Written by Albert Bullock, Edited by Issy Smith

Well, here we are one year later and who could have expected so much change in so little time. We sure as hell didn’t. It feels like only yesterday Parasite took home the well-deserved Best Picture Oscar and Bong Joon-ho made his two awards kiss on the mouth. However, despite the difficulties and restrictions facing the Warwick Film & Television department, in terms of some of last year’s big releases not being easily accessible, the votes are now in and it is time to reveal Reel Talk’s alternative Oscar winners for 2020!

Best Picture

• Minari – 6 votes (all students) – WINNER
• Nomadland – 5 votes (1 staff, 4 students)
• I’m Thinking of Ending Things – 5 votes (1 staff, 4 students)
• Lovers Rock/Small Axe – 4 votes (all staff)
• Da 5 Bloods – 4 votes (1 staff, 3 students)
• Soul – 4 votes (1 staff, 3 students)
• Never Rarely Sometimes Always – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students)
• Promising Young Woman – 3 votes (2 staff, 1 student)
• Wolfwalkers – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students)

Minari wins! But not by a lot, it only won by a single vote, leaving Nomadland and I’m Thinking of Ending Things at joint second. Is Minari’s win a surprise, however? Well, not really. Minari has been nominated for a total of six Oscars, and at this point has been established to be loved by all. It is a fantastic film and its place as our pick for Best Picture feels well deserved and is only to be expected. What is surprising however is the absence of any staff votes for Minari, with all six voters being students.

The staff favourite appears to be Steve McQueen’s Lovers Rock, which notably has not been nominated for a single Oscar, perhaps because of its status as a TV movie? Other notable features for this year’s alternative Oscars that have not been nominated by the academy are films like Da 5 Bloods and I’m Thinking of Ending Things, both of which are Netflix productions, which consequently made them very accessible lockdown viewing. This perhaps explains why these films, along with Lovers Rock, sit so strongly on the list and the very surprising absences of films like Sound of Metal and Judas and the Black Messiah, both of which obtained only 2 votes each (and were nominated by the academy for this category); because they were much easier to watch. What a weird time to live in. It is also nice to see animation sitting so comfortably in this year’s category, with Soul and Wolfwalkers proving they can contend with their live-action peers.

Best TV

• I May Destroy You – 10 votes (3 staff, 7 students) – WINNER
• The Queen’s Gambit – 4 votes (2 staff, 2 students)
• It’s a Sin – 3 votes (2 staff, 1 student)
• Normal People – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students)
• The Haunting of Bly Manor – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• The Mandalorian – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Better Call Saul – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Devs – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• WandaVision – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Schitt’s Creek – 2 votes (all students)
• The Last Dance – 2 votes (all students)
• Unorthodox – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)

I May Destroy You secures a very confident win here, winning by 6 votes! This critically acclaimed show took audiences, and our Film & Television department by storm and currently rests at 98% on Rotten Tomatoes. What is surprising about this turnout is not that it won, but the fact that the show didn’t even get nominated for any notable TV awards such as an Emmy or a BAFTA. Other features are the consistently raved about The Queen’s Gambit, It’s a Sin and WandaVision, which all made our lockdown just a little easier.

Best Director

• Chloé Zhao – 6 votes (all students) – WINNER
• Steve McQueen – 5 votes (all staff)
• Lee Isaac Chung – 4 votes (all students)
• Spike Lee – 3 votes (all students)

And Chloé Zhao wins for her ethereal directing skills in the anti-capitalist Nomadland. It is no surprise that Zhao is our pick for Best Director, she only recently won a Golden Globe and a BAFTA for the same category, so clearly this is universally accepted opinion that out of the nominees, she truly shines. She is also the first Asian woman to be nominated for Best Director!

The majority staff vote went to Steve McQueen for his Small Axe series, unsurprising considering the results for best picture. Seasoned directors Christopher Nolan, David Fincher and Thomas Vinterberg also obtained some votes, but it was pleasant to see newcomers like Emerald Fennell and Lee Chung-Hyun get a vote too. It is quite exciting to see all this new talent and imagine what they will do next.

Best Screenplay

• I’m Thinking of Ending Things – 4 votes (1 staff, 3 students) – WINNER
• Promising Young Woman – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students)
• Palm Springs – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Trial of the Chicago 7 – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Judas and the Black Messiah – 2 votes (2 students)

I’m Thinking of Ending Things is the department’s pick for Best Screenplay, only adding more acclaim to veteran writer Charlie Kaufman. It is no surprise considering how layered, intelligent and dark the script is and how, no matter if you enjoyed the film or not, when you finish it you feel like you need a cold shower. A killer script all round.

Complex scripts like Trial of the Chicago 7, Judas and the Black Messiah and Promising Young Woman, all of which deal with very serious subject matter (expertly may I add), feature comfortably on this list but what was refreshing to see was the inclusion of Palm Springs: a comedy, albeit a dark one. It is very reassuring to still see quality comedy films getting acclaim and attention from audiences and critics rather than being reminded of the era of passable comedies we have found ourselves in. So many incredible scripts this year!

Best Actress

• Sidney Flanigan – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students) – WINNER
• Carey Mulligan – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students) – WINNER
• Frances McDormand – 3 votes (all students) – WINNER
• Andra Day – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Jessie Buckley – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Vanessa Kirby – 2 votes (2 students)

There were so many great female leads from last year that our list of nominees was our most inconclusive yet. We received a total of 20 different nominations, ranging from newcomer Bukky Bakray for her performance in Rocks to the experienced Youn Yuh-jung, for her work in Minari. Consequently, the tough competition has resulted in 3 shared winners!

Sidney Flanigan, Carey Mulligan and Frances McDormand received 3 votes each and deservedly so. Frances McDormand has always been brilliant and is only just cooling off from her previous Oscar win in 2018 for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri; if she wins this year, it will make it her 3^rd Oscar win for Best Actress! Carey Mulligan is slowly becoming one of the UK’s finest actresses and proves she has a lot more to offer thanks to her chilling performance in Promising Young Woman. It’s so weird to think she got her start in acting by fighting off weeping angels in Doctor Who. That’s real character development. But the most exciting nomination here is Sidney Flannigan who is in fact a first-time actress. It’s a very exciting thing to see someone just erupt into the industry because it asks what they will do next. Very cool stuff.

Best Actor

• Chadwick Boseman – 4 votes (3 staff, 1 student) – WINNER
• Riz Ahmed – 4 votes (all students) – WINNER
• Delroy Lindo – 4 votes (all students) – WINNER
• Steven Yeun – 3 votes (all students)
• Anthony Hopkins – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)

Although our list of nominees for Best Actors is more limited than our list of Best Actress nominees, we have another three-way tie. Chadwick Boseman (R.I.P), Riz Ahmed and Delroy Lindo are this year’s winners! Chadwick Boseman blessed us with one of his last performances in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, and clearly gave it his all in this portrayal of an unstable musician named Levee. Riz Ahmed shows off his dramatic skills, as opposed to his previous comedic roles in films such as Four Lions, in Sound of Metal where he portrays a drummer struggling to cope with his rapid hearing loss. And Delroy Lindo gave us one hell of performance in Da 5 Bloods, where he plays a Vietnam veteran who is haunted by PTSD, and in fact acted alongside Boseman for another one of his last screen appearances. It’s a shame that Lindo wasn’t even nominated by the academy for this category; his performance was incredible. Along with this, Anthony Hopkins proves he’s still got it, with a career defining performance in The Father. 83 years young!

Most Snubbed

• Delroy Lindo – 4 votes (1 staff, 3 students) – WINNER
• Regina King – 3 votes (2 staff, 1 student)
• I’m Thinking of Ending Things – 3 votes (all students)
• Tenet – 3 votes (all students)

And as expected, Delroy Lindo came out at the top of our most snubbed category. As I briefly mentioned before, it is quite an accepted opinion that Lindo delivered an incredible performance last year and should’ve been nominated by the academy. It’s hard to watch Da 5 Bloods and not think that Lindo deserves a lot more acclaim than he’s currently getting. Our 2^nd place Best Picture nominee, I’m Thinking of Ending Things has been voted as being snubbed by the academy also, and rightly so.

What all these nominees have in common, however, is that they are films or performances in films that were a lot more accessible than other films that came out this year. Tenet was released in cinemas during August this year (the most lockdown-free month the UK has experienced since the outbreak), and the other nominees were generally released straight to widely used streaming platforms. Perhaps the votes are partially down to what people were able to see?

Best Lockdown Viewing

• Tiger King – 3 votes (1 staff, 2 students) – WINNER
• The Last Dance – 3 votes (1 staff. 2 students) – WINNER
• I May Destroy You – 2 votes (1 staff, 1 student)
• Normal People – 2 votes (all students)

Now to find out what people watched to keep themselves busy during lockdown! And unsurprisingly Tiger King comes first. Almost everyone was talking about the ridiculous and fantastical life of Joe Exotic back in the first lockdown, you practically couldn’t escape a conversation about that man. It was quite exhausting to tell the truth. However, it was incredibly entertaining to see these people who didn’t seem real shoot guns, hug big cats and hire assassins on each other and it was a memorable part of the lockdown.

Other great shows on this list are rightly featured, including the masterpiece of television that is I May Destroy You and the provocative mini-series The Last Dance. But lockdown is (hopefully) nearly over and these shows will always hold a special place in our heart as our coping mechanism for when times were tough… and boring. Time to get off the sofa!