a piece titled, Let John Mulaney Host Everything.) The year prior, Mulaney had been asked by The Hollywood Reporter if he would ever consider hosting the Oscars. “Sure, why not?” he replied. “It would be really fun. It’s hosting the Academy Awards. Johnny Carson did that.”
And while the comic addressed the possibly more recently, telling THR in June that he “wouldn’t necessarily say no”; in the end, he decided to pass for this year. (Don’t bother asking about the year after since he insists he doesn’t plan more three months in advance.) Though hosting the Oscars is a prestigious opportunity and still a major platform, it’s also a massive, months-long and often thankless undertaking. Plus, Mulaney would have had to give up other opportunities, including another likely (and hugely lucrative) standup tour. So, it’s back to the drawing board for ABC and the Academy, which hasn’t had to run an extensive search for an Oscars host in years. ABC declined to comment for this story, and the Academy did not immediately respond.
The Academy is currently accepting general entries (best picture and other categories), animated features, animated shorts, documentary features, documentary shorts, international features, live action shorts, original scores and original songs.
Submissions are due on different dates between Aug. 15 and Nov. 14, depending on the submission’s category and the date of its qualifying run. (General entries, animated features, documentary features and short films of all sorts have two different due dates, one for submissions that qualified before July 1 and another for submissions that qualified on or after that date.)
The 97th Oscars will take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Sunday, March 2, 2025. Early contenders include spring indie Challengers; summer blockbuster Inside Out 2; Cannes standouts Anora, Emilia Pérez and The Substance; and Sing Sing, a drama that opens in theaters today.
The 2024 Oscars, which took place this past March, saw Oppenheimer named best picture and win six other awards including best director (Christopher Nolan), best actor (Cillian Murphy) and best supporting actor (Robert Downey Jr.). Best actress went to Poor Things‘ Emma Stone and best supporting actress was won by The Holdovers‘ Da’Vine Joy Randolph.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences said Tuesday that it is extending invitations to 487 to join the membership ranks of the Oscar organizer. If all accept, it will bring the Academy’s total membership to 10,910, of which 9,934 would be voting members.
This year’s list across 19 branches include 2024 Oscar winners Da’Vine Joy Randolph from The Holdovers; Poor Things costume designer Holly Waddington and production design team James Price, Shona Heath and Zsuzsa Mihalek; 20 Days in Mariupol director Mstyslav Chernov, War Is Over! producer Brad Booker; The Zone of Interest sound duo Tarn Willers and Johnnie Burn; the Godzilla Minus One VFX team Tatsuji Nojima, Kiyoko Shibuya, Masaki Takahashi and Takashi Yamazaki; American Fiction writer-director Cord Jefferson; and Anatomy of a Fall writing duo Justine Triet and Arthur Harari.
Jefferson and Triet are among eight names on the list who were invited to more than one branch (noted in the list below with asterisks); invitees must select one branch to join.
Other notables include Killers of the Flower Moon Oscar nominee Lily Gladstone; SAG-AFTRA chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland; Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr.; John Wick franchise director Chad Stahelski; and the Past Lives trio of Celina Song, Greta Lee and Teo Yoo. Song is also a multi-branch nominee (Writers and Directors).
“We are thrilled to welcome this year’s class of new members to the Academy,” said Academy CEO Bill Kramer and Academy president Janet Yang today. “These remarkably talented artists and professionals from around the world have made a significant impact on our filmmaking community.”
The Academy said the 2024 class is made up of 44% who identify as women, while 41% belong to underrepresented ethnic/racial communities and 56% are from 56 countries and territories outside U.S. A total of 71 Oscar nominees and 19 winners are among the invitees to AMPAS’ 19 branches.
The 487 new members for this year is up from the 398 invited in 2023. The record for most invitees came in 2018, when 928 were asked amid the Academy’s overhaul of its rolls as it focused on diversifying its membership.
See below for the full list of 2024 invitees:
Actors
Jessica Alba – “Machete,” “Frank Miller’s Sin City” Erika Alexander – “American Fiction,” “30 Years to Life” Swann Arlaud – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Bloody Milk” Shabana Azmi – “Godmother,” “Arth” Obba Babatunde – “City of Lies,” “The Manchurian Candidate” Saleh Bakri – “The Blue Caftan,” “The Band’s Visit” Stephanie Beatriz – “Encanto,” “In the Heights” Danielle Brooks – “The Color Purple,” Clemency” Tia Carrere – “True Lies,” “Wayne’s World” Sergio Castellitto – “Don’t Move,” “My Mother’s Smile” Alfredo Castro – “El Conde,” “Tony Manero” Jason Clarke – “Oppenheimer,” “Zero Dark Thirty” Kate Del Castillo – “Under the Same Moon,” “American Visa” Gang Dong-won – “Broker,” “Peninsula” Lily Gladstone – “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “The Unknown Country” Rachel House – “Hunt for the Wilderpeople,” “Boy” Sandra Hüller – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “The Zone of Interest” Maeve Jinkings – “Toll,” “Neon Bull” Greta Lee – “Past Lives,” “Gemini” Kate Mara – “Megan Leavey,” “The Martian” Dash Mihok – “Silver Linings Playbook,” “The Thin Red Line” Catherine O’Hara – “For Your Consideration,” “Best in Show” Da’Vine Joy Randolph – “The Holdovers,” “Dolemite Is My Name” Fiona Shaw – “The Last September,” “The Butcher Boy” Qi Shu – “The Assassin,” “Three Times” D.B. Sweeney – “Dinosaur,” “Eight Men Out” Jasmine Trinca – “Fortunata,” “Honey” Koji Yakusho – “Perfect Days,” “The Blood of Wolves” Teo Yoo – “Past Lives,” “Vertigo”
Casting Directors
Dixie Chassay – “Dune: Part Two,” “Poor Things” Kharmel Cochrane – “Saltburn,” “The Northman” Angela Demo – “Cha Cha Real Smooth,” “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” Jennifer Euston – “American Fiction,” “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” Rene Haynes – “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “The Revenant” Gayle Keller – “Bros,” “The King of Staten Island” Moira Miller – “A Fantastic Woman,” “The Green Inferno” Masunobu Motokawa – “Perfect Days,” “The Wandering Moon” Ulrike Müller – “Ghost Trail,” “Scorched Earth” Elsa Pharaon – “A Silence,” “Holy Motors” Alejandro Reza – “Noche de Bodas,” “Gringo” Luis Rosales – “Cassandro,” “Bardo: False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths” Limor Shmila – “The Vanishing Soldier,” “The Stronghold” Rebecca van Unen – “Sweet Dreams,” “Quo Vadis, Aida?” Chamutal Zerem – “Karaoke,” “Foxtrot”
Cinematographers
Eric Branco – “Story Ave,” “The Forty-Year-Old Version” Chananun Chotrungroj – “Birth/Rebirth,” “The Trapped 13: How We Survived the Thai Cave” Matthew Chuang – “You Won’t Be Alone,” “Blue Bayou” Andrew Commis – “Blueback,” “Babyteeth” Ashley Connor – “Polite Society,” “The Miseducation of Cameron Post” Josée Deshaies – “The Beast,” “Passages” Alex Disenhof – “Alice,” “Captive State” Jomo Fray – “All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt,” “Port Authority” Damián García – “Jungleland,” “I’m No Longer Here” Magdalena Górka – “Die in a Gunfight,” “An Ordinary Man” Ryuto Kondo – “Monster,” “A Man” Dariela Ludlow Deloya – “A Million Miles Away,” “Prayers for the Stolen” Catherine Lutes – “Close to You,” “Mouthpiece” Aurélien Marra – “L’Homme Debout,” “Two of Us” Igor Meglic – “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire,” “Fast X” Crescenzo Giacomo Notarile – “Bullet,” “Moonwalker” Sophia Olsson – “Charter,” “Echo” Yerkinbek Ptyraliyev – “Yellow Cat,” “Karinca” Jamie Ramsay – “All of Us Strangers,” “Living” Nanu Segal – “Emily,” “Donkey Punch” Hidetoshi Shinomiya – “Drive My Car,” “The Town of Headcounts” Jigme Tenzing – “The Monk and the Gun,” “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” Ravi Varman – “Japan,” “Ponniyin Selvan: Part Two” Maria von Hausswolff – “Godland,” “A White, White Day” Sophie Winqvist – “Clara Sola,” “Pleasure”
Costume Designers
Dave Crossman – “Napoleon,” “1917” Mario D’Avignon – “Midway,” “Hochelaga, Land of Souls” Anne Dixon – “The Marsh King’s Daughter,” “The Song of Names” Jürgen Doering – “Personal Shopper,” “Clouds of Sils Maria” Leesa Evans – “Always Be My Maybe,” “Bridesmaids” Gabriela Fernández – “I’m No Longer Here,” “Cantinflas” Małgorzata Karpiuk – “The Zone of Interest,” “Quo Vadis, Aida?” Kazuko Kurosawa – “Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai,” “Silk” Ann Maskrey – “The Man Who Knew Infinity,” “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” Mona May – “Enchanted,” “Clueless” Rama Rajamouli – “RRR,” “Baahubali: The Beginning” Sheetal Sharma – “Gangubai Kathiawadi,” “Kesari” Preeyanan “Lin” Suwannathada – “The Creator,” “Buffalo Boys” Jill Taylor – “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” “My Week with Marilyn” Mónica Toschi – “A Ravaging Wind,” “Argentina, 1985” Holly Waddington – “Poor Things,” “Lady Macbeth” Khadija Zeggaï – “Passages,” “Love Crime”
Directors
Fede Álvarez – “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” “Don’t Breathe” Kyle Patrick Alvarez – “The Stanford Prison Experiment,” “C.O.G.” Lila Avilés – “Totem,” “The Chambermaid” Jamie Babbit – “The Stand-In,” “But I’m a Cheerleader” Minhal Baig – “We Grown Now,” “Hala” Bahrām Beyzaie* – “When We Are All Asleep,” “Killing Mad Dogs” Jayro Bustamente – “La Llorona,” “Tremors” Steven Caple Jr. – “Transformers: Rise of the Beasts,” “Creed II” İlker Çatak* – “The Teachers’ Lounge,” “I Was, I Am, I Will Be” Ayoka Chenzira – “Alma’s Rainbow” Justin Chon – “Blue Bayou,” “Ms. Purple” Rima Das – “Tora’s Husband,” “Village Rockstars” JD Dillard – “Devotion,” “Sweetheart” Alice Diop – “Saint Omer,” “We” Sally El Hosaini – “Unicorns,” “The Swimmers” Leslie Harris – “Just Another Girl on the I.R.T.” Cord Jefferson* – “American Fiction” S.S. Rajamouli – “RRR,” “Eega” Boots Riley – “Sorry to Bother You” Alex Rivera – “The Infiltrators,” “Sleep Dealer” A.V. Rockwell – “A Thousand and One” Juliana Rojas – “Good Manners,” “Necropolis Symphony” Emma Seligman – “Bottoms,” “Shiva Baby” Celine Song* – “Past Lives” Angel Manuel Soto – “Blue Beetle,” “Charm City Kings” Justine Triet* – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Sibyl” Anand Kumar Tucker – “The Critic,” “Leap Year” David Yates – “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2,” “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” Susan Youssef – “Marjoun and the Flying Headscarf,” “Habibi Rasak Kharban”
Documentary
Trish Adlesic – “The ABCs of Book Banning,” “Gasland” Daniela Alatorre – “A Cop Movie,” “Midnight Family” Waad Al-Kateab – “We Dare to Dream,” “For Sama” Anne Alvergue – “The Martha Mitchell Effect,” “Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn” Raed Andoni – “Ghost Hunting,” “Fix Me” Alethea Arnaquq-Baril – “Twice Colonized,” “Angry Inuk” Mila Aung-Thwin – “Let There Be Light,” “Last Train Home” Tina Baz – “Adolescents,” “Fix Me” Jorge Bodanzky – “The Amazon, a New Minamata?,” “Third Millennium” Moses Bwayo – “Bobi Wine: The People’s President” Caryn Capotosto – “Little Richard: I Am Everything,” “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” Nadim Cheikhrouha* – “Four Daughters,” “Benda Bilili!” Mstyslav Chernov – “20 Days in Mariupol” Michael Collins – “Almost Sunrise,” “Give Up Tomorrow” Flávia de Souza – “Aftershock,” “Open Heart” Jeanie Finlay – “Your Fat Friend,” “Seahorse: The Dad Who Gave Birth” Beadie Finzi – “Only When I Dance,” “Unknown White Male” Ellen Goosenberg Kent – “Torn Apart: Separated at the Border,” “Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1” Sky Hopinka – “Kicking the Clouds,” “Malni: Towards the Ocean, towards the Shore” José Joffily – “A Symphony for a Common Man,” “Foreign Soldier” Rachel Lears – “To the End,” “Knock Down the House” Rebecca Lichtenfeld – “The Eternal Memory,” “The Nightcrawlers” Sergei Loznitsa – “Babi Yar. Context,” “Mr. Landsbergis” Aïcha Macky – “Zinder,” “The Fruitless Tree” Kara Magsanoc-Alikpala – “Delikado,” “Call Her Ganda” Elaine McMillion Sheldon – “King Coal,” “Heroin(e)” Mark Mitten – “A Compassionate Spy,” “Abacus: Small Enough to Jail” Vincent Moloi – “Skulls of My People,” “Men of Gold” Nisha Pahuja – “To Kill a Tiger,” “The World before Her” Pola Rapaport – “Addicted to Life,” “Broken Meat” RaMell Ross – “Easter Snap,” “Hale County This Morning, This Evening” Ousmane Samassekou – “The Last Shelter,” “The Heirs of the Hill” Frédéric Tcheng – “Invisible Beauty,” “Halston” Jennifer Tiexiera – “Subject,” “P.S. Burn This Letter Please” Hemal Trivedi – “Among the Believers,” “Saving Face” Christine Turner* – “The Barber of Little Rock,” “Lynching Postcards: “Token of a Great Day”” Keith Wilson – “Joonam,” “I Didn’t See You There”
Executives
Salma Abdalla Cate Adams Maya Amsellem Lenora del Pilar Ferrero Blanco Sasha Bühler Michelle Byrd Elaine Chin Duncan Crabtree-Ireland Paolo Del Brocco Gina Duncan Dan Friedkin Poppy Hanks Kate Hurwitz Iris Knobloch Tim League Sasha Lloyd Harvey Mason Jr. Daniela Michel Brittany Morrissey Brianna Oh Lejo Pet Areli Quirarte Matthew Reilly Chris Rice Ben Roberts Peter Safran Couper Samuelson Ellen Stutzman Fumiko Takagi Graham Taylor Emily Woodburne Kim Yutani
Film Editors
Timothy Alverson – “Halloween,” “Orphan” Michael Andrews* – “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “Shrek 2” Qutaiba Barhamji – “Four Daughters,” “Smoke Sauna Sisterhood” Joseph Charles Bond – “Wildflower,” “The Man Who Knew Infinity” Victoria Boydell – “Saltburn,” “Rye Lane” Paul Carlin – “Bobi Wine: The People’s President,” “The Mystery of D.B. Cooper” Carlotta Cristiani – “The Inner Cage,” “Daughter of Mine” Cătălin Cristuțiu – “Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World,” “Poppy Field” Annette Davey – “Dreamin’ Wild,” “Together, Together” Amy Foote – “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed,” “The Work” Keith Fraase – “Past Lives,” “To the Wonder” Jo Francis – “Memory,” “Charming the Hearts of Men” Toni Froschhammer – “Perfect Days,” “Pina” Nassim Gordji-Tehrani – “Rosalie,” “The Wolf’s Call” Kaya Inan – “My Wonderful Wanda,” “In the Aisles” Lisa Lassek – “Leave the World Behind,” “Marvel’s The Avengers” Jaume Martí – “Society of the Snow,” “God’s Crooked Lines” Rie Matsubara – “The Boy and the Heron,” “When Marnie Was There” Mike Munn – “To Kill a Tiger,” “This Is Not a Movie” Darrin Navarro – “Summering,” “Tallulah” Mdhamiri Nkemi – “Blue Story,” “The Last Tree” Hilda Rasula – “American Fiction,” “Vengeance” Josh Schaeffer – “Godzilla vs. Kong,” “Molly’s Game” Laurent Sénéchal – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Onoda: 10,000 Nights in the Jungle” Takeshi Seyama – “The Boy and the Heron,” “Spirited Away” Michelle Tesoro – “Maestro,” “On the Basis of Sex”
Makeup Artists and Hairstylists
Ana Bulajić Črček – “Illyricvm,” “Number 55” Hildegard Haide – “Run to Ground,” “Extinction” Karen Hartley Thomas – “Golda,” “The Personal History of David Copperfield” Frédéric Lainé – “The Animal Kingdom,” “Benedetta”
Marketing and Public Relations
Michele Abitbol-Lasry Matt Johnson Apice Austin Barker Neil Bhatt Darnell Brisco Nasim Cambron Holly Connors Mauricio Azael Duran Ortega Stephen Garrett Christopher Gonzalez Andrea Grau Blair Green Carlos Alberto Gutiérrez Lisa Zaks Markowitz David Ninh Julien Noble Gitesh Pandya Michelle Paris Elaine Patterson Lonnie Snell Ray Subers Caren Quinn Thompson Jessica Thurber Hemingway Vilija Vitartas Stephanie Wenborn
Music
Michael K. Bauer – “Cassandro,” “The Equalizer 3” Stephen Bray – “The Color Purple,” “Psycho III” Anthony Chue – “Man on the Edge,” “G Storm” Gary M. Clark – “Flora and Son,” “Sing Street” Marius de Vries – “Navalny,” “CODA” Jerskin Fendrix – “Poor Things” Simon Franglen – “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “The Magnificent Seven” Jo Yeong-wook – “Decision to Leave,” “Hunt” Shari Johanson – “Maybe I Do,” “All Together Now” Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch – “All of Us Strangers,” “Living” Fabrizio Mancinelli – “Il Viaggio Leggendario,” “The Boat” Diego Navarro – “The Cuckoo’s Curse,” “The Wasteland” Martin Phipps – “Napoleon,” “The Princess” Plínio Profeta – “Desapega!,” “Nosso Sonho” Philippe Rombi – “Driving Madeleine,” “Joyeux Noël” David Sardy – “The Beekeeper,” “Zombieland” Katrina Marie Schiller – “Wonka,” “Black Mass” Carl Sealove – “Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down,” “The Human Trial” Ryan Shore – “Veselka: The Rainbow on the Corner at the Center of the World,” “Zombie Town” Kubilay Uner – “American Traitor: The Trail of Axis Sally,” “Force of Nature” Dan Wilson – “American Symphony,” “Love Again”
Producers
Tom Ackerley – “Barbie,” “I, Tonya” Nadim Cheikhrouha* – “Four Daughters,” “The Man Who Sold His Skin” Jay Choi – “The Good the Bad the Weird,” “A Tale of Two Sisters” Jennifer Davisson – “Robin Hood,” “Live by Night” Fernanda De la Peza – “The Hole in the Fence,” “Robe of Gems” Simón de Santiago – “Regression,” “Agora” Diana Elbaum – “Hounds,” “Isn’t She Lovely?” Saïd Hamich Benlarbi – “Deserts,” “Return to Bollene” Alex Heineman – “Gunpowder Milkshake,” “The Commuter” Sandra Hermida – “Society of the Snow,” “Un Amor” John M. Jacobsen – “Trollhunter,” “Max Manus” David Koplan – “Spirited,” “Papillon” Ben LeClair – “American Fiction,” “Fair Play” Tatiana Leite – “Rule 34,” “Loveling” Agustina Llambí Campbell – “Argentina, 1985,” “The Wild Ones” Andrew Lowe – “Poor Things,” “Chevalier” Renata de Almeida Magalhães – “The Great Mystical Circus,” “The Greatest Love of All” Kaoru Matsuzaki – “Shoplifters,” “Like Father, Like Son” Kelly McCormick – “Bullet Train,” “Violent Night” Sarah Schechter – “My Policeman,” “Free Guy” Ritesh Sidhwani – “Gully Boy,” “Dil Chahta Hai” Leslie Urdang – “Rabbit Hole,” “Adam” Edward Vaisman – “The American Society of Magical Negroes,” “A Thousand and One” James Wilson – “The Zone of Interest,” “Under the Skin” María Zamora – “The Rye Horn,” “Alcarràs”
Production and Technology
Deva Anderson Keir Beck Nicholas Bergh Geoff Burdick Larry Chernoff Man-Nang Chong George Cottle Eddie Drake Shauna Duggins Jonathan Eusebio Clay Donahue Fontenot Kyle Gardiner Barrie Hemsley Joel C. High Susan Jacobs Renard T. Jenkins Joshua Levinson Larry McConkey David James McKimmie Samantha Jo “Mandy” Moore Kenny Ortega Prem Rakshith Chad Stahelski David Webb Woo-Ping Yuen
Production Design
Alain Bainée – “Society of the Snow,” “Official Competition” Annie Beauchamp – “Swan Song,” “Penguin Bloom” Ruth De Jong – “Oppenheimer,” “Nope” Douglas Dresser – “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” “Finch” Emmanuelle Duplay – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Red Island” Warren Flanagan – “Sonic the Hedgehog 2,” “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” Lorin Flemming – “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” Henry Fong – “Army of the Dead,” “A Wrinkle in Time” Jennifer Gentile – “Blue Beetle,” “Malignant” Shona Heath – “Poor Things” Sam Hutchins – “The Greatest Beer Run Ever,” “Joker” Steven Jones-Evans – “Anyone but You,” “Carmen” Claire Kaufman – “Oppenheimer,” “White Noise” Carol Kupisz – “Napoleon,” “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” Zsuzsa Mihalek – “Poor Things,” “Atomic Blonde” Edwin L. Natividad – “Blue Beetle,” “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” Till Benjamin Nowak – “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” “Black Panther” Chris Oddy – “The Zone of Interest,” “King of Thieves” Jenny Oman – “Mr. Malcolm’s List,” “The Green Knight” Adam O’Neill – “Chevalier,” “Empire of Light” James Price – “Poor Things,” “The Iron Claw” Peggy Pridemore – “Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House,” “Jack Reacher: Never Go Back” Scott Purcell – “Ambulance,” “A Quiet Place” Steve Saklad – “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.,” “Barb & Star Go to Vista Del Mar” Rick Schuler – “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania,” “Once upon a Time…in Hollywood” Don Shank – “Elemental,” “Luca” Andrew M. Siegel – “The Fabelmans,” “Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn” Tom Targownik Taylor – “Stand Up Guys,” “Little Fockers” Adam Willis – “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “Marriage Story” Katia Wyszkop – “Peter von Kant,” “Une Jeune Fille Qui Va Bien” Milena Zdravkovic – “Sonic the Hedgehog 2,” “Ghostbusters: Afterlife”
Short Films and Feature Animation
Dan Abraham – “Once upon a Studio,” “Planes” Abigail Addison – “The Debutante,” “I’m OK” Michael Andrews* – “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “Megamind” Brad Booker – “WAR IS OVER! Inspired by the Music of John & Yoko,” “The Book of Life” Samuel Caron – “Invincible,” “As Happy as Can Be” Nazrin Choudhury – “Red, White and Blue” Sarah Helen Cox – “Heavy Pockets,” “Plain Pleasures” Louie Del Carmen – “Luck,” “The Star” Kayla Galang – “When You Left Me on That Boulevard,” “Joan on the Phone” Amit R. Gicelter – “Letter to a Pig,” “Black Slide” Alan Hawkins – “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “The Mitchells vs. the Machines” Atsuko Ishizuka – “Goodbye, Don Glees!,” “No Game No Life: Zero” Tal Kantor – “Letter to a Pig,” “In Other Words” Àlex Lora – “The Fourth Kingdom,” “Us” James Mansfield – “Zootopia,” “Hercules” Patrick Mate – “Smurfs: The Lost Village,” “Puss in Boots” Boris Mendza – “Bazigaga,” “Rise of a Star” Yegane Moghaddam – “Our Uniform,” “On the Cover” Maral Mohammadian – “Impossible Figures and Other Stories I,” “Shannon Amen” Mari Okada – “Maboroshi,” “Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms” Ryo Orikasa – “Miserable Miracle,” “Datum Point” Frank Passingham – “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio,” “Kubo and the Two Strings” Ülo Pikkov – “’Til We Meet Again,” “Empty Space” Rebecca Pruzan – “Lovesick,” “Ivalu” Troy Quane – “Nimona,” “Spies in Disguise” Vincent René-Lortie – “Invincible,” “The Man Who Traveled Nowhere in Time” Carlos Segundo – “Big Bang,” “Sideral” Pauline Seigland – “One and Thousand Nights,” “Little Hands” Shuzo Shiota – “Blame!,” “Muybridge’s String” Justin K. Thompson – “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” Christine Turner* – “The Barber of Little Rock,” “Lynching Postcards: “Token of a Great Day”” Theodore Ty – “Nimona,” “Lilo & Stitch” Chie Uratani – “In This Corner of the World,” “Summer Wars” Viviane Vanfleteren – “Titina,” “The Secret of Kells” Atsushi Wada – “Bird in the Peninsula,” “The Great Rabbit” Virgil Widrich – “Fast Film,” “Copy Shop” Masaaki Yuasa – “Inu-Oh,” “Mind Game” Rayka Zehtabchi – “Are You Still There?,” “Period. End of Sentence.”
Sound
Gina R. Alfano – “Baby Ruby,” “You Hurt My Feelings” Manfred Banach – “Home Sweet Home – Where Evil Lives,” “John Wick: Chapter 4” Stephanie Brown – “Haunted Mansion,” “The Marvels” Johnnie Burn – “The Zone of Interest,” “Poor Things” Alexandra Fehrman – “American Fiction,” “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Linda Forsén – “Love Lies Bleeding,” “A House Made of Splinters” Lee Gilmore – “Dune: Part Two,” “The Batman” Glynna Grimala – “End of the Road,” “Father Stu” Loveday Harding – “Heart of Stone,” “The Batman” Brent Kiser – “The Lionheart,” “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Frédéric Le Louêt – “Only 3 Days Left,” “Alibi.com 2” Steven A. Levy – “Oppenheimer,” “Tenet” Kate Morath – “The Boys in the Boat,” “Belfast” Mark Purcell – “Maestro,” “Dune” Alejandro Quevedo – “Murder City,” “Radical” David M. Roberts – “The Killer,” “Killers of the Flower Moon” Shelley Roden – “Elemental,” “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” Jay Rubin – “How to Blow Up a Pipeline,” “Master Gardener” Ian Voigt – “The Creator,” “The Hustle” Laura Wiest – “The Boogeyman,” “Sanctuary” Tarn Willers – “The Zone of Interest,” “Starve Acre” Linda Yeaney – “The Beekeeper,” “Interstellar”
Visual Effects
Gerardo Aguilera – “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “Avengers: Endgame” Stephen Hugh Richard Clee – “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “Ant-Man and the Wasp” Simone Coco – “Napoleon,” “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” Ian Comley – “The Creator,” “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Tim Dobbert – “The Creator,” “Kong: Skull Island” Emile Ghorayeb – “Nope,” “Alita: Battle Angel” Michael Grobe – “Dune: Part Two,” “Fast X” Trevor Hazel – “The Creator,” “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor among Thieves” Tamara Kent – “Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child of Fire,” “The Flash” Julius Lechner – “The Batman,” “Spider-Man: Far from Home” Allan Magled – “Bad Boys for Life,” “Geostorm” Luc-Ewen Martin-Fenouillet – “Napoleon,” “Cruella” Raymond McMillan – “Little Children,” “Dracula 2000” Lori C. Miller – “Nyad,” “Avatar: The Way of Water” Johnathan Nixon – “Nyad,” “Avatar: The Way of Water” Tatsuji Nojima – “Godzilla Minus One,” “Ghost Book Obake Zukan” Rick Walter O’Connor – “Bumblebee,” “A Quiet Place” Stephane Paris – “The Commuter,” “Guardians of the Galaxy” Laura Pedro – “Society of the Snow,” “A Monster Calls” Pietro Ponti – “The Marvels,” “Terminator Genisys” Kyle Robinson – “The Flash,” “Black Panther” Kiyoko Shibuya – “Godzilla Minus One,” “Ghost Book Obake Zukan” Kathy Siegel – “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” “Ford v Ferrari” Orde Stevanoski – “Smurfs: The Lost Village,” “Alice through the Looking Glass” Masaki Takahashi – “Godzilla Minus One,” “Parasyte” Alexis Wajsbrot – “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” Alex Wuttke – “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” Takashi Yamazaki – “Godzilla Minus One,” “Parasyte” Dennis Yoo – “The Batman,” “War for the Planet of the Apes”
Writers
Bahrām Beyzaie* – “When We Are All Asleep,” “Killing Mad Dogs” Elegance Bratton – “The Inspection,” “Pier Kids” Samy Burch – “May December” Dave Callaham – “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” Alessandro Camon – “The Listener,” “The Messenger” Nicolás Casariego – “Society of the Snow,” “Intruders” İlker Çatak* – “The Teachers’ Lounge,” “I Was, I Am, I Will Be” Massimo Ceccherini – “Io Capitano,” “Pinocchio” Linda Yvette Chávez – “Flamin’ Hot” Akela Cooper – “M3gan,” “The Nun II” Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer – “Blue Beetle,” “Miss Bala” Zeina Durra – “Luxor,” “The Imperialists Are Still Alive!” Lee Eisenberg – “Good Boys,” “Bad Teacher” Massimo Gaudioso – “Io Capitano,” “Tale of Tales” Arthur Harari – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Onoda: 10,000 Nights in the Jungle” David Hemingson – “The Holdovers” Cord Jefferson* – “American Fiction” Erik Jendresen – “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One,” “Ithaca” Maryam Keshavarz – “The Persian Version,” “Circumstance” Marc Klein – “Mirror Mirror,” “Serendipity” Kogonada – “After Yang,” “Columbus” Tony McNamara – “Poor Things,” “The Favourite” Rhett Reese – “Ghosted,” “Deadpool” Tony Rettenmaier – “They Cloned Tyrone,” “Young. Wild. Free.” Bernard Rose – “Traveling Light,” “Candyman” Sarah Adina Smith – “The Drop,” “Birds of Paradise” Celine Song* – “Past Lives” Gene Stupnitsky – “No Hard Feelings,” “Good Boys” Takuma Takasaki – “Perfect Days,” “Honokaa Boy” Juel Taylor – “They Cloned Tyrone,” “Creed II” Erica Tremblay – “Fancy Dance,” “Heartland: A Portrait of Survival” Justine Triet* – “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Sibyl” Eva Vives – “All about Nina,” “Raising Victor Vargas” Paul Wernick – “Ghosted,” “Deadpool”
Artist Representatives
Laura Berwick Eryn Brown John Carrabino Hillary Cook Tim Curtis Brian Dobbins Frank Frattaroli Jay Gassner Roger Green Laurent Gregoire Jermaine Johnson Theresa Kang Becca Kovacik Linda Lichter Douglas Lucterhand Devin Mann Gregory McKnight Evelyn O’Neill David Park Cynthia Lee Pett Valarie Phillips Maggie Pisacane Lindsay Porter Gretchen Rush Jodi Shields Chris Silbermann Carolyn Sivitz Gary Ungar Douglas Urbanski Steve Warren Alex Yarosh
The actress was nominated for best actress during the March ceremony, but the Academy Award ultimately went to Emma Stone for Poor Things. However, Gladstone recently toldEsquire that “nobody was upset” that she didn’t win.
The Under the Bridge star recalled her “beautiful trip home,” and how her tribe’s “whole confederacy came together for a Lily Gladstone Day. It was the biggest honor anybody could get. The confederacy decided together that they wanted to do it. It was a beautiful homecoming.”
She added, “Two thousand people showed up, from every corner of the US. It was absolutely one of the most moving things that has ever happened in my life.”
Ahead of the event, Gladstone explained that Blackfeet Nation leaders did preemptively assume she would be coming home with a gold statuette, so when she lost, it led to a “funny” call.
“The organizers of the event called me beforehand and they said that they’d got a bunch of little cardboard cut-outs of gold-man statues that looked like an Oscar, to give to the kids. They asked if that was okay, or if it was gonna hurt my feelings. I said: ‘No, absolutely not,’” the actress recalled. “That’s just the whole thing of award campaigns and the competitive nature of pitting art against art. Clearly this film, in this moment, had meaning. It did its job.”
She continued, “Yeah, nobody was upset that it didn’t happen. I feel like when the Golden Globe happened (Gladstone won best actress), a lot of people who are very far away from the industry just kind of thought it was the Oscars. It’s about the fact that [the film has] been awarded and it’s historic, and it’s still just a really meaningful moment. So it’s irrelevant whether or not I walked home with that statue in hand.”
Gladstone added that “regardless of how things turned out,” she’s just fortunate to “have work coming out and I have work lined up,” including some of her most recent projects,Fancy Danceand The Memory Police.
Despite her Oscars loss, the actress took to her social media after the 2024 Academy Awards to express her gratitude for fans’ support throughout the award season.
“Feeling the love big time today, especially from Indian Country. Kittō”kuniikaakomimmō”po’waw – seriously, I love you all,” she posted on X (formerly Twitter) at the time. “(Better believe when I was leaving the Dolby Theater and walked passed the big Oscar statue I gave that golden booty a little Coup tap – Count: one).”
“When watching the Osage Singers at the Oscars, my inner voice said ‘They’re the ones bringing us all up on stage tonight, that’s how it should be,’” she wrote. “The history in the film and of the moment rightfully belong to the Osage Nation. What an honor to be close enough to feel the drum.””
Born Emily Jean Stone in 1988, the actor said in 2017 that she was compelled to choose a different moniker as a teen. “My real name is Emily Stone, but when I started acting, that name was already taken by another actress, so I had to come up with a different one.” (Actors’ union SAG-AFTRA requires each member to have a unique working name.)
“For a 16-year-old, picking a new name is an interesting prospect.”
But “Emma” wasn’t her first choice. A look at Stone’s IMDB page shows that her early aughts credits, for appearances on shows such as Medium, were under the name “Riley Stone.” That lasted about six months, she said in an interview with W. “I did a guest spot on Malcolm in the Middle, and one day they were like, ‘Riley! Riley!’ and I had no idea who they were talking to.”
“So then I changed it to ‘Emma’, because it’s closer to Emily.”
That said, she had the option of Emily J. Stone at the time, but didn’t take it, saying “I don’t think I can pull off the ‘J’.” Another possible factor in the decision was a fondness for the Spice Girls, particularly Emma “Baby Spice” Bunton. In an interview with Jimmy Fallon from 2018, Stone said that “Growing up, I was super blonde … I wanted to be called Emma because of Baby Spice.
“And guess what? Now I am,” Stone said. It’s unclear if in the years since that interview, she’s grown less into the Spice Girls or more into her “J” era, but her desire to reclaim “Emily” seems to be ever-growing. Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter in a conversation published this week, she was again outed as an Emily by her co-interviewee and The Curse co-starNathan Fiedler.
“I’d like to say something,” Fielder said as the interview kicked into gear. “Her name’s Emily, but she goes by Emma professionally. So when there’s people that don’t know her, I end up saying Emma. But I’m going to just say Emily from here on.”
“I freaked out a couple of years ago,” Stone said in response. “For some reason, I was like, ‘I can’t do it anymore. Just call me Emily.’”
That freakout has abated a bit, Stone said, to the point where she’s taken a “You can say Emma. You can say anything,” attitude. But still, she has a yearning for the name of her birth. If a fan addressed her as “Emily,” “That would be so nice,” Stone said. “I would like to be Emily.”
Kevin Hart wants people to know that some of the stories of his height have been greatly exaggerated.
The actor appeared on Sunday night’s edition of CBS‘ 60 Minutes, where he spoke with Anderson Cooper and set the record straight. Cooper noted that GQ reported his height as 5-foot-5, while TheLos Angeles Times put it at 5-foot-4. “And some other place said you were 5’2″,” Cooper added.
“Well, that place is bullshit,” Hart joked. “GQ finally got it right. [I’m] 5-foot-5, like with a shoe on, like a sneaker. Now, if I put a boot on, I can get to 5’5″ and a half.”
Hart, who talks about his short statue in his stand-up comedy routine, explained why he’s been incorporating those jokes for more than 20 years.
“It’s talking about the things that you aren’t afraid to laugh at about yourself,” he said. “I’m really confident that the laugh that I’m getting, you’re not laughing necessarily at me as if I’m a joke. You’re laughing at the experience. I’m giving you an experience through a story that is relatable. And more importantly, I’m saying things that other people just don’t have the heart to say.”
Cooper asked Hart if he’s a billionaire yet, to which the actor-comedian quipped in response: “None of your business. Man, are you trying to get me robbed?”
Pressed about whether he will be a billionaire, Hart turned serious: “I mean, hopefully and even if I don’t or if I’m not, I think the better side to what I’ve done is create what can become the new norm for other people in the business of funny for other people in the business of entertainment, right? Not just being a part of the business, but learning and understanding how to be the business.”
Cooper also asked Hart about the 2018-19 controversy in which he was selected to host the Oscars ceremony but was forced to step down when homophobic comments he’d made on social media and in his stand-up act in the past resurfaced. These included: “I’m not homophobic. I have nothing against gay people. Be happy. Do what you want to do. But me, as a heterosexual male, if I can prevent my son from being gay, I will.”
Hart didn’t apologize at first, but later reversed course. On 60 Minutes, he reiterated past comments he’s made about how Wanda Sykes helped him realize the impact of his words.
“Later on, the understanding came from the best light bulb ever,” Hart told Cooper. “Wanda Sykes said. there’s people that are being hurt today because of comments like the ones that you made then, and there’s people that were saying it’s OK to make those comments today based off of what you did. It was presented to me in a way where I couldn’t ignore that.”
He said it was a lesson he took to heart.
“In those moments of despair, great understanding and education can come out of it if you’re given the opportunity,” he added.
“In those moments of despair, great understanding, and education can come out of it if you’re given the opportunity,” says Kevin Hart, whose comments about the gay community onstage and on Twitter sparked a controversy. https://t.co/0rEqdUbKxipic.twitter.com/OqWo9XSMx3
The 2025 Oscars ceremony is months away, but we already know some things about the show, the potential nominees and who may host it.
Read on below for answers to your questions about the 2025 Academy Awards.
When Are The 2025 Oscars?
The Oscarswill be handed out Sunday, March 2 — a week earlier than the March 10, 2024 show. The ceremony will start at 4 p.m. PT/7 p.m. ET — a welcome time change that began with the 96th Academy Awards last March. The show had typically run from 5 p.m./8 p.m. (and often much later depending on speeches).
Who Is Hosting The 2025 Oscars?
The host usually isn’t announced until November or December, but given the show is on ABC through 2028 and given Jimmy Kimmel’s well-received efforts earlier this month, he may well be back again. If so, it will be his fifth time hosting, putting him in company with the great Johnny Carson. Only Bob Hope and Billy Crystal have fronted the event more times (a LOT more times).
No one knows. Nominees are usually announced in January.
There are plenty of great actors and directors who’ve made promising movies that could be in the mix, including Joaquin Phoenix returning to his Oscar-winning role in Joker: Folie à Deux; Paul Mescal, Pedro Pascal and Denzel Washington in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator 2; Emma Stone and Yorgos Lanthimos together again in the director’s upcoming anthology film Kinds of Kindness; Forrest Gump pals Robert Zemeckis and Tom Hanks reuniting for Here; Oscar-winner Steve McQueen’s wartime epic Blitz; Angelina Jolie returning as Maria Callas in Pablo Larraín’s Maria and the list goes on.
The ceremony will air live on ABC. In addition to ABC, the Oscars ceremony has typically been available on ABC.com and the ABC app via authentication with a cable or satellite provider. ABC is also available through streaming services including Hulu Live TV, YouTubeTV, AT&T TV and FuboTV.
