Oscars

Meryl Streep is getting another opportunity to spit some political fire all over the Dolby Theatre on Sunday. Today the Academy revealed that yes, of course Streep would be among the presenters at this year’s ceremony, probably hoping for another rousing speech from the actress who’s made it known that she won’t take any nonsense from anyone, not even from the highest office in the land.

After months of hype and controversy, the big night is finally upon us. The red carpet has been rolled out, the votes have been cast, and host Jimmy Kimmel has rehearsed all his best Matt Damon jokes. At last, the 89th Academy Awards have arrived.

You know the movies. They’re the weepy dramas, often based on a true story, about an ailed male protagonist. Maybe they comment on race relations in one or two scenes, maybe a main character is afflicted with a fatal disease, or maybe a man is wrecked with guilt for an accident he caused. They’re Oscar bait; the movies made to jerk tears and woo the Academy.

It’s that time of the year again where we must set aside our personal opinions and favorites to try and guess which movies the Academy will deem the most culturally significant. A lot had changed since our initial Oscar predictions last December. Manchester By the Sea is no longer a Best Picture frontrunner, a race dominated by La La Land with Moonlight shortly behind. The days of calling Natalie Portman a Best Actress shoe-in last fall feel like a distant dream, and Lion and Hacksaw Ridge might just lend this year’s Oscars some surprising upsets.

While the Academy Awards may leave a sour taste in the mouths of those who think artists shouldn’t be forced to compete, there’s no denying that an Oscar nomination is still a powerful piece of validation for a lot of filmmakers, especially those from other countries. Filmmakers like Asghar Farhadi  —  whose 2016 film The Salesman will be seen by many Americans due to its Best Foreign Language Film nomination  —  should be able to take this time to engage with audiences about the importance of this work. Instead, Farhadi will have to watch the Academy Awards on television like the rest of us.

Ah, can you smell it? The aroma of scorching hot awards season debates is already in the air! The nominees for the 2017 Oscars were announced bright and early this morning – or should we say dark and early, as the ScreenCrush team beat the sunrise for the big announcement.

It’s been a topsy-turvy week for awards prognosticators, relative even to the usual topsy-turviness of an industry based entirely on guesswork and speculation. Deadpool frightened and confused Oscar oddsmakers when it unexpectedly snatched up a Best Picture nomination from the Producers Guild Awards program on Tuesday, and then officially rejiggered everyone’s slate of predictions when director Tim Miller earned a nomination from the Directors Guild of America. What had been all but forgotten as a superhero oddball is staging a late-phase charge among the groups of professionals that vote for Oscar nominees — nothing is out of the question.

La La Land, duh. Manchester By the Sea, right. Moonlight, you better. Deadpool – excuse me? It’s true, Ryan Reynolds’ superhero movie has just been named one of the 10 best films of 2016 by the Producers Guild of America (via Variety). Many of us thought its Golden Globes nominations were just a result of the HFPA’s always wacky taste, but it seems the Deadpool virus has spread across the nation to multiple voting bodies, from the Writer’s Guild of America to the Producers.

Not long after setting Mike DeLuca and Jennifer Todd as showrunners, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has officially selected the host of the 2017 Oscars telecast. Drumroll please…oh, forget it, you saw the headline. It’s Jimmy Kimmel, comedian, host of Jimmy Kimmel Live! and, most importantly, the guy who brought you celebrities reading mean tweets about themselves for your entertainment.

Film critics and awards pundits have been talking about Oscar frontrunners for months now, but it’s that time of the year when all that prognostication finally matters. This week marked the beginning of awards season with the Gotham Awards, the National Board of Review’s list of winners and yesterday’s New York Film Critics’ Circle picks. It’s still too early to tell who and what will win the gold come Oscar night, but when it comes to predictions, we’ve got you covered.

Leo's first winning moment at the show garnered nearly a half-million tweets per minute.

Each year’s ceremony usually yields a handful of viral moments, little unexpected happenings that catch the public’s interest and make their way around social media platforms. Last year, the surprise selfie taken by host Ellen Degeneres quickly set Twitter ablaze, racking up millions of retweets and favorites in a matter of minutes. This year’s ceremony re-set that bar, with Leonardo DiCaprio’s long-awaited Best Actor win now the most-tweeted Oscar moment of all time.