If Netflix is the big dog in Hollywood now, then “The Power of the Dog” is the dog behind the dog at this year’s Academy Award nominations, announced Tuesday.
The film’s 12 Oscar nominations include best picture, adapted screenplay, direction and all four key actors: the lead (Benedict Cumberbatch, who’ll win if Will Smith in “King Richard” doesn’t) plus three sizable supporting turns (Kirsten Dunst, Kodi Smit-McPhee and Jesse Plemons).
Nominations for “The Power of the Dog” handed a second directorial nod,to screenwriter-director Jane Campion, following “The Piano” a generation ago. Campion’s Netflix-backed 1925-set chamber Western of repressive sexuality and expressive vistas premiered last summer at the Venice International Film Festival. After that, to quote “Popstar,” it never stopped not stopping.
At this profoundly uncertain juncture in global screen culture, Campion’s film hit the mark, certainly critically, and even by some squishy, shadowy Netflix audience metrics. “The Power of the Dog” is a little bit traditional, a little bit outre, reassuring in its quality and just faithful enough to novelist Thomas Savage’s source material to make the most of a narrative full of tortured soul, as well as intriguing payoffs.
The 94th Oscar nominees reflect a year that felt like two or three. (Not a full year; the Oscars eligibility release window was shortened to 10 months.) Most people saw movies at home, not in a theater, and millions appear unlikely to return to the communal screen option.
For worse or better, or at least better for next quarter’s earnings, Hollywood has made its peace with streaming. The studio conglomerates have appeased their stockholders with an increasing number of simultaneous, self-competing theatrical and streaming premieres. This was the case with several multiple-Oscar-nominee titles, notably best picture prospects “King Richard” (looking good for Will Smith for best actor) and “Dune” (looking likely for various design and technical categories).
Writer-director Adam McKay scored with “Don’t Look Up” — like “The Power of the Dog” a Netflix-backed best picture nominee. McKay cast his doleful satire of climate change denial and MAGA belligerence with seemingly half the available members of the Screen Actors Guild. He agreed to the fees (reportedly $30 million and $25 million, respectively: all hail unequal pay for equal work among superstars!) negotiated by topliners Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence. And he ended up with four nominations, including best picture.
Another Netflix title and one of my 2021 favorites, “The Lost Daughter,” failed to make that top slot but scored two richly deserved acting nominations, one widely predicted (Olivia Colman), the other more surprising but wonderful (first-time nominee Jesse Buckley). Director and adapter Maggie Gyllenhaal was nominated for adapted screenplay.
The acting nominees in lead and supporting ranks offered additional and often heartening surprises, and evidence of verifiable diversity married to formidable quality. The only performance category without a person of color in the ranks was best supporting actor; meantime, best actress nominees this year include Penélope Cruz (“Parallel Mothers”). Best actor nominees include Javier Bardem (“Being the Ricardos”); Will Smith (“King Richard”); and Denzel Washington (“The Tragedy of Macbeth”), in addition to Cumberbatch and, for his fervent portrayal of “Rent” creator Jonathan Larson in “Tick, Tick…Boom!,” Andrew Garfield.
Garfield, for the record, also showed up in “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” the film that saved the theatergoing experience from utter pandemic irrelevance and proved that there’s no business like Marvel business. Soon enough there’ll be no other business besides Marvel business, if we don’t watch out and occasionally make new stuff.
Soon we’ll wade back into the yearly tradition of unreliable, unwarranted, unsound predictions about who’ll win what. This year’s Oscars ceremony comes March 27, returning to a hosted live show at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. Tuesday morning’s network TV coverage of the nominations flashed rather forlorn early-morning footage of the sidewalk outside the Dolby, sitting quietly next to a Sephora and a Walgreens.
It looked less like a sleeping giant of popular culture than an anchor tenant in an indoor/outdoor mall, waiting for retail trends to reverse course.
Meantime, some wholly justified cries of outrage tempered by a few bright spots:
No “Passing”? No Ruth Negga? No Tessa Thompson? No Rebecca Hall?
Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem, nominated for “Being the Ricardos”: Really? Nomination worthy? Yes, if we’re nominating “most valiant and conspicuous effort to make sense of our miscasting.”
No Jared Leto for “House of Gucci”! Fine by me! (Lady Gaga, on the other hand, I wouldn’t have minded at all.)
“Drive My Car” among the 10 best picture nominees — way to go!
“West Side Story”: Every nomination, ripely deserved, although I would’ve loved also to see Mike Faist’s Riff nominated along with screenwriter Tony Kushner.
Jonny Greenwood: The inspired composer deserved a win for “Phantom Thread,” but the Academy will make it up to him this year for “The Power of the Dog.”
“Belfast” and “King Richard” best picture nods: Oh, well. You know. Nice films, more fraudulent than authentic. But that’s where casting comes in. Ciaran Hinds and Judi Dench do all they can, effortlessly, in “Belfast,” while in “King Richard” Aunjanue Ellis’s confrontation scene with Will Smith arrives just in time to toughen up a movie inclined to soft-pedal the fascinating man at the film’s center.
Finally: Kristen Stewart! Yes! An excellent surprise, as she is excellent in “Spencer,” a film few saw in a year when even the comparatively popular titles felt weirdly unseen.
BEST PICTURE
“Belfast”; “CODA”; “Don’t Look Up”; “Drive My Car”; “Dune”; “King Richard”; “Licorice Pizza”; “Nightmare Alley”; “The Power of the Dog”; “West Side Story”
BEST DIRECTOR
Kenneth Branagh, “Belfast”; Ryusuke Hamaguchi, “Drive My Car”; Paul Thomas Anderson, “Licorice Pizza”; Jane Campion, “The Power of the Dog”; Steven Spielberg, “West Side Story”
BEST ACTOR
Javier Bardem, “Being the Ricardos”; Benedict Cumberbatch, “The Power of the Dog”; Andrew Garfield, “Tick, Tick … Boom!”; Will Smith, “King Richard”; Denzel Washington, “The Tragedy of Macbeth”
BEST ACTRESS
Jessica Chastain, “The Eyes of Tammy Faye”; Olivia Colman, “The Lost Daughter”; Penélope Cruz, “Parallel Mothers”; Nicole Kidman, “Being the Ricardos”; Kristen Stewart, “Spencer”
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Ciaran Hinds, “Belfast”; Troy Kotsur, “CODA”; Jesse Plemons, “The Power of the Dog”; J.K. Simmons, “Being the Ricardos”; Kodi Smit-McPhee, “The Power of the Dog”
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Jessie Buckley, “The Lost Daughter”; Ariana DeBose, “West Side Story”; Judi Dench, “Belfast”; Kirsten Dunst, “The Power of the Dog”; Aunjanue Ellis, “King Richard”
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
“Belfast”; “Don’t Look Up”; “King Richard”; “Licorice Pizza”; “The Worst Person in the World”
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
“CODA”; “Drive My Car”; “Dune”; “The Lost Daughter”; “The Power of the Dog”
ANIMATED FEATURE
“Encanto”; “Flee”; “Luca”; “The Mitchells vs. the Machines”; “Raya and the Last Dragon”
PRODUCTION DESIGN
“Dune”; “Nightmare Alley”; “The Power of the Dog”; “The Tragedy of Macbeth”; “West Side Story”
COSTUME DESIGN
“Cruella”; “Cyrano”; “Dune”; “Nightmare Alley”; “West Side Story”
CINEMATOGRAPHY
“Dune”; “Nightmare Alley”; “The Power of the Dog”; “The Tragedy of Macbeth”; “West Side Story”
EDITING
“Don’t Look Up”; “Dune”; “King Richard”; “The Power of the Dog”; “Tick, Tick … Boom!”
MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING
“Coming 2 America”; “Cruella”; “Dune”; “The Eyes of Tammy Faye”; “House of Gucci”
SOUND
“Belfast”; “Dune”; “No Time to Die”; “The Power of the Dog”; “West Side Story”
VISUAL EFFECTS
“Dune”; “Free Guy”; “No Time to Die”; “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”; “Spider-Man: No Way Home”
SCORE
“Don’t Look Up”; “Dune”; “Encanto”; “Parallel Mothers; “The Power of the Dog”
SONG
“Be Alive” (“King Richard”); “Dos Oruguitas” (“Encanto”); “Down to Joy” (“Belfast”); “No Time To Die” (“No Time to Die”); “Somehow You Do” (“Four Good Days”)
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
“Ascension”; Attica”; “Flee”; “Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)”; “Writing With Fire”
INTERNATIONAL FEATURE
“Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom,” Bhutan; “Flee,” Denmark; “The Hand of God,” Italy; “Drive My Car,” Japan; “The Worst Person in the World,” Norway
ANIMATED SHORT
“Affairs of the Art”; “Bestia”; “Boxballet”; “Robin Robin”; “The Windshield Wiper”
DOCUMENTARY SHORT
“Audible”; “Lead Me Home”; “The Queen of Basketball”; “Three Songs for Benazir”; “When We Were Bullies”
LIVE-ACTION SHORT
“The Dress”; “The Long Goodbye”; “On My Mind”; “Please Hold”; “Ala Kachuu — Take and Run”
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