Oscar Nominations AND WINNERS 2016

Here's the full list of Oscar nominees for 2016. The ceremony will be held on February 28th and is going to be hosted by Chris Rock.

Song

Earned It - 50 Shades of Grey
Manta Ray - Racing Extinction
Simple Song #3 - Youth
Til It Happens to You - The Hunting
Writing's on the Wall - Spectre WINNER

Cinematography

Carol
The Hateful Eight
Mad Max Fury Road
The Revenant WINNER
Sicario

Documentary Feature

Amy WINNER
Cartel Land
The Look of Silence
What Happened, Miss Simone?
Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom

Costume

Carol
Cinderella
The Danish Girl
Mad Max Fury Road WINNER
The Revenant

Sound Editing

Mad Max Fury Road WINNER
The Martian
The Revenant
Sicario
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Sound Mixing

Bridge of Spies
The Martian
The Revenant
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Mad Max Fury Road WINNER

Make Up and Hair

Mad Max Fury Road WINNER
The 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared
The Revenant

Animated

Anomalisa
Boy and the World
Inside Out WINNER
Shaun the Sheep
When Marnie Was There

Best Supporting Actor

Christian Bale - The Big Short
Tom Hardy - The Revenant
Mark Rufflao - Spotlight
Mark Rylance - Bridge Of Spies WINNER
Sylvester Stallone - Creed

Best Supporting Actress

Jennifer Lawrence - Joy
Rooney Mara - Carol
Rachel McAdams - Spotlight
Alicia Vikander - The Danish Girl WINNER
Kate Winslet - Steve Jobs

Visual Effects

Ex Machina WINNER
Mad Max Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Film Editing

The Big Short
Mad Max Fury Road WINNER
The Revenant
Spotlight
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Production Design

Bridge of Spies
The Danish Girl
Mad Max Fury Road WINNER
The Martian
The Revenant

Adapted Screenplay

The Big Short WINNER
Brooklyn
Carol
The Martian
Room

Original Screenplay

Bridge of Spies
Ex Machina
Inside Out
Spotlight WINNER
Straight Outta Compton

Original Score

Bridge of Spies
Carol
The Hateful Eight WINNER
Sicario
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Best Foreign Language

Embrace of the Serpent
Mustang
Son of Saul WINNER
Theeb
A War

Director

Adam McKay - The Big Short
George Miller - Mad Max Fury Road
Alejandro Inarritu - The Revenant WINNER
Lenny Abrahamson - Room
Tom McCarthy - Spotlight

Actress

Cate Blanchett - Carol
Brie Larson - Room WINNER
Jennifer Lawrence - Joy
Charlotte Rampling - 45 Years
Saoirse Ronan - Brooklyn

Actor

Bryan Cranston - Trumbo
Matt Damon - The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio - The Revenant WINNER
Michael Fassbender - Steve Jobs
Eddie Redmayne - The Danish Girl

Best Picture

The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight WINNER

Still Alice Review

Julianne Moore finally gets the recognition she deserves from the Academy with an attention grabbing performance that is sure to tug at the heart strings of audiences around the world.  

Alice Howland (Julianne Moore) is a happily married woman with three grown children and a successful career as a renowned linguistics professor. Soon after turning 50, Alice begins to forget words and decides to see a neurologist as her memory starts to decline in other ways. It starts with just missing a few words here and there, but then she starts to forget where she is, even on the campus where she works. Alice receives the devastating diagnosis that she has early onset Alzheimer’s disease and that her life, and that of her family, is about to rapidly and dramatically change. 

Alec Baldwin is the husband too wrapped up in his own work to even notice his wife’s struggle until Alice lets it all spill out one night. While Alice has to face no longer working, her husband John remains committed to his own career, testing their bond and making life more difficult for both of them. Alice’s grown children all have their own issues with eldest daughter Kate Bosworth trying to get pregnant and Kristen Stewart desperate to become an actress, much to her mother’s disapproval. 

Based on the novel by Lisa Genova, Still Alice is a weepy, depressing film. Luckily, and ironically for a film called Still Alice, it barely stays still for a moment. Despite the slow, mournful soundtrack, Still Alice rushes through its story. Alice’s Alzheimer’s comes on rapidly, affecting her life and the life of her family quickly and viciously. It is a shame that there is not more time to get to know the characters of her kids as Bosworth, Stewart and Hunter Parrish in particular feel completely short changed by a script that barely explores their reaction to their mother’s illness. 

It’s an aggressive, destructive disease that not only eats at Alice’s mind, but also threatens to attack the three children. The inherited nature of the disease means that they all have a 50/50 chance of developing it also, and then on passing it on to their own children. However, this is only briefly alluded to and the focus remains very much on Moore’s central character. Alice is a fiercely intelligent woman who relishes her mind and finds the erosion of her cognitive capacity to be unbearable. 

Moore is an actress who often looks on the verge of crying anyway, but Still Alice gives her the opportunity to really give those tear ducts a workout. At times trying desperately to appear normal and happy for her children and at others, letting all her emotions loose, Moore unsurprisingly delivers on all fronts. Seeing her transformation from remarkable and vivacious career woman to tragic victim hits home most notably in the scene when her old self comes face to face with the woman she has become. Before succumbing to the disease, Alice makes a video for herself to watch in the future, and this moment really brings home just how much she has changed.

At forty minutes into the film, this is Alice making a tragic, life-altering decision that will leave audiences feeling defeated and hopeless. It’s a brave or cowardly choice from Alice, depending on your viewpoint, but it also lends the rest of the film a terrible inevitability. It is clear that there is no way that Sill Alice can have a happy ending, no matter what the outcome is.

Though there are occasional moments of happiness, the score is all heartbreaking stings and melancholy piano. Directors Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland aren’t letting anyone off easily when watching this story full of despair. They plant us in the headspace of Alice with her surroundings often out of focus , reflecting the confusion and distance she begins to feel, even in the most familiar of surroundings. They use Moore’s face continuously to reveal the inner torment that she feels as her memory deteriorates. On the one hand, there is some respite from the misery in knowing that she lived a full life and got to watch her children grow up, but on the other, the irony that such an intelligent woman, so passionate about words and communication is now starting to lose her ability to speak is all the more tragic.

When Alice sums up living with her disease in an impassioned speech to the Alzheimer’s Association, it is a rare moment of triumph in a film that does not deal in joy and overcoming adversity. Still Alice is a film about loss, about perceptions of people suffering from Alzheimer’s and about the effects it has on the victims and (to a far lesser extent) those around them. Despite Moore’s excellent performance, Bosworth, Stewart and Baldwin could have been given more to do by a script that should have spent more time exploring the effects on those around Alice. 

Watch the trailer:

More 2015 Oscar contender reviews:

Selma

American Sniper

Birdman

The Imitation Game

The Theory of Everything

Whiplash

Big Hero 6

2015 Oscar Predictions and Oscar Odds on the William Hill Podcast

I was invited back to give my predictions on what might be the big winners at the Oscars in 2015 on the William Hill Oscars Specials Podcast. I was invited on by Lee Phelps from William Hill last year and returned to give my opinions again this year. You can listen to the podcast below:

listen to ‘The Oscars Podcast: Friday February 20th’ on audioBoom

I've got too much riding on the Oscars now so I'm really hoping some of my predictions come true. My biggest bets are for Inarritu to win Best Director for Birdman and Boyhood to win Best Picture. I've also bet on a bunch of the favourites but I'm clearly not going to win much on them. If you want to have a gamble on the Oscars at William Hill, head here. There is loads of categories. 

Wild Review

Based on yet another memoir, Wild is the story of Cheryl Strayed (Oscar nominated Reese Witherspoon), a woman who decides to desert her past life by packing one hell of a big bag and trekking 1100 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert to the Oregon-Washington border. Relying on nothing but a solid pair of walking boots, the occasional help of total strangers and fellow hikers, and a head full of memories spurring her forwards and away from the dubious decisions of her past, Strayed heads out on her epic solitary journey. Frequent flashbacks fill in the blanks and detail the life that lead her to take on this mammoth walk. Her relationship with her mother (also Oscar nominated Laura Dern) and her descent into heroin addiction and unsatisfying promiscuity all figure in this life affirming tale of getting your life back on track by taking it into your own hands.

Compared to some of the other Oscar contenders that are based on memoirs and are fighting for attention in the 2015 awards season, Wild feels like a slight story with a heroine its often hard to root for. Stephen Hawking has his tragic illness, Vera Brittain has World War I to contend with and Chris Kyle had Iraqi insurgents and PTSD to combat. On the other hand, Strayed loves and loses her mother, makes some questionable life choices and then sets out on an epic walk. Even the hardships she endures seem underplayed; her addiction to heroin is glossed over and her recovery seems to take a single scene.

To his credit, perhaps director Jean-Marc Valee (Dallas Buyers Club) deliberately underplays this one woman struggle to find herself out in the Wild. The score is never rousing and the script never really throws unnecessary elements in to spice up the drama. Even Witherspoon never really gets to cut loose in her performance, making the whole film slightly subdued. There are some touching quieter moments, particularly in one scene where Strayed bonds with another female hiker and the editing is wonderfully dreamlike as thoughts invade Strayed's memory muddled mind. However, the landscapes never quite feel used to their full advantage, meaning Wild is nowhere near as awe inspiring as it should be.

Strayed's story never hits its potential emotional highs and lows. Instead of being wild, it more often withers.

Watch the trailer:

More awards-bait film reviews from I Love That Film:

Whiplash Review

Testament of Youth Review

The Theory of Everything Review

Into the Woods Review

American Sniper Review

Unbroken Review

And more on awards season:

Golden Globes Gambling

Top 10 Best True Stories of 2014