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It’s finally here: The morning of the year where every single media outlet has a story up that uses the word “snub” in the headline. Because it’s never that other people simply got more votes! No! No, it’s an active SNUB. Which is “buns” backward, which we can probably connect to Oscar turning his naked backside to them. Or just use it as an excuse to send the disappointed folks some really nice bread?

Best Picture
Belfast
CODA
Don’t Look Up
Drive My Car
Dune
King Richard
Licorice Pizza
Nightmare Alley
The Power of the Dog
West Side Story

I mean… it’s your standard list of Movies That Don’t Really Excite Anyone, with a couple exceptions. West Side Story is lovely. King Richard is good, but did feel more like it should have been an HBO series. I haven’t seen CODA or Belfast, but I’m planning to, and I guess I should watch Drive My Car because it did really well. I won’t watch Nightmare Alley because it’s not my movie, but I’ve heard it’s good, so congrats to Guillermo del Toro. Y’all know that Licorice Pizza was my own personal nightmare alley. We did finally watch The Power of the Dog, which ticked all the Oscar boxes: slow, a bummer, stark, cruel, drinking, accents, sexual secrets, passive-aggressive use of a banjo. If you put me in a hole and forced me to pick either that or Lost Daughter to watch on a loop, I would pick it, I guess? Tick, Tick…Boom! is still my favorite of the season by a pretty decent margin, so I’m sad it didn’t make it in here and I can’t quite figure out why. Also off the list: anything animated, Spider-Man: No Way Home (a longshot hope, I think), House of Gucci (unwatchable), Cyrano (really terrible, honestly, and Peter Dinklage was shockingly bad in it?), and Wes Anderson’s The French Dispatch. Perhaps the Academy simply forgot it existed. I did. And they passed on Passing. And Macbeth.

Best Director
Kenneth Branagh, Belfast
Ryúsuke Hamaguchi, Drive My Car
Paul Thomas Anderson, Licorice Pizza
Jane Campion, The Power of the Dog
Steven Spielberg, West Side Story

No Denis Villenueve. Sorry, Dune! And no Joel Coen for Macbeth, though that movie has all the buzz of a dust mote. I assume this is Jane Campion’s to lose, although I thought Steven Spielberg did an incredible job with West Side Story and would give it to him.

Best Actress in a Leading Role
Jessica Chastain, The Eyes of Tammy Faye
Olivia Colman, The Lost Daughter
Penélope Cruz, Parallel Mothers
Nicole Kidman, Being the Ricardos
Kristen Stewart, Spencer

Everyone is clutching their pearls over the lack of Lady Gaga, but I do not think she deserved a nomination, although I’m sad we won’t get to see what she picked out to wear. I also think it’s possible the Academy was so tired of hearing her talk about her Process — it gets more and more pretentious as she goes — that it voted in other people just so her press tour would stop. Kristen Stewart and Penelope Cruz edged in, leaving out Jennifer Hudson. And I guess Frances McDormand? I thought she was a presumptive choice simply because she’s Frances McDormand and they love her, but no. I assume this one goes to Colman.

Best Actor in a Leading Role
Javier Bardem, Being the Ricardos
Bristlebrush Cactusbranch, The Power of the Dog
Andrew Garfield, Tick, Tick… Boom!
Will Smith, King Richard
Denzel Washington, The Tragedy of Macbeth

Man, the academy is hot for Aaron Sorkin’s movies. I’m surprised Bardem got in here, although is it just me, or does it feel like they’re having a hard time filling a couple of these? They were correct to leave out everyone from Don’t Look Up, and Cooper Hoffman (smarm and charm are not the same thing, Licorice Pizza!), and Peter Dinklage. Mahershala Ali from Swan Song made this category at the Globes, but the movie dropped off everyone’s radars. I’m sure it’s Cactusbranch’s to lose, although I would absolutely vote for Andrew Garfield, and fully expect Will Smith to put up a fight. UNLESS they give it to Denzel as an apology for the fact that he lost for Fences (the win went to Casey Affleck for Shit Is Sad and Everyone Cries in Boston Accents).

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Jessie Buckley, The Lost Daughter
Ariana DeBose, West Side Story
Judi Dench, Belfast
Kirsten Dunst, The Power of the Dog
Aunjanue Ellis, King Richard

I am delighted that Aunjanue Ellis continues to get credit for a wonderful anchoring performance. Y’all know I hated The Lost Daughter, but even so, Colman and Buckley were both excellent in it. Ariana DeBose is on a deserved roll. Kirsten Dunst is precious to me, and she really is fantastic in that movie — you feel the hope being sucked out of her, slowly, without her noticing until she’s too weak to fight it. But man, I feel for Ruth Negga and Caitriona Balfe. They’re the top names on The Snub List this year, and I feel like even the great Dame Judi Dench is like, “Wait, what? I am in Belfast, too? And they picked ME?”

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Ciarán Hinds, Belfast
Troy Kotsur, CODA
Jesse Plemons, The Power of the Dog
J.K. Simmons, Being the Ricardos
Kodi Smit-McPhee, The Power of the Dog

I love J.K. Simmons as a person, but did ANYONE have him on their short list, or even realize he’s in the movie? And honestly, while Landry is ALSO precious to me, he disappears from that movie — literally, he is not in very much of it — and the role itself is paper-thin. I guess those are the spots that would have gone to Jared Leto (sorry not sorry) and Ben Affleck, who is in this category for The Tender Bar at other awards shows. I’ve said it before, but I’d have loved Robin de Jesus from Tick, Tick… Boom! in here, although I’m glad they left out Bradley Cooper’s Licorice Pizza role, so I suppose that balances it out. It’d be cool to see Troy Kotsur take it.

Best Original Screenplay
Kenneth Branagh, Belfast
Adam McKay and David Sirota, Don’t Look Up
Zach Baylin, King Richard
Paul Thomas Anderson, Licorice Pizza
Eskil Vogt and Joachim Trier, The Worst Person in the World

You love to see an unexpected arrival! Congrats to the team behind The Worst Person in the World, which, strangely, is not about me OR Carrie Bradshaw. I know some pundits hoped Renate Reinsve would sneak in the Best Actress category, but dropping in and delivering the boot to Aaron Sorkin must be satisfying. I truly thought a screenplay nod would be that movie’s only consolation prize, but no, it’s everywhere ELSE.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Siân Heder, CODA
Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, Takamasa Oe, Drive My Car
Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve, and Eric Roth, Dune
Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Lost Daughter
Jane Campion, The Power of the Dog

Sure! But this would have been Tony Kushner’s category, yes? He did a wonderful job with West Side Story.

Best Cinematography
Greg Fraser, Dune
Dan Lausten, Nightmare Alley
Ari Wegner, The Power of the Dog
Bruno Delbonnel, The Tragedy of Macbeth
Janusz Kaminski, West Side Story

Best Film Editing
Hank Corwin, Don’t Look Up
Joe Walker, Dune
Pamela Martin, King Richard
Peter Sciberras, The Power of the Dog
Myron Kerstein and Andrew Weisblum, Tick, Tick… Boom!

Best Animated Feature Film
Encanto
Flee
Luca
The Mitchells vs. The Machine
Raya and the Last Dragon

Best Animated Short Film
Affairs of the Art
Bestia
Boxballet
Robin Robin
The Windshield Wiper

Best Live-Action Short Film
Ala Kachuu — Take and Run
The Dress
The Long Goodbye
On My Mind
Please Hold

Best International Feature Film
Drive My Car (Japan)
Flee 
(Denmark)
The Hand of God (Italy)
Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom (Bhutan)
The Worst Person in the World (Norway)

I would ASSUME that the one movie that made it into regular Best Picture would win this, but you never know! Oscar voters can be chaos agents when they want to be.

Best Documentary Feature
Ascension
Attica
Flee
Summer of Soul
Writing with Fire

Best Documentary Short Subject

Audible
Lead Me Home
The Queen of Basketball
Three Songs for Benazir
When We Were Bullies

Best Original Score
Nicholas Britell, Don’t Look Up
Hans Zimmer, Dune
Germaine Franco, Encanto
Alberto Iglesias, Parallel Mothers
Jonny Greenwood, The Power of the Dog

Best Original Song
“Be Alive” from King Richard — Music and Lyric by DIXSON and Beyoncé Knowles-Carter
“Dos Oruguitas” from Encanto — Music and Lyric by Lin-Manuel Miranda
“Down to Joy” from Belfast — Music and Lyric by Van Morrison
“No Time to Die” from No Time to Die — Music and Lyric by Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell
“Somehow You Do” from Four Good Days — Music and Lyric by Diane Warren

Best Sound
Denise Yarde, Simon Chase, James Mather, and Niv Adiri, Belfast
Mac Ruth, Mark Mangini, Theo Green, Doug Hemphill, and Ron Bartlett, Dune
Simon Hayes, Oliver Tarney, James Harrison, Paul Massey, and Mark Taylor, No Time to Die
Richard Flynn, Robert Mackenzie, and Tara Webb, The Power of the Dog
Tod A. Maitland, Gary Rydstrom, Brian Chumney, Andy Nelson, and Shawn Murphy, West Side Story

Best Costume Design
Jenny Beavan, Cruella
Massimo Cantini Parrini and Jacqueline Durran, Cyrano
Jacqueline West and Robert Morgan, Dune
Luis Sequeira, Nightmare Alley
Paul Tazewell, West Side Story

Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Mike Marino, Stacey Morris and Carla Farmer, Coming 2 America
Nadia Stacey, Naomi Donne and Julia Vernon, Cruella
Donald Mowat, Love Larson and Eva von Bahr, Dune
Linda Dowds, Stephanie Ingram and Justin Raleigh, The Eyes of Tammy Faye
Göran Lundström, Anna Carin Lock and Frederic Aspiras, House of Gucci

Best Production Design
Dune — Production Design: Patrice Vermette; Set Decoration: Zsuzsanna Sipos
Nightmare Alley
 — Production Design: Tamara Deverell; Set Decoration: Shane Vieau
The Power of the Dog — 
Production Design: Grant Major; Set Decoration: Amber Richards
The Tragedy of Macbeth 
— Production Design: Stefan Dechant; Set Decoration: Nancy Haigh
West Side Story
 — Production Design: Adam Stockhausen; Set Decoration: Rena DeAngelo

Best Visual Effects
Paul Lambert, Tristan Myles, Brian Connor, and Gerd Nefzer, Dune
Swen Gillberg, Bryan Grill, Nikos Kalaitzidis, and Dan Sudick, Free Guy
Charlie Noble, Joel Green, Jonathan Fawkner, and Chris Corbould, No Time to Die
Christopher Townsend, Joe Farrell, Sean Noel Walker, and Dan Oliver, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Kelly Port, Chris Waegner, Scott Edelstein, and Dan Sudick, Spider-Man: No Way Home