The 88th Oscars Nominations: Initial Thoughts, Lists, and Stats

Creed!

Original working title for this entry: “I’m Sorry the Academy Thinks Michael B. Jordan Sucks”.

The Academy Award nominations are in! But you already knew that because chances are you’ve had more time for internet than I have today. You’ve already been surprised at how many of the nominees you’ve seen, not surprised that the theme of the 88th Academy Awards will be the Year of the White Guy, and probably up in arms that Star Wars: The Force Awakens wasn’t nominated in nineteen different categories including Best Foreign Language Film on behalf of the one scene with the two guys from The Raid. Ha! Sorry you got your hopes up, you FOOL. The guys from The Raid weren’t nearly white enough.

(If you had to work today like I did, here’s the complete list in showy poster format, or you can do like I do and skip to the “Printable List” button on the right side of that page for a handy PDF. I have zero interest in copying ‘n’ pasting the entirety from someone else’s site, or in typing every single title from scratch. It’s not like I’m paid by the word.)

Momentary pause here to signify my disappointment that Creed likewise failed to be nominated for all the awards ever. I’m sincerely cool with Stallone’s nomination and expected no less, but much more love needed to go out to Michael B. Jordan, director Ryan Coogler, Ludwig Goransson’s score, screenplay, editing, the works. I already went through this frustration two years ago with Fruitvale Station, and yet here we go again. A few things went my way, but seeing Creed seated at the kiddie table wasn’t one of them.

(Same goes to a certain extent for Inside Out, my favorite film of 2015, but I’m used to Hollywood underrating its animated films. To its credit, it received nods for Best Animated Feature and Best Original Screenplay, which means it got twice as many nominations as Creed did. Congrats?)

The following lists and other thoughts popped into my head throughout the day while I mulled over this year’s honorees:

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The 87th Oscars Nominations: Initial Random Thoughts and Lists

Selma!

The long march from Selma to the Dolby Theatre was stopped cold in its tracks by a fabulous year in white cinema.

The Academy Award nominations are in! But you already knew that. Like 99% of America, you likely haven’t seen too many of the nominees yet. The complete list is available in myriad locations (here’s the example I’ve been using for reference), so I don’t see a point in wasting time or space copying, pasting, and reformatting all that off someone else’s site. The nice thing about running my own site is I have no high-pressure word-count quotas to meet.

I’ve seen and written about three of the nominees so far — Birdman, Boyhood, and Selma — all of which I super-liked, all of which I wish could win all the prizes, one of which was dealt a far crappier hand than the other two by the elderly white voting majority of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Perhaps Selma‘s most egregious error was in failing to better balance the dual celebrations of black and white nobility like The Help did. Who can say.

The following lists and other thoughts popped into my head throughout the day while I mulled over this year’s honorees:

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