Snub: Viola Davis/Carey Mulligan not winning Best Actress
One can argue that the Best Actress race was impossible to call. For a moment there, it was neck and neck, and at one time or another, both Viola Davis and Carey Mulligan seemed like they were edging ahead. Davis, for one, won the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) award, and there’s arguably no greater Oscar acting augur than SAG; not to mention the push for diversity seemed to be in her favor. To be fair, Mulligan didn’t win many precursor awards (Globes went to Andra Day, though that seemed like an outlier, and BAFTA went to McDormand). But she did win the Critics Choice Award, seemingly a nod to the populist choice, and she had a groundswell of critical and pundit support that seemed to crest high in the few final weeks leading up to the race, which led many to nervously move their chips at the last moment. – RP
Surprise: Frances McDormand winning Best Actress
Look, ANYONE winning this award was going to be a surprise. I could have pre-written this capsule and just plugged in Viola, Carey, and Frances where appropriate: “given that NAME’s performance was seen as level-pegging with NAME and NAME right up the last moment…” (And let’s right here throw a little sympathy Vanessa Kirby‘s way, given she was somehow never quite in the mix. And also, let’s share a cool Andra Day tidbit: She’s one of only two “true” debutantes – as in first acting role with no theater experience/Tony nod behind her–to be nominated for Best Actress for her very first film role. The other being last night’s presenter Marlee Matlin who had to waste all that grace and poise and a great Vivienne Westwood frock on signing “My Octopus Teacher” as Best Doc without rolling her eyes.) Where was I? Oh yes, McDormand. Not only did she give my personal favorite performance of those three (Mulligan was great in a flawed film; Davis felt to me underserved by a role more defined by its makeup – which had already won an Oscar), the closeness of this race in retrospect looks to have been a bit of a lie, one manufactured by Oscar prognosticators with columns and endless lengthening evenings to fill. McDormand, winner of the BAFTA, Globe, Independent Spirit, and Critics Choice awards, also took the Oscar? We need a new word for “surprise” that incorporates the immediate sense of not being surprised at all, and indeed of being faintly annoyed that you were ever being set up for being surprised here when that energy should apparently have been saved for what would weirdly turn out to be the evening’s last and most mishandled award.
Surprise: Anthony Hopkins winning Best Actor/ Snub: Chadwick Boseman not winning Best Actor.
There are two main strands to this strange kink in the night. One, this seemed to be Chadwick Boseman’s award to lose. Still, then Hopkins won the BAFTA as “The Father” built a late head of steam that not only gave everyone pause but had every major Oscar pundit rethinking their predix – before literally, every single one of them plumped for Boseman as most likely anyway. But to paraphrase Mark Harris from Vulture, an Oscar veteran himself: never underestimate how much Oscar voters may second-guess themselves and give in to the thinking that posthumous Academy Awards are somehow a “waste.” Secondly, all one needs to do is look at the show and its radical rethinking of the order. The evening ended on Best Actor—indicating that even Steven Soderbergh and the Oscar producers thought Boseman would win and give the night a sense of dignified closure in honoring this beloved and much-missed actor. Well, it wasn’t to be, which led to the night’s deeply anticlimactic climax when Hopkins wasn’t even around to accept the evening’s final award from the reliably uncomfortable-in-the-spotlight Joaquin Phoenix. It really was the biggest upset of the evening, and a sad misjudgment in an otherwise well-judged show: just look at social media – while many insiders knew Hopkins had a great shot, the general Internet public is in shock and baying for blood as loudly as Frances McDormand howling at the moon. – RP/JK
Snub: “Husavik” for Best Song
Yeah, yeah, it was never going to happen. The predictions were all going with Leslie Odom Jr‘s “Speak Now” getting the award, partially as a way to award “One Night in Miami” without actually, you know, awarding “One Night In Miami” – a task that was actually fulfilled by director Regina King absolutely bossing the ceremony’s intro (srs, when you think of how crisply and smoothly it started, the end of the show is even more deflating). Furthermore, it’s arguably Diane Warren who should be regarded as the major snubbee here, given that this was her 12th nod without an award so far. But Warren’s rather forgettable song was not among her classics, plus it’s for an Italian film that no one saw, so no one expected this to be some sort of dozenth-time-lucky scenario for her. However, “Husavik” was in “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story Of Fire Saga,” a pleasantly daft movie that everyone saw, and it was absolutely the only one you’ll still be able to pick out of a lineup in a year or two. Fine, except possibly the eventual winner (“Fight For You,” from “Judas and the Black Messiah” by H.E.R.), which is admittedly a bit of a banger, even if it has zero mentions of whales being gentle people or mountains singing through the screams of seagulls.
Snub: Surprises
Apart from Best Actor, Song and Cinematography, and at a pinch Adapted Screenplay and Editing, which had somewhat mixed predictions, it’s truly spectacular how 18/23 Oscar categories went to the overwhelming favorites. And seriously, right down to the shorts and tech categories, they were overwhelming: on my highly unscientific scorecard of 10 major Oscar bellwethers, there’s an average of 80-90% consensus, with a whopping 13 categories having 100% advance agreement. Even surprise winner Anthony Hopkins surprised every single one of them equally, as all of them had plumped for Boseman. Thus, ladies and gentlemen, as seems weirdly fitting, to sum up, an evening that ended on a big upset that was also somehow a total non-event, our final snub: The concept of surprise.
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