Page 8 The Skanner Portland & Seattle January 23, 2019
Arts & Entertainment
MARVEL STUDIOS-DISNEY VIA AP
Oscar Nods Honor ‘Roma,’ ‘The Favourite,’ ‘Black Panther’
This image released by Disney shows Michael B. Jordan in a scene from Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther.” The film may emerge as a major
contender Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2019, when nominations to the 91st Oscars are announced.
By Jake Coyle
AP Film Writer
NEW YORK — Oscar
voters on Tuesday show-
ered Alfonso Cuaron’s
“Roma” and Yorgos Lan-
thimos’ “The Favourite”
with a leading 10 nom-
inations for the 91st
Academy Awards, while
two dominant but con-
tentious Hollywood forc-
es — Netflix and Marvel
— each scored their first
best picture nomination.
Though many expected
“A Star Is Born,” Brad-
ley Cooper’s revival
of one of Hollywood’s
most remade show busi-
ness myths, to top the
nominations,
Cooper
was surprisingly over-
looked as director and
the Academy of Motion
Pictures Arts and Scienc-
es instead put its fullest
support behind a pair of
indies by international
directors.
With the black-and-
white, Spanish-language
“Roma,” Netflix scored
its first best picture
nomination, a prize the
streaming giant has
dearly sought. Marvel,
too, joined the club with
Ryan Coogler’s “Black
Panther,” the first super-
hero movie ever nomi-
nated for best picture.
Cuaron tied the record
for most decorated Os-
car nominee ever for
one film with four indi-
vidual nods for “Roma,”
his deeply personal ex-
humation of his Mexico
City childhood. Cuaron
was nominated for di-
rection, cinematography,
original screenplay and
best picture. Only Orson
Welles (“Citizen Kane”)
and Warren Beatty (who
did it twice with “Reds”
and “Heaven Can Wait”)
have matched the four-
nod feat.
Cuaron, previously a
six-time nominee and
winner for directing
“Gravity,” said by phone
from London that the
nominations for such a
personal film were more
meaningful to him, as
was the attention for a
film about a humble in-
digenous domestic work-
er (Yalitza Aparicio, who
was nominated for best
actress). He praised Net-
flix for its commitment
to his film.
“Cinema needs the op-
portunity to be diverse,”
Cuaron said. “What
mainstream cinema and
the theatrical experi-
ence has lacked in gen-
eral is diversity. And I’m
talking about diversity
in terms of stories and
characters and ways of
doing films.”
Just as rewarded Tues-
day was Lanthimos’
period romp, which re-
sounded most in the act-
ing categories thanks to
its trio of actresses: Ol-
ivia Colman in the best
actress category, and
Rachel Weisz and Emma
Stone in supporting.
Along with “Roma,”
‘’Black Panther” and
“The Favourite,” the
eight nominees for best
picture were: Peter Far-
relly’s interracial road
trip tale “Green Book,”
Spike Lee’s eviscerating
“BlacKkKlansman,” the
Freddie Mercury biopic
“Bohemian Rhapsody,”
Adam McKay’s highly
critical Dick Cheney bi-
opic “Vice” and “A Star Is
Born,” which still landed
“
from five to up to 10 nom-
inees.
The lush, big-budget
craft of “Black Panther”
was rewarded with sev-
en total nominations,
including
Hannah
Beachler and Jay Hart’s
production design, Ter-
ence Blanchard’s score,
Ruth Carter’s costume
design and Kendrick
Lamar and SZA’s song
“All the Stars.” Beachler
became the first African
American nominated for
production design.
“To break down a wall
like that, to be your an-
cestors’ wildest dreams,
to show other young
women of color and boys
and girls that you can
do whatever you want
no matter what strug-
gles you have in your
life — all of that. That’s
what it means to me,”
said Beachler, talking by
phone from the Cincin-
nati set of Todd Haynes’
latest.
There has likewise
been resistance among
some academy members
to awarding Netflix films
since the company typi-
cally bypasses movie the-
‘Black Panther,’ the year’s
biggest domestic box-office
hit and a bona fide cultural
event, finally cracked the
category long kryptonite to
superheroes
eight nominations, in-
cluding best actress for
Lady Gaga and best sup-
porting actor for Sam
Elliott.
“Black Panther,” the
year’s biggest domestic
box-office hit and a bona
fide cultural event, final-
ly cracked the category
long kryptonite to su-
perheroes. Despite the
overwhelming popular-
ity of comic book mov-
ies, they had previous-
ly been shunned from
Hollywood’s top honor
to the consternation of
some industry insiders.
After “The Dark Knight”
was snubbed in 2009, the
academy expanded the
best picture category
aters. Steven Spielberg
has said Netflix films are
more like TV movies and
deserve an Emmy, not an
Oscar . Netflix altered its
policy for “Roma” and
the Coen brothers’ “The
Ballad of Buster Scruggs”
(which earned three un-
expected nods), premier-
ing them first in theaters
before debuting them on
Netflix. In turn, it was
rewarded with a 15 nom-
inations overall, second
only to Disney’s 17.
Three decades after
landing a writing nod
for 1989’s Do the Right
Thing,” Spike Lee was
nominated for his first
directing
Oscar
for
“BlacKkKlansman.”
“Thirty years is a long
time, ain’t it?” Lee said
by phone Tuesday with
a hearty laugh. The
61-year-old
filmmaker
lamented the oversight
of his lead actor, John Da-
vid Washington, whom
he consoled with a pre-
diction of future awards:
“Young blood, you’ll be
here.” But Lee took pride
in his film’s six nomina-
tions, and he likes his
odds.
“’BlacKkKlansman’ is
the dark horse — pun
intended,” said Lee, cack-
ling. “You know what?
That’s fitting. I’ve always
been an underdog, from
the very beginning, from
film school. That nar-
rative has not changed.
And I like that position.”
The other directing
nominees were Lanthi-
mos, Cuaron, Pawel Paw-
likowski (“Cold War”)
and McKay (“Vice”) — a
field that, a year after
continued focus on gen-
der inequality in Holly-
wood, included no female
directors. Some had cam-
paigned for Debra Gran-
ik (“Leave No Trace”) or
Chloe Zhao (“The Rider”)
to become the sixth wom-
an ever nominated for
best director.
The
nominations,
announced by Kumail
Nanjiani and Tracee El-
lis Ross from the Samuel
Goldwyn Theatre in Bev-
erly Hills, California, in-
cluded plenty of surpris-
es. In a blockbuster year
for documentaries , the
Fred Rogers documen-
tary “Won’t You Be My
Neighbor” was snubbed
despite more than $22
million in ticket sales
(a huge sum for a doc).
Instead the nominees
were “Free Solo,” ‘’Hale
County This Morning,
This Evening,” ‘’Minding
the Gap,” ‘’Of Fathers and
Sons” and the Ruth Bader
Ginsberg portrait “RBG.”
The acting categories
played out largely as ex-
pected with a few notable
differences. Along with
Lady Gaga, Colman and
Aparicio, the best lead
actress nominees were
See OSCARS on page 9
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