For Your Consideration

Queer singers, gay ‘Boys,’ scheming lesbians & more: If Queerty picked the Oscar Nominations, 2021

Awards season climaxes again, as Hollywood wakes up early this Monday (March 15)  morning for the 93rd Annual Academy Awards nominations.

Of course, 2020 didn’t do movies any favors, with most cineplexes remaining closed due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Thank goodness for streaming then, which offered a safe venue to view the best Hollywood had to over…that wasn’t held back until theatres reopen, anyway. We’re happy to report that plenty of wonderful films dealing with LGBTQ themes or that featured the work of queer artists also offered some comfort.

To be clear, this is not a predictive list of the nominations. Rather, we’d just like to offer up our voice to commend the work that most impressed us, and hope that Oscar–and his voters–also take notice.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

  • Peter Dinklage, I Care a Lot
  • Colin Chu, The Half of It
  • Frank Langella, The Trial of the Chicago 7
  • Stanley Tucci, Supernova
  • Lance Henriksen, Falling

It’s high time the world accepts a certain truth: Peter Dinklage is one of the great character actors of our time. His work as a ruthless mobster in I Care a Lot had us both laughing and chilled, which is why he gets mentioned here. Chu gave one of the most underrated–and compelling–performances of the year as a brooding Chinese-American father of a lesbian teen in The Half of It. Langella doesn’t have a part as showy or noble as his Chicago 7 co-stars, but his anchors the film as a man walking the razor’s edge between stupidity and evil. Stanley Tucci isn’t gay–not that it matters–but he gives a tender, respectful performance as a gay man with dementia in Supernova. Henriksen, by contrast, plays a reprehensible monster with dementia in Falling, and gives one of the best performances of his career.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

  • Maria Bakalova, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
  • Amanda Seyfried, Mank
  • Allison Brie, Promising Young Woman
  • Ellen Burstyn, Pieces of a Woman
  • Jane Seymour, Friendsgiving

Bakalova seems a lock–even a frontrunner to win–in this category for her bonkers performance in the Borat sequel, one of the funniest of the year. Seyfried does her best work to date as the sultry Marion Davies in Mank. That leaves three overlooked gems here. For all the talk about Promising Young Woman, Brie doesn’t get enough credit for her extraordinary work as a woman both complacent and abused. She does a lot with very little. Burstyn is a living legend–maybe even the best actress alive (no shade to Meryl, Viola or Glenn)–and given her stalwart work here, we’d love to see her enjoy some glory after such a fine career. That leaves Seymour, which may seem like a joke. On the other hand, anyone who has seen Friendsgiving will know that she steals the movie with her wild, horny performance that casts her against type. It may well be the best of her career, and we think Oscar should notice.

BEST ACTOR

  • Riz Ahmed, Sound of Metal
  • Chadwick Boseman, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • Gary Oldman, Mank
  • Kingsly Ben-Adir, One Night in Miami
  • Paul Bettany, Uncle Frank

Ahmed doesn’t just give his best performance to date as a deaf drummer in Sound of Metal; he gives his sexiest as well. Call us biased, but we feel like he more than deserves some attention here. The always-reliable Oldman gives another spectacular performance as the alcoholic screenwriter Herman J. Mankowitz in Mank; we only wish the historically inaccurate screenplay would have served him better. Bettany showed a hereto-unseen worldliness in Uncle Frank, a too-little-seen film that pulled at our heartstrings. Ben-Adir gave two excellent performances this year, one in The Comey Rule (as Barack Obama), and the other in One Night in Miami. Ben-Adir’s Malcolm X shows off the usual ferocity we associate with the real-life man, but also his nerdiness behind closed doors, and the actor somehow manages to merge them into one, complete, three-dimensional man. All that said, Chadwick Boseman gave not just the performance of his life, but the performance of the year. That Ma Rainey also is his last is our loss. Bet on him to win, folks.

BEST ACTRESS

  • Viola Davis, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • Andra Day, The United States vs. Billie Holiday
  • Rosamund Pike, I Care a Lot
  • Sidney Flanigan, Never Rarely Sometimes Always
  • Carey Mulligan, Promising Young Woman

Few readers will have heard of Flanigan, the young star of Never Rarely Sometimes Always. For that matter, they may not have heard of the film either. Flanigan plays a teenager sneaking off to New York for an abortion in the movie, and seems so real you’d think the producers plucked her from an actual high school. We have issues with Mulligan, but those can’t distract from an awesome performance as the femme vigilante of Promising Young Woman. Pike delighted us as a conniving lesbian–both funny and deplorable–in I Care a Lot. This year, however, looks to be a battle of the bisexual divas, as Viola Davis squares off against newcomer Andra Day for the golden statue. Davis, quite simply, is one of the best actors alive, and she commands the screen as Ma Rainey. How amazing then, that newcomer Day could command the screen with as much power, and as another famous singer, Billie Holiday. Oh, and did we mention both ladies do their own singing? Call it the clash of the titans–and we have no idea who will win.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

  • Aaron Sorkin, The Trial of the Chicago 7
  • Harry MacQueen, Supernova
  • Alice Wu, The Half of It
  • Carlo Mirabella-Davis, Swallow
  • Emerald Fennell, Promising Young Woman

Sorkin–a man who has made a career out of electric banter between prickish characters–is a lock for a spot here for his Boomer-guilt polemic about the Chicago 7. Flawed as the movie is, the script is not one of its failings. We loved MacQueen’s gentle take on two middle-aged men in love in Supernovait’s one of the best queer-themed films of the year. Fennell proved she can walk the line between comedy and horror with Promising Young Woman, a film with its share of twists. We also fell in love with the humor and warmth of The Half of It, a story of a closeted high schooler & jock dullard in love with the same woman. If the movie has a shot at Oscar glory, it will likely come here. Of all the year’s overlooked gems, however, we submit Swallow a psychological drama masquerading as a horror film. Of everything we saw in 2020, it is the only movie that made our skin crawl.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

  • Kemp Powers, One Night in Miami
  • Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • Chloé Zhao, Nomadland
  • Peter Baynham, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jena Friedman, Anthony Hines, Lee Kern, Dan Mazer, Nina Pedrad, Erica Rivinoja, & Dan Swimer, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
  • Mart Crowley & Ned Martel, The Boys in the Band

Apparently, it takes a village to write a great comedy, as Borat Subsequent Moviefilm attests. That said, it is the best comedy of 2020. Zhao’s quiet take on a drifter in Nomadland haunted us less with what the film presents than with the questions it raises. Santiago-Hudson had the impossible task of making an August Wilson script feel more like cinema than a filmed play (see also: Fences), and did a wonderful job. Ditto Powers, who adapted his own stage version of One Night in Miami, a script so cinematic it is almost hard to imagine on stage. We also send love to the late Mart Crowley and his writing partner Ned Martel for re-adapting–and amending–The Boys in the Band to land on the screen again. It may have taken 50 bloody years, but the pair finally gave the homophobia of the original book a clear purpose, and hinted that the titular Boys aren’t as pathetic as they may seem.

BEST DIRECTOR

  • Regina King, One Night in Miami
  • George C. Wolfe, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • Chloé Zhao, Nomadland
  • David Fincher, Mank
  • Christopher Nolan, Tenet

This year announced the arrival of two virtuoso directors, both of them women. Zhao crafted something of an anti-Western in Nomadland, a haunting film that can be read as both hopeful and hopeless. King, likewise, announced herself as a towering talent, directing One Night in Miami with such grit and grace that it could pass for a Martin Scorsese opus. Wolfe we’ve loved for years, and given his power with actors in Ma Rainey, we think it’s high time the Academy gave him proper credit. That leaves the two “star directors,” Nolan and Fincher. Both use their movies as an opportunity to exercise style, complicated action and complex characters, and Mank and Tenet are no exception. At times they seem more like circus ringmasters than filmmakers, but man oh man, do they put on one Hell of a show.

BEST PICTURE

  • Mank
  • The Half of It
  • Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
  • One Night in Miami
  • Welcome to Chechnya
  • The Trial of the Chicago 7

It’s hard to know how many films will land in the Best Picture category this year, given the funky rules surrounding nominations and the spotty patterns of release. That said, we’re guessing for about six nominees, and laid out our picks here. Mank is second-rate history but first-rate spectacle, a Hollywood tale told with the utmost style. The Half of It may be the most singularly underrated film of 2020, which is a crime: not only is it a marvelous queer story, it is also a terrific high school comedy. Ma Rainey features some of the best performances of the year, and feels well-timed given the story’s comments on gender, sexuality and race. Chicago 7, for all its flaws, does tell a frightening story about American Democracy gone awry, and abuse of the justice system. As in previous years, we feel documentaries don’t get enough love in the most prestigious category, and Welcome to Chechnya tells one of the most urgent and powerful stories of any movie of 2020. Our pick for the gold, however, will go to One Night in Miami, a treasure cove of commentary on race, wealth, and masculinity told with wonderful performances, style and commanding direction. Academy, take note!

What are your hopes for the Oscar nominations? Sound off in the comments!

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