View all newsletters
Sign up to our newsletters

Support 110 years of independent journalism.

  1. Culture
  2. Film
2 January 2019updated 14 Sep 2021 2:24pm

The 2019 Oscar predictions

And the Acadamy Award might go to…

By Ryan Gilbey

The Academy Awards recently proposed a new category of Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film to reward the sort of multiplex releases that rarely win awards, only to hastily scrap the idea amid widespread derision. Multiplex-goers were to be catered for instead by the choice of the goofball comic Kevin Hart as the ceremony’s presenter on 25 February – except he had to step down amid controversy over his history of homophobic tweets. Mainstream tastes should be amply represented by nominations for A Star Is Born, and by a likely Best Supporting Actor nod for Michael B Jordan for his charismatic turn as the villain Erik Killmonger in Black Panther.

Alfonso Cuarón’s gorgeous Roma is a possible Best Picture contender, which would represent the first non-documentary Oscar win for a Netflix production. Yorgos Lanthimos’s riotous period comedy The Favourite (see opposite) should be in line for prizes, including Olivia Colman as Best Actress, a title she took at the Venice Film Festival last year. That category will find Lady Gaga in A Star Is Born pitted against Glenn Close in The Wife. Felicity Jones may be in the mix as Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in On the Basis of Sex (8 February). My vote, if I had one, would go to Melissa McCarthy as the literary forger Lee Israel in Can You Ever Forgive Me? (1 Feb).

Other big-hitters include Green Book (1 Feb), a race-relations road movie with Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali, who won an Oscar for Moonlight. The latter film’s director, Barry Jenkins, is back with an acclaimed adaptation of James Baldwin’s novel If Beale Street Could Talk (8 Feb). The Front Runner (11 Jan) has Hugh Jackman as the presidential candidate Gary Hart, while Christian Bale is vice-president Dick Cheney in Vice (25 Jan).

Serious issues abound in three movies starring two young Oscar nominees: the drug-addiction dramas Beautiful Boy (18 Jan) with Timothée Chalamet from Call Me by Your Name, and Ben Is Back starring Lucas Hedges of Manchester By the Sea fame alongside Julia Roberts. Hedges also plays a young gay man undergoing conversion therapy in Boy Erased (8 Feb). The danger is that all these big, serious movies become indistinguishable. Anyone for Beautiful Ben is Erased

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU

Content from our partners
The promise of prevention
How Labour hopes to make the UK a leader in green energy
Is now the time to rethink health and care for older people? With Age UK

This article appears in the 02 Jan 2019 issue of the New Statesman, 2019: The big questions

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU