2024 Oscar race preview: Scorsese, Nolan and Gerwig lead the pack

SINGAPORE – Now that the major film festivals of Sundance, Cannes, Venice and others are over, journalists who have watched the big premieres have started posting their hunches about the films and people poised to make a splash at the 2024 Oscars.

Nominations will be announced on Jan 23, with the Academy Awards ceremony held on March 10.

While most of the Oscar-worthy films – such as Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer – have screened in Singapore cinemas, and Killers Of The Flower Moon opens on Thursday, a few contenders have yet to be released.

These include the historical biopic Napoleon from Ridley Scott (Nov 23), musical fantasy Wonka starring Timothee Chalamet (Dec 6) and Leonard Bernstein biopic Maestro (Dec 20 on Netflix).

Local distributors tend to hold back titles to exploit awards season hype.

From January to March, the musical remake of the 1985 period drama The Color Purple; sports biopic Ferrari, headlined by Adam Driver; and Yorgos Lanthimos’ black comedy Poor Things, winner of the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, should appear in theatres here.

Here are the top contenders shaping the race.

Best Picture and Best Director

1. Oppenheimer – Christopher Nolan

The biggest surprise of 2023 has been the phenomenal commercial success of the biopic Oppenheimer.

The talk-heavy, action-light character study of American physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer is now British director Christopher Nolan’s biggest box-office earner, at more than US$942 million (S$1.3 billion) worldwide, pipped only by his Batman film trilogy (2005 to 2012).

At this stage in the race, pundits are saying that not only is Oppenheimer going to be among the 10 films nominated in the Best Picture category, but it also ought to give Nolan his first Best Picture and Best Director win.

He received dual nods for 2018’s Dunkirk, but left empty-handed.

Voters will show him extra love in 2024 because, unlike American film-making veteran Martin Scorsese, who is willing to partner streamers such as Netflix and Apple TV+, Nolan wants his films to be seen only in theatres upon their release.

2. Killers Of The Flower Moon – Martin Scorsese

Some say Killers Of The Flower Moon, a crime biography directed by Martin Scorsese, could spoil Christopher Nolan’s chances of walking away with the Best Picture and Best Director prizes.

Like Nolan’s, Scorsese’s latest offering is adapted from a non-fiction book but has two factors that Oscar voters love. Its subject – the exploitation of indigenous peoples by the white majority – is quintessentially American, and it also brings to light an injustice that deserves wider attention.

This true story of wealthy Native Americans murdered by those who were supposed to protect them has received strong early reviews.

It is also backed by solid performances from Lily Gladstone, who plays Mollie, a member of the Osage Nation; and Leonardo DiCaprio as Ernest, her husband.

Scorsese’s last Oscar-bait film, The Irishman (2019), received 10 nominations, including for Best Picture and Best Director, but failed to win any award.

3. Barbie – Greta Gerwig

Barbie should be an easy nomination in the Best Picture category.

The musical comedy about the title character, a doll who ventures into the world of real adults, became linked with Oppenheimer to create the Barbenheimer Internet meme that marketing professionals could only dream of.

American director Greta Gerwig’s warm and uplifting work, with Australian actress-producer Margot Robbie in the lead role, proved to be a perfect foil to Oppenheimer’s heaviness, causing many cinemagoers to watch the films back to back.

Voters will put a tick next to Barbie because Barbenheimer showed that films without superheroes can pull in the crowds.

It is, after all, now the highest-grossing film of 2023, with a haul of US$1.4 billion worldwide.

Gerwig earned a Best Director nomination for her coming-of-age comedy Lady Bird (2017) and will repeat the feat with Barbie, a work that showcases her ability to find heartfelt truths in the most unlikely places.

4. Maestro – Bradley Cooper

This biopic of American composer Leonard Bernstein and his wife Felicia Montealegre stars Bradley Cooper, who also directs. The American actor’s directorial debut, 2018’s A Star Is Born, was his last Oscar shot at Best Picture.

Maestro premiered at the Venice Film Festival, receiving strong notices and competing for the Golden Lion.

Critics loved the way the story brought to life the complex dynamics at play in the marriage between the Chilean-American actress and the flamboyant, sexually fluid musician.

5. Poor Things – Yorgos Lanthimos

The film that beat Maestro for the Golden Lion in 2023 is a black comedy directed by Greek film-maker Yorgos Lanthimos, whose previous works include the Oscar-winning biographical comedy The Favourite (2018) and the drama The Lobster (2015).

Poor Things, based on Scottish writer Alasdair Gray’s 1992 novel of the same name, won universal acclaim from those who saw it at Venice.

Best Actress

Lily Gladstone – Killers Of The Flower Moon

Emily Blunt – Oppenheimer

Emma Stone – Poor Things

Carey Mulligan – Maestro

Margot Robbie – Barbie

At this stage, these five actresses are the front runners in the nominations race.

Gladstone and Blunt have never been nominated, while Stone leads the pack, with two nominations and one win for the musical La La Land (2016).

American actress Gladstone first appeared on critics’ radar when she played a rancher in the drama Certain Women (2016), but then stayed busy with television roles.

British actress Mulligan earned plaudits from critics who felt real chemistry between her and Cooper.

Similarly, Blunt received acclaim for also portraying the wife of a great man – in this case, Katherine is a fierce, bristly woman who was the scientist’s intellectual equal and shaped his political and moral thinking.

Stone’s fearless performance in Poor Things, singled out for its comedic virtuosity, has won raves from critics who say she deserves to get her fourth Oscar nod as the weird but carefree Bella, a woman of mysterious origins creating social chaos in Victorian England.

In interviews, director Gerwig had said that Robbie’s performance as the toy that learns to look beyond the surface of things was a transformation she admired greatly, and critics are in agreement.

Best Actor

Cillian Murphy – Oppenheimer

Bradley Cooper – Maestro

Leonardo DiCaprio – Killers Of The Flower Moon

Paul Giamatti – The Holdovers

These four names are the ones appearing with the most frequency in industry reports at the moment.

Irish actor Murphy is guaranteed to get a nomination – his first – with Cooper also on solid ground.

Murphy’s ability to find the core of a man who was brilliant and charismatic yet oddly complacent when attacked by political enemies has won praise, while Cooper, playing the titan of American symphonic music, has delivered a masterful and haunting performance, say critics.

DiCaprio’s Ernest Burkhart, a World War I veteran who falls under the malignant tutelage of his uncle William Hale (Robert De Niro), is a mentally tormented male of the sort found in classic Scorsese films and should strike a chord with voters.

Positioning itself alongside the heavyweights is The Holdovers, a drama-comedy from American film-maker Alexander Payne, a specialist in funny-sad stories centred on stubborn older men jolted out of their complacency by changed circumstances.

He helmed 2004’s Sideways, also starring Giamatti, and 2011’s The Descendants, which both won Oscars for Best Adapted Screenplay.

The Holdovers sees Giamatti playing Paul Hunham, a curmudgeonly history teacher forced to care for a student unable to go home for the holidays.

It was well-received at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it earned a People’s Choice Award nomination.