Category: Precursors

Boston has gone in fairly hard for Phantom Thread giving it a Best Picture win that no one expected. They also gave most of their other awards to expected contenders. Award Tallies (3) Phantom Thread (2) Get Out, Lady Bird The Awards

Blowing away all others, The Shape of Water was their most nominated film followed distantly by Call Me by Your Name and Dunkirk. There aren’t any out-of-left-field selections on this list. Award Tallies (9) The Shape of Water (5) Call Me by Your Name, Dunkirk (4) Blade Runner 2049, Get Out, Lady Bird, The Florida…

Of all the critics groups to announce so far, San Diego is by far the most eclectic. nominating films and performances that have so far been outside the norm, they inject a bit of unusual energy into the race. It means they aren’t particularly instructive, just interesting. Award Tallies (8) Dunkirk, The Shape of Water,…

Another critics group goes for Get Out for Best Picture. All of the winners here are either previously recognized or well regarded, so there aren’t any major surprises this time out. Award Tallies (3) Get Out (2) Phantom Thread The Awards

Jordan Peele’s horror hit was named Best Picture by the Washington DC Area critics. Only three films picked up multiple awards. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri picked up three different acting citations while Blade Runner 2049 was recognized in three tech categories. While many of their winners are certainly Oscar contenders, few of them are…

AFI announces its list of the ten best American-made films each year. Below is the list of those films. The notable omission is Blade Runner 2049, but the rest of these have been cited several times by other groups as among the best of the year with Wonder Woman the lone non-Best Picture candidate of…

Early nominations and early wins usually means the selection of winners that are outside the Oscar conversation. Either these awards will give visibility to these productions in terms of Oscar consideration or they will be ignored as being too far out there. Only Willem Dafoe among these winners seems possible to carry over to the…

Tying for first place in the nominations from the Washington DC Area Film Critics are two technical achievements, only one of which managed a Best Film nomination. The Shape of Water, Blade Runner 2049, and Mudbound were among the top seven films nominated, but not cited for Best Film. The rest of the list feels…

Why a regional group like this would want to get out ahead of the curve is anyone’s guess, especially when their selections aren’t terribly similar to what the Academy picks. They also likely didn’t get to see some of the titles they nominated, at least not enough of them, which might explain why The Post…

The nominees have been announced the big surprise is that The Shape of Water utterly destroyed all comers in terms of nominations with 14. Three films have eight each, the next highest amount. All are nominated for Best Picture. Of all the films nominated for 5 or more awards, only Blade Runner 2049 and I,…

Decimating the competition, Coco should handily win many of its awards. The big surprise here is that The Breadwinner managed to pull off a feat that many indie animated films can’t: double-digit nominations. That could position it as a spoiler in a number of categories and should give it the corresponding Independent Picture race. Nominations…

The Los Angeles film critics have selected their winners for this year with two ties. Call Me By Your Name was the big winner, but The Shape of Water also performed well. The list of winners looks familiar with plenty of this year’s contenders within their ranks. Award Tallies (3) Call Me By Your Name,…

Once again, the Satellite Awards announce their nominations earlier than they posted on their own website. This kind of disorganization is plainly frustrating. So too is their inability to alphabetize anything. Now to the nominees. Dunkirk dominated with The Shape of Water not far behind. They matched all categories with the exception of which category…

The NYFCC winners have been announced and there are some expected selections and some unexpected ones. Willem Dafoe was always a contender, as was Phantom Thread in screenplay, also Coco, Faces Places, Jordan Peel, and BPM. Sean Baker as Best Director was the biggest surprise, though Lady Bird as Best Picture wasn’t expected, nor was…