The Academy Awards honor many things in movies but not some of the most important. AP Film Writers Lindsey Bahr and Jake Coyle make selections for their own awards â some more offbeat than others.
BEST ACTUALLY SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE: Cory Michael Smith, âMay Decemberâ
Sometimes the best truly supporting performances are the ones that will never, ever get the âawards push,â like the brilliant Cory Michael Smith as Georgie Atherton in With his subtly manic energy, sad smile and that awful bleached hair, his is that kind of undeniable presence who steals both scenes heâs in and also completely upends everything weâve come to understand so far. But this is how awards season works and something that only our awards strategist friends can justify. â L.B.
BEST HAIRSTYLE: Gwenâs upside-down ponytail, âSpider-Man: Across the Spider-Verseâ
There are, no doubt, more elegantly styled heads of hair among this yearâs Oscar nominees. But no 'do could match the gravity-assisted beauty of the ponytail that hangs suspended in the air when Gwen (Hailee Steinfeld) and Miles (Shameik Moore) sit together, clung to the underside of cornice, gazing out at an upturned New York in For a topsy-turvy, , Gwenâs upside-down ponytail points the way. â J.C.
BEST DUO ACT: Jeffrey Wright and John Ortiz, âAmerican Fictionâ
As great as the whole ensemble is in the movie is never better than when Wright and Ortiz are matched together. When meets with his agent Arthur (Ortiz), âAmerican Fictionâ sparkles with the comic interplay of two character-actor greats. Give these guys a sitcom and Iâd watch six seasons. â J.C.
BEST CAMEO: Margot Robbie, âAsteroid Cityâ
Wes Andersonâs got a raw deal this year with zero nominations (maybe heâll win his first Oscar for his ). One performance in a sea of great ones that really made an impact was a true cameo thatâs saved for the very end: Margot Robbie as the actor whose scene as Jason Schwartzmanâs dead wife was cut for time. She gets only a few minutes, to remind her wouldâve-been co-star of their wouldâve-been lines, dressed in Elizabethan garb a balcony away. It is an emotional gut punch of the best kind, brief and perfect. â L.B.
BEST FACE: Willem Dafoe, âPoor Thingsâ
Willem Dafoeâs face is already a work of art, but turns it into a masterpiece. His scarred Dr. Godwin Baxter, whose deformities come from experiments performed on him, is like a fusion of mad scientist and wounded victim. Heâs Frankenstein and Frankensteinâs monster, in one. â J.C.
BEST STUNTS: âMission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning â Part Oneâ
It remains wild that the film academy still doesnât recognize stunts, but we can here. isnât the underdog in this category but that doesnât make what they did any less impressive. The obvious âbestâ is the cliff jump, which most of us know by now that Tom Cruise did himself. But Iâm also partial to the Rome car chase in which Cruise and Hayley Atwell try to escape capture in a creaky, vintage Fiat 500 while handcuffed together. â L.B.
BEST USE OF EARTH WIND AND FIREâS âSEPTEMBERâ: âRobot Dreamsâ
âSeptemberâ has probably been heard in a hundred movies and at a billion weddings, but the best animated feature nominee uses the disco classic to perfection. In a movie that is strikingly grown-up about a relationship between a dog and robot, all of the joy and nostalgia of âSeptemberâ has never been more moving. It sends you out of the theater humming âThe bell was ringinâ, oh, oh / Our souls were singinâ.â â J.C.
MOST STYLISH: âPriscillaâ
This is perhaps a silly superlative to give to a movie that was easily one of the strongest adaptations of the year, taking what was essentially a young womanâs diary entries and making something evocative and profound without the use of first-person narration. The thoughtful style of helps make this point, transporting audiences into this intoxicating and dreamlike wonderland of the most beautiful clothes and glamorous settings with the biggest star of the time, and guiding us along with Pricilla to the realization that it is also a nightmare. â L.B.
BEST SCENE: The Trinity Test, âOppenheimerâ
I donât love everything about but I think is a sequence that will be taught to film students for generations. Itâs not just the explosion itself, which was accomplished with old-school moviemaking techniques like forced perspective (doing something small but making it seem big). Itâs the rumbling tremors of the moments that follow, when Oppenheimer, after hearing that the bomb has been dropped on Hiroshima, is greeted by a flag-waving gymnasium audience. Oppenheimerâs face is horrified, reckoning with what heâs wrought. The crowd turns grotesque and ashen. A girl (played by Nolanâs daughter) shrieks. Here is the real thunder of âOppenheimer.â â J.C.
BEST DREAM BALLET: 'Barbie'
Last year had so much great dancing, from the sweaty club scenes in to the wedding line dance in Jeffâs silly moves in âBŽÇłÙłÙŽÇłŸČő,â Bella Baxterâs broken doll euphoria in âPoor Things,â âM3GANâsâ boogie and, of course, the end of But the trophy goes to Greta Gerwigâs euphoric âIâm Just Kenâ dream ballet, a sequence she fought to keep in that is also the best in the film. â L.B.
BEST FIGHT: Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Tobias Menzies, âYou Hurt My Feelingsâ
Sure, you could pick more violent encounters. But is there possibly anything more ferociously rock âem-sock âem than an author overhearing her husband say he doesnât like her latest book? In Nicole Holofcenerâs itâs the opening salvo in a painfully, hysterically acute examination of honesty in relationships. Not, I repeat not, a date movie. â J.C.
BEST USE OF A PREEXISTING SONG: 'Silver Joy' by Damien Jurado, âThe Holdoversâ
I think the original song category needs an overhaul. For years, movies have helped introduce me to songs that exist that I might have missed, that become immediate favorites because of the emotional association with a movie. Selecting the right existing song is such an art and one last year stood out over all the rest: Damien Juradoâs âSilver Joyâ in â L.B.
BEST HAT: Michael Fassbenderâs bucket hat, âThe Killerâ
Meticulous movie hitmen have long worn stylish hats. Think of the fedora of the protagonist of The assassin of though, wears a bucket hat. It's just as much a silhouette, but he looks more like a dopey tourist than a stone-cold killer. Thatâs much the point for a movie about murder in increasingly anonymous times. â J.C.
BEST ONE-SCENE PERFORMANCE: Audra McDonald, âOriginâ
In much of the filmâs sense of humanity comes from the rich presences of the actors who float in and out of the movie. Not just the stellar lead, Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, but a number of performers â including Jon Bernthal, Emily Yancy and Nick Offerman â add to the nuance of âOrigin.â Thatâs especially true of Audra McDonald, who turns up for just one scene that may be the most potent of the film. McDonald plays a woman named Miss Hale, and her story of how she got that name is a delicate powerhouse. â J.C.
MOST ROMANTIC: âThe Taste of Thingsâ
There are not many truly romantic films made for big audiences these days. Sure thereâs the odd rom-com here and there, but sweeping, luscious, capital R romances are few and far between and rarely celebrated at awards season (yes, Iâm still thinking about ). This season, that title went to which doesnât have an ounce of cynicism, just pure love. â L.B.
BEST NFL PLAYER PERFORMANCE: Marshawn Lynch, âBottomsâ
With exactly zero apologies to â80 for Bradyâ (Jets fan here), no former footballer made more of a big-screen impression than Marshawn Lynch, the former elite running back known as âBeast Mode.â In Emma Seligmanâs raunchy lesbian teen comedy Lynch turns up as a high school teacher and is quite funny acting opposite Rachel Sennott and The role also has poignance. Lynch has said he did it to help make up for how he handled his sister, Marreesha Sapp-Lynch, coming out in high school. â J.C.
BEST DOG NOT NAMED SNOOP: Chaplin, âFallen Leavesâ
Snoop, the all-seeing dog in the best picture nominee âAnatomy of a Fall,â has really hogged the pooch spotlight. Messi, the dog who plays Snoop, has been all over the place, including . But itâs time his reign of terror came to end. In my , a pair of loners find in a cruel and grim world: the movies, karaoke and a dog named Chaplin. The dog, named Alma in real life, is KaurismĂ€kiâs own mutt, and deserves a few bones thrown her way, too. â J.C.
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Lindsey Bahr And Jake Coyle, The Associated Press
