Thanks to the new TV categories, Netflix won 16 Spirit Award nominations, increasing Oscar chances for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”, “Crip Camp” and “Dick Johnson Is Dead”.
In recent years, the nominees for the Film Independent Spirit Awards have turned their eyes to the Oscars, and this year is no exception. But in a sign of the times, the Spirits added new categories of television this time. Thus, Netflix dominated the 2021 nominations of Spirit’s nominating committees, marking 11 nominations in seven films and documentaries, plus five more for scripted series, for a total of 16 nominations.
From conventional theatrical distributors, Focus Features won 10 nominations in two films, the winner of Eliza Hittman’s Film Critics Circle in Berlin, “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” with seven, and “Promising Young Woman” with three . A24, who led the pack last year with 18 nominations in seven films, followed by nine, six for Lee Isaac Chung’s “Minari” and three for Kelly Reichardt’s critics favorite “First Cow” (who won the best film at the NYFCC). All three were nominated for Best Picture, along with “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” by George C. Wolfe (Netflix) and “Nomadland” by Chloe Zhao (Searchlight), which received five nominations.
Spirit’s six nominating committees of about 50 are a mix of people from the independent film community, including filmmakers, artisans and journalists; this year, there were 67% women and 63% BIPOC. See all nominees here.
According to Film Independent President Josh Welsh, the nominations represent 22 countries; 57 percent of those nominated to direct and write Spirit are women and 48 percent are people of color. Of all the nominated actors, 69 percent are BIPOC. And of all the nominees, 42% are women and 37% are BIPOC.
Last year, “The Farewell” won Best Picture, and Best Lead Actress winner Renee Zellweger took home the Oscar for “Judy” the next day. In the previous year, “If Beale Street Could Talk” won Best Feature Film and Regina King for Best Supporting Actress in Spirits and Oscars. Therefore, although the Spirits are not entirely predictive of Oscar attention, their nominations highlight deserving films and create momentum for the awards.
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”
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The highest profile Oscar candidates nominated today were “Nomadland”, starring Frances McDormand, and “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom”, whose stars Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman are leading their respective Oscar categories. Colman Domingo and Glynn Turman also received indications of support. (The rest of Netflix declined, from “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and “Da 5 Bloods” to “Mank”, exceeded the Spirits’ $ 22.5 million budget limit.) But a sign of possible weakness for ” Ma Rainey ”there was no direction or script nod; Fennell took both slots, which gave impetus for a possible nod to the Original Screenplay Oscar. Neither Netflix’s “Pieces of a Woman” nor the last “Malcolm & Marie” found the love of the Spirits.
By giving Amazon’s “One Night in Miami” the Robert Altman Ensemble award, Regina King’s high-powered cast – Kingsley Ben-Adir, Leslie Odom, Jr., Eli Goree and Aldis Hodge – while the “winners” have made become ineligible for performance indications and removed from the competitive fight (and, its concomitant buzz and impulses). Thus, the film bears only one indication. Amazon’s “Sound of Metal” won three nods, for Best Debut, Best Male Actress (Riz Ahmed) and Best Supporting Man (Paul Raci); both actors are on their way to Oscar nods.
Among the nominees for leading women, only Davis, Frances McDormand (“Nomadland”) and Carey Mulligan (“Promising young woman” will likely be part of the Oscar race. While “Never Rarely Things Always” newcomer Sidney Flanagan won the award for Best Actress on the NYFCC, she still has a remote chance of being nominated for an Oscar, along with nominee for the Female Screenplay, Talia Ryder, but these nominations for Spirit increase the chances of the film being seen by more voters and to get a nomination for the Original Screenplay for Hittman.
The nominee for Best Low Profile Film “Minari” (A24), which had been overlooked by groups of high-level critics, also needed his nominations for Feature Film, Director and Screenplay (Chung), Male Principal (Steven Yeun) and two Supporting Women (Yeri Han and Yuh-jung Youn) to become a mandatory place for Academy voters.
Another supporting female nomination was for comedian “French Exit” Valerie Mahaffey, one of five nominations for Sony Pictures classics, including “Nine Days” and “I Carry You With Me”, which are unlikely to be nominated for an Oscar. . The Academy Actors branch could respond to Mahaffey’s showstopper performance, but star Michelle Pfeiffer was left out. (“The Father”, produced in Europe, was not eligible.)
With a fierce Oscar competition going on between a large number of documentaries, international inscriptions “Collective” (Magnolia) and “The Mole Agent” (Gravitas Ventures), “Crip Camp” and “Dick Johnson is Dead” from Netflix and “Time “Amazon continues to draw attention on its way to the documentary and international Oscar selection list announcements on February 9.
In the foreign feature film race, the Brazilian “Bacarau” (Kino Lorber) was not eligible for the Oscar this year, nor was the festival favorite “O Discípulo” (Netflix) registered by India; the Ivory Coast presentation “Night of the Kings” (Neon) will be presented at Sundance 2021, and “Preparations to be Together for an Unknown period of Time” (Hungary) and “Quo Vadis, Aida” (Bosnia and Herzegovina) as well are raising awareness in the Oscar race.
7000 Film Independent members vote for the Spirit Awards, which will be broadcast on Thursday before the Oscars on April 22, 2020, at 7 pm PT, 10 pm ET, on IFC.
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