The 90th Academy Awards are just five days away, but here at the Silver Screening Room, it's still 1982. You've taken a look at my Top Ten of that year - now I present the complete best-ofs: the nominees for the 1982 Retro Hollmann Awards. Order of categories was decided by random drawing. So let's begin with...
Best Adapted Screenplay
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
Larry L. King & Peter Masterson and Colin Higgins
based on the musical play by Larry L. King and Peter Masterson
Edo Porn
Kaneto Shindô
based on the play Hokusai Manga by Seiichi Yashiro
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
Cameron Crowe
based on his book
The Thing
Bill Lancaster
based on the short story "Who Goes There?" by John W. Campbell Jr. (alias Don A. Stuart)
Victor/Victoria
Blake Edwards
based on the 1933 film written by Reinhold Schünzel
The rest of the nominees, starting with Best Actor, after the jump....
After two months, I am ready to unveil my Top Ten of 1982. Before I do, I'd be remiss not to name some honorable mentions... Blade Runner and Fast Times at Ridgemont High.
Blade Runner's groundbreaking future-noir aesthetics. Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean's incredible ensemble of women. Fast Times at Ridgemont High's poignant sense of humor. Their absence from the Top Ten is greatly felt, and is in no way a reflection of their quality. I wish I had room in my Top Ten for thirteen titles, but that's not how numbers work. As it stands now, these will do. The Top Ten of 1982, in alphabetical order, after the jump...
We make a big deal of "precursors" in today's awards landscape, with a full nine awards ceremonies to go before we get to the Oscars: the BAFTAs, the Golden Globes, LAFCA, NYFCC, National Board of Review, National Society of Film Critics (NSFC), Critics' Choice Awards, SAG Awards, PGA Awards....and that's just if you're following Best Picture! To try to predict how this year's Oscars may turn out, those of us obsessed with awards look to these nine bodies to help us see which way the wind is blowing. In a year like 2017, that's proving especially difficult.
Here, let's look at the nine films currently nominated for Best Picture, and see which ones have already won a Best Film prize:
Call Me By Your Name: LAFCA
Darkest Hour
Dunkirk
Get Out
Lady Bird: Golden Globes (Musical/Comedy), NSFC, NYFCC
Phantom Thread
The Post: National Board of Review
The Shape of Water: Critics' Choice Awards, PGA Awards
Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri: BAFTA Awards, Golden Globes (Drama), SAG Awards (Ensemble, which many consider the Best Picture equivalent at SAG)
It's a much bigger spread than usual. Compare that to 1982. Back then, there were only six awards besides the Oscars competing for attention - no PGA, no SAG, no Critics' Choice - but they all still played before the Academy Awards. No one dare compete outright with The Big One. Here's how things went then:
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial: Golden Globes (Drama), LAFCA
Gandhi: BAFTA Awards, Golden Globes (Foreign Film - they used to put the Brits in this category and it's bonkers), National Board of Review, NYFCC
Missing
Tootsie: Golden Globes (Musical/Comedy), NSFC
The Verdict
It also looks fairly spread out, but Gandhi has the edge, having won over the British Film Academy, the Hollywood Foreign Press, the National Board of Review, and the New York Critics. And of course, what wound up happening Oscar Night?
A different time, but now, as then, people like to make a statement with their vote. Obviously you have to like the film, but as Attenborough and Kingsley averred in their speeches, a vote for Gandhi is a vote for world peace. What is the equivalent in 2017? What film not only represents the best in filmmaking, but the best of intentions? And will that combination result in an Oscar win?
We'll find out March 4th. Until then, let's look at the Best Picture lineup of 1982. After the jump...
Meryl Streep famously won her second Academy Award for Sophie's Choice:
It's not hard to see why. The movie saw her speaking three languages, all in a Polish accent, while also physically transforming into both a starving concentration camp inmate and the heartbreakingly beautiful object of lust for the main character, called Stingo (the movie is, frankly, ridiculous). It's de-glam and sexy - something for everyone!
If there is an equivalent today, I have to believe it's Margot Robbie. For I, Tonya, the native Australian beauty affects an American accent, wears braces, dons a variety of wigs for unflattering frizz, and goes from ice princess to female boxer, with some age de-glam thrown in. It's a transformation, and Oscar loves that.
Thirty-five years later, Meryl Streep is back. Today she's a veteran whose Best Actress nomination is, increasingly, more reliable than tomorrow's sunrise. This year, fortunately, she got some of the best reviews of her career for The Post. I'm not sure who is the 1982 equivalent, but I think Sissy Spacek comes closest. Though Missing is only her third Oscar nomination, she was coming off a win for Coal Miner's Daughter and dominated the 1980s. There's a reason this is the fourth retrospective in a year to feature Spacek: girl was prolific.
Another veteran, and one very likely to take the prize this year, is Frances McDormand in Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri. A friend of mine explained the appeal of the performance this way: "Frances McDormand was an avatar for the cauterizing power of rage." Ok! I have to think that was part of the appeal of Jessica Lange's performance in Frances, too - beyond "just" being a biopic, Lange gives us fire and fury as a woman who doesn't behave as prescribed, and gets branded as crazy because of it. Do not underestimate a fearsome female.
Nor a romantic one. The high school comedy and the romantic drama are not the most respected of genres, regarded as being more "slight" (read: female-driven) than others. But sometimes there comes a movie, and a performance, that's so perfect, its worthiness is undeniable. This year, Saoirse Ronan helped lead Lady Bird to five Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture; in 1982, Debra Winger helped make An Officer and a Gentleman into the third highest-grossing movie of the year (even Richard Gere admits she stole the show!).
Where does that leave The Shape of Water's Sally Hawkins and Victor/Victoria's Julie Andrews? These ladies landed their nods thanks to physicality, expressiveness, and their voice - or lack thereof. Hawkins plays a mute janitor, but you don't need subtitles to know what she's thinking; it's there on her face, in her posture. Andrews is anything but mute, but the way she adjusts the timbre of her voice and body language to appear more masculine, the way she fights and dances, make for an impressive showcase. These ladies are limber!
Enough of now, let's talk then. The 1982 nominees, after the jump....
Lord, I just want to take a break from writing for a short time. Fortunately, we can take a music break, as this is Best Original Song!
Culture critic Joe Reid calls the 1980s the greatest decade for this category. He may be right: from "Fame" in 1980 to "Under the Sea" in 1989, with some karaoke standbys and Bond themes in between, the 80s are rife with riches in the Original Song category. 1982 is no exception, with lyricists Alan & Marilyn Bergman taking up three slots, and the standards "Up Where We Belong" and "Eye of the Tiger" among the nominees. The eagles did fly, right into a win:
(This is just a bizarre video, from the dead silence greeting Yes, Giorgio to the uncomfortable PDA between Nitzsche and Saint-Marie)
Oddly missing is Victor/Victoria, which boasts several original songs and won for Best Adapted and/or Song Score. Where is "Le Jazz Hot"? Whither "Crazy World"?
Anyway, the nominated songs after the jump - and while we're at it, you'll also get the songs nominated for the 2017 Oscars! So have a listen, won't you?:
Louis Gossett, Jr., made history at the 1982 Oscars by becoming both only the second African-American man to win an Academy Award (Sidney Poitier was first) and the first to do so for Best Supporting Actor.
(Ok, can I just point out: no, Susan Sarandon, two of those roles could not have been played by women. Preston does one scene at the end of his film in a dress. Fun "drag race" joke, though.)
Supporting Actors come in many forms and flavors. Here are a few of them, taking into account not just 1982's crop, but also the current batch of nominees for the 2017 film year.
The Movie Thief: Though his on-screen time is relatively brief compared to the rest of the cast, his character is unforgettable, the one you leave thinking about. It also helps if he has a big scene, like a monologue or a musical number. For the latter, take Charles Durning's sidestepping guv'nor in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas; for the former, Woody Harrelson's sheriff in Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri.
The Tough Love Father Figure: He's not fighting the protagonist, he's making him/her/them a better person - but he's gonna do it with discipline. When his eyes brim with tears at movie's end, that's the cue for the audience to lose its mind. Take Louis Gossett, Jr.'s, drill sergeant in An Officer and a Gentleman or Willem Dafoe's motel manager in The Florida Project.
The Best Friend: There for the protagonist to connect with the way he/she can't with a romantic partner; also there to help hatch and execute any harebrained schemes alongside the hero/ine. Take John Lithgow's trans bestie to Robin Williams in The World According to Garp or Richard Jenkins' gay bestie to Sally Hawkins in The Shape of Water.
The Guy You Can't Trust: A worthy adversary, he's not just the charmer - he's the snake as well. Take James Mason's high-powered defense attorney in The Verdict or Christopher Plummer's megalomaniacal billionaire in All the Money in the World.
The Co-Lead: Well, almost - I mean, you can make the argument. He gets just as juicy an arc - and almost as much screentime - as the supposed protagonist. Hell, the movie ends with him! Take Robert Preston's nightclub singer/manager in Victor/Victoria or Sam Rockwell's dim-witted cop in Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri.
I used to have an Oscar Season Reading List, made up of books whose upcoming adaptations had some buzz surrounding them. This was during college, 2007 - 2010, and it forced me to jump ship from my usual pulps and whodunnits and explore other genres, forms, and writers. Nominated titles included Atonement, No Country for Old Men, Oil! (There Will Be Blood), "The Bear Went Over the Mountain" (Away from Her), "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button", Doubt, Frost/Nixon, The Reader, Push (Precious), Up in the Air, The Accidental Billionaires (The Social Network), True Grit, Winter's Bone and The Invention of Hugo Cabret (Hugo). Unnominated titles included Public Enemies and Revolutionary Road.
Eventually I became frustrated with bringing expectations from my readings to the movies, and so I've more or less stopped that. Still, it's worth trying again, especially when it comes to a year like this one - or indeed, a year like 1982. Because you never know just where the inspiration for an awards-worthy screenplay can come from....
Like a novel, preferably a best-seller - after all, if people want to read a story, other people probably want to watch it. In 1982, The Verdict is one of those courtroom thrillers that would sell at any airport; Sophie's Choice is a doorstop of a novel about a post-War love story and secrets of World War II Europe. In 2017, Call Me By Your Name is a gay-themed novel about memory; Mudbound is an epic about the post-war South.
Truth is stranger than fiction - thus, the non-fiction book. Missing, based on The Execution of Charles Horman, relates the story of the disappearance and murder of Charles Horman in Chile, and the implication of our own American government in its subsequent coverup. And if you want to count autobiographical fiction, Das Boot, about the exploits of a German U-boat, is based on a novel written by a war correspondent who went aboard U-96 in 1941. 2017 offers two true tales of its own: The Disaster Artist, about the making of cult hit The Room, and Molly's Game, which is terrible.
They don't even have to come from books - they could be other films! Victor/Victoria is based on the 1933 German film Viktor und Viktoria; actually, it's the fourth version of that story, following the 1935 British film First a Girl and the 1957 German remake. Logan is inspired by the X-Men comics, yes, but it's mostly our understanding of Hugh Jackman's performance in 8 films over 17 years that informs the film.
In 1982, truth took the prize:
And what will happen in 2017? No idea, we'll talk about that next week. For now, a closer look at the nominees of 1982...
"I was certain that not only would E.T. win, but that it should win. It was inventive, powerful, wonderful. I make more mundane movies." Words famously uttered by the very honest Richard Attenborough, reacting not just to Gandhi's win for Best Picture, but to his own triumph in being named Best Director.
I have a great many friends who would agree with Attenborough's self-assessment, but we'll talk more about that later. I do wonder, though, what the late Attenborough would think of this year's Best Director lineup. Who among them is putting out inventive, powerful, wonderful work - and who is more mundane? Who are the Attenborough and Spielberg and etc. of 2017?
I think the Attenborough of 2017 is Dunkirk's Christopher Nolan - and no, it's not because of any mundanity. It's because we have a fixture of the cinema being given his due by playing to his strengths for a passion project 20 years in the making. For Attenborough, his British sensibilities and historical epics experience employed for a biopic of Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi. For Nolan, his unorthodox approaches to blockbuster storytelling enhance what could have been an otherwise straightforward telling of the evacuation of Dunkirk.
Who is the Sidney Lumet of 2017, the one making films for grownups? I should think that's obvious: Paul Thomas Anderson, whose Phantom Thread manages to be much larger than its intimate focus on a complex relationship would suggest. Inversely, Lumet takes a big underdog-vs.-Archdiocese courtroom thriller like The Verdict and never loses sight of the fact that, at heart, it's an intimate recovery drama. These are men who can focus on the macro and the micro in a single shot.
Whither the Wolfgang Petersen, rarely misstepping despite the unique challenges of his film, with an ear for surprising humor and a real sense of claustrophobia? Specific, yes! And also - that man is Jordan Peele, who makes social satire within a horror framework look as easy as a sprawling epic set within a submarine. You laugh, but you also can't escape a sense of dread, thanks chiefly to the sound design: Get Out with its spoon hitting the teacup, Das Boot with its propellers churning overhead.
How about a Sydney Pollack, so good with actors, maybe not offering the most visual pizzazz, but showing that directing is more than flash and dollies and whatnot, that performances and chemistry and a consistent handle on a tricky tone are just as important. Duh, Greta Gerwig; Lady Bird, like Tootsie, is hilarious and emotional and realistic, with a looseness belying its sturdy structure.
Which means the Spielberg equivalent is Guillermo del Toro, who also made a fantasy drama unapologetic in its sweetness, one that not only wears its cinematic influences on its sleeve, but recreates indelible moments from those films to further its sense of wonder.
The Biopic: This man existed, and this actor nailed it. Ben Kingsley as Gandhi in Gandhi, Gary Oldman as Churchill in Darkest Hour.
The Breakdown: His performance is a slow burn as he realizes the shit he's got into - and it's satisfying to him lash out near the end. Jack Lemmon in Missing, Daniel Kaluuya in Get Out.
The Transformation: Trust me when I say you've never seen him like this. Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie, Denzel Washington in Roman J. Israel, Esq.
The Legend: Whether he wins or loses, he's a respected thesp who gets nominated often. Peter O'Toole in My Favorite Year, Daniel Day-Lewis in Phantom Thread.
And it looks like this year, as in 1982, the Biopic will reign triumphant. But who knows? We'll find out soon enough - until then, let's take a look at the 1982 performances after the jump!
The music branch of the Academy seems to be the most insular, exclusive group. Like every category, there's usually one newcomer a year, but the rest of the nominees tend to have an unusually high tally of previous nods. The record for most Academy Award nominations is held by a composer, and soon it will become clear who (as if you didn't already know!).
I break the nominees up like so:
Welcome to the Club - My goodness, they actually let some "new" blood in, and look who it is: Ravi Shankar and George Fenton sharing a nom in 1982 (Fenton would return), Jonny Greenwood in 2017 (and I should mention, Shankar and Greenwood are both best-known around the world as popular music figures)
Old Friend - Prolific, but not in the double-digits yet, and a winner who keeps doing great work: Marvin Hamlisch in 1982 (he had two wins in one year) and Alexandre Desplat in 2017 (recently won for The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Prolific Bridesmaid - It feels like he's always here, yet despite his reputation, he's actually only won once before, if at all: Jerry Goldsmith in 1982 (12th nominationforscoring, previous winner for The Omen) and Hans Zimmer in 2017 (11th nomination, previous winner for The Lion King)
Second Time's the Charm - Just when you thought he was a one and done, he comes roaring back: Jack Nitzsche in 1982 (previously nominated for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, also up for Best Original Song this year) and Carter Burwell in 2017 (previously nominated for Carol)
John Williams - You can't getrid of him! Fifty-one nominations total, 46 in scoring alone, most recently 2017's The Last Jedi! 1982's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial got him his fourth Oscar (hehasfive).
Let our ears feast upon their work, after the jump......
When trying to name nominees for a given year off the top of my head, Supporting Actress comes easiest to me. It's consistently the most interesting lineup, even in a dizzy year like 1980, a place to honor mothers, lovers, veteran character actresses, even singers making their acting breakthrough. It's also, famously, a place to award leading ladies who probably wouldn't have even been nominated in Best Actress, but for some reason, Supporting is seen as slumming it, so here we are. 2017 has no such controversy this year; 1982 did, with many taking exception to Jessica Lange's nomination and eventual win for playing the romantic interest in Tootsie (she's borderline enough, in my eyes, to belong here, but then I felt the same way about Viola Davis in Fences). The more things change, etc.
Well, now we've brought it up: what has changed? What does it take now to get the Oscar nomination compared to then? As always, the Academy seems attracted to certain types, but one has to stretch a bit to draw direct parallels between the past and present.
One type that's always been a sure thing: the Monster Momma. She's hateful, she's crass, she's the chief antagonist in her daughter's life. Kim Stanley, previously nominated in Lead for Seance on a Wet Afternoon, took the Monster Momma slot in 1982; in 2017, it's Allison Janney for I, Tonya - unlike Stanley, she's the favorite the win.
Then there's the character who's almost a second lead, the emotional core of the entire movie. The aforementioned Jessica Lange takes on this role in Tootsie, as the woman who teaches Dustin Hoffman how to be a better man as a woman, while Laurie Metcalf has the honor in Lady Bird, as the exhausted mom whose tough love and concern come from genuine worry and love.
There's the character you miss whenever she's off-screen, whether it's Teri Garr filling Tootsie with her comic brilliance or Lesley Manville deepening our understanding of Phantom Thread's world. On the other hand, there are also enjoyable characters who don't draw so much focus but are still warmly received whenever they appear, like Lesley Ann Warren in Victor/Victoria or Octavia Spencer in The Shape of Water.
Then there's the fun narrative of The Established Performer Breaking Through in Films. Glenn Close was already a respected, eight-year Broadway veteran and Tony Award nominee when she made her film debut in The World According to Garp, netting wins from LAFCA and the National Board of Review and nominations from the National Society of Film Critics, NYFCC, and the Academy. Meanwhile, Mary J. Blige, a music legend with nine Grammy Awards, is no stranger to film and television, but her previous performances have capitalized on her reputation as a singer, and hile Mudbound may include an original song by her in the credits, her work in the film hinges on delivering serious thesping. And, like Close, she's been a frequent face at precursors, with
Critics' Choice Award, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award nomination.
That's the legacy, now on to the legends - the nominees of 1982, after the jump...
I promised I'd be making fairly loose connections between the films of 1982 and the films of 2017, and for the most part, Original Screenplay writes itself.
Diner, for instance, is classic autobiographical filmmaking, with Barry Levinson borrowing elements from his own youth to tell a highly personal yet universal story about maturity. Obviously, it's the Lady Bird of 1982, right down to the writer taking the reins of director.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial frequently nods to classic cinema within its surprisingly human story of the relationship that develops between a somewhat isolated boy and the lost alien creature who just wants to go home. Be prepared for this comparison to come up a lot, because, duh, The Shape of Water.
An Officer and a Gentleman unexpectedly makes for a great double feature with The Big Sick. Both depict a romance that comes during a young man's pursuit of a career, as well as the relationship he develops with parental/authority figures who aren't his family.
Tootsie is the comedy with a lot more on its mind - namely, society's treatment of women - whose perfect construction reaps huge rewards on subsequent viewings. See also: Get Out, the satire of race relations whose every scene, comic or otherwise, goes for insight and dread.
That leaves Gandhi and Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri. Both find fascinating ways to address white power structures and the literal explosiveness of blind rage, each with its own bald man preaching love and calm over hate.
These are the stories, themes, genres that fascinate filmmakers past, present, and, I'm certain of this, future. So what do we make of the ones that came before? After the jump, we take a closer look at the Original Screenplay nominees of 1982...
This is it: the last batch of films watched for 1982. Did I skip one or two "classics", did I miss out on movies I wanted to see? Yes. But that happens.
The final seven are:
Gregory's Girl
dir/scr: Bill Forsyth
High schooler Gregory experiences love, lust, other hijinks. Somewhat amusing, honest portrayal of confusing, fickle teenage emotions. Slight story stretched by non-sequitur, sitcom-level "bits"; oddly cavalier about teacher-student fucking.
It is said that truth is stranger than fiction, which is probably why so much fiction is founded in fact: biopics, roman à clefs, historical epics, etc. With that in mind, this batch of films, with one or two exceptions, is dedicated to cinema that finds fantasy in reality.
Quartet
dir: James Ivory (A Room with a View, Howards End, The Remains of the Day)
scr: Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, based on the (semi-autobiographical) novel by Jean Rhys
Young woman falls in with dysfunctional married couple. Fine performances mostly, though motivations remain murky and at least one curious casting decision undermines the whole film. It certainly looks nice, and Maggie Smith is, as always, superb.
Back before the Academy expanded its field, it was common for at least one Best Director nominee to deviate from the Best Picture lineup. In 1982, Missing's Costa-Gavras missed out on a nod; instead, the slot went to Wolfgang Petersen, director of the World War II u-boat epic Das Boot. You'll find a capsule review of Das Boot below, along with nine other films helmed by Oscar-nominated directors.
Yes, Giorgio
dir: Franklin J. Schaffner (Patton - won)
scr: Norman Steinberg, based on the novel by Anne Piper
Oscar Nominee: Best Original Song ("If We Were In Love")
Intolerable married opera tenor courts hot blonde throat specialist over an interminable two-week period. A charmless movie with nothing to offer. Bleached look, stale gags, unbelievable romance.
The 1982 train continues - with sequels! Mostly! Only seven films reviewed herein instead of the regular 10...
Rocky III (#4 at the box office)
dir/scr: Sylvester Stallone
Oscar Nominee: Best Original Song ("Eye of the Tiger")
Sequel to: Rocky, Rocky II
Rocky's newfound success makes him an easy target for hungry up-and-comer Clubber Lang. Light on character, big on montages! Manages to raise the stakes and numb you to them. Carl Weathers walks off with the movie.
Sequels to Halloween, Star Trek, Grease, and more, after the jump...
The trip down 1982 lane continues. We've talked movies others have recommended to me; we've talked movies I revisited. This next batch shares a common element: these are all fantasy films.
Conan the Barbarian
dir: John Milius
scr: John Milius and Oliver Stone, based on the character created by Robert E. Howard
Titular barbarian seeks vengeance against cult leader. Milius gives it the epic treatment, complete with rousing score, gorgeous cinematography, and fantastic sets and costumes. James Earl Jones great as the villain. Interminable, but I can't dismiss it.
Continuing our look back at 1982. Yesterday, we talked movies that I finally caught up with after years of waiting. Today, ten films I needed to re-watch.
Blade Runner
dir: Ridley Scott
scr: Hampton Fancher and David Peoples, based on the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
Oscar Nominee: Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Visual Effects Previously seen: The 1992 Director's Cut in high school; this screening, I caught the original theatrical cut
In the future, a specialized cop hunts down rebellious human replicants long past their due date. Clunky voice-over aside, it's a deservedly iconic and jaw-dropping feat of filmmaking, lusciously photographed and meticulously designed. A melancholy, stunning sci-fi noir.
Poltergeist, Tootsie, and more, after the jump....
Welcome to the 80s! Starting today, I'll post ten daily capsule reviews of the movies I saw for my journey through 1982: the Oscar nominees, the box office behemoths, the cult legends, and many more.
Naturally, all these retrospectives are my catching up with cinema that I've missed in my 20-odd years on the planet. What makes this first batch of movies special is that I can remember exactly when the titles became must-see selections, even if, in some cases, it took me decades to follow through.
To put it another way: besides the Oscar parallels, these are the reason I chose 1982.
Night Shift dir: Ron Howard
scr: Lowell Ganz & Babaloo Mandel Recommended by: My dad's best friend and next-door neighbor Steve, who had a VHS copy
Meek morgue attendant is talked into running a brothel out of his workplace. Henry Winkler a winning leading man; he and kooky Michael Keaton get through shaky plotting, miscast Shelley Long, yo-yo progressiveness on gender, sex, and prostitution. Laughs frequent and loud.
Starting Sunday, we'll take a look at the cinematic year of 1982: reviews of over 60 films, a retrospective on that year's Oscars, and my personal picks. Why go back 35 years to that specific Oscar ceremony? Because...
The three films with the most nominations were a fantasy drama, a historical epic, and a socially conscious dramedy
Steven Spielberg helmed a Best Picture nominee
Two of the Best Director nominees started as actors
The frontrunner for Best Actor played a major political figure in a British-made biopic
Meryl Streep was up for Best Actress
Blade Runner disappointed at the box office but was nominated for its visuals
The best musical of the year received only one Oscar nomination
It all starts Sunday with a week's worth of capsule reviews, with Oscar talk February 12th.
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
