Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin Scorsese eyeing reunion on The Devil In The White City
Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese are eyeing a reunion on the film adaptation of The Devil in the White City
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Oscar Nominations 2025: Biggest Snubs and Surprises
No love for a milk-guzzling Nicole Kidman or the score for 'Challengers', while a political drama becomes the first Brazilian nominee for Best Picture.
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Not everybody’s a winner — and some, shockingly, aren’t even contenders. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences announced the nominations for the 97th Oscars this morning, and per usual, there were yelps of joy throughout the land: Viva Anora! You got in for Best Picture, Nickel Boys! Way to make history, Karla Sofía Gascón! There were gasps, as a few didn’t-see-that-coming shocks spiced up some key categories. And there were screams of agony, as the inevitable disappointments over whose names were not called by Bowen Yang and Rachel Sennott up at the podium. Here were the big snubs and surprises regarding the 2025 Oscar nominations.
Simon Mein/Thin Man Films Ltd/Bleecker StreetSNUB: Best Actress, Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Hard Truths)This one hurts. Teaming up again with her Secrets & Lies director Mike Leigh — you may remember that 1996 film did nab her a Best Supporting Actress nomination — the British actress gave one of the most stunning performances of the last decade, much less this past year, as a one-woman wrecking crew who makes life miserable for those around her. Jean-Baptiste swept a lot of critics group’s awards and made the Critics Choice and BAFTA lineups, and a lot of us hoped the Oscars were next. A hard truth to swallow, indeed.
SURPRISE: Best Director, Coralie Fargeat (The Substance)The Best Director category went more or less as people expected, with Brady Corbet, Jacques Audiard and Sean Baker securing slots — some wondered whether James Mangold or Denis Villeneuve would be the wild-card inclusion. (Congratulations, Mr. Mangold.) And it was assumed that Edward Berger, whose terrifically trashy Conclave was a lock for Best Picture, would be No. 5. Instead, French director Coralie Fargeat swooped in and deservedly took the last slot, much to our delight. The film also made it into the Best Picture category as well. Apparently, her story about a Hollywood actor determined to do anything to stay young and relevant resonated with even the most squeamish of voters.
Searchlight PicturesSNUB: Best Picture, A Real PainIt was a truth universally acknowledged that Kieran Culkin would be one of the five nominees for Best Supporting Actor, give the sheer amount of love for his take on a shiny, happy stoner on a trip with his cousin. Kudos to write-director-costar Jesse Eisenberg as well for his Best Original Screenplay nomination. But most of us thought that this funny, moving, thoughtful riff on the road movie would be among the 10 films picked for Best Picture, and — no offense to most of the ones who did make it in — the fact that it was left out feels like a glaring mistake. That title now doubles as a description of our feelings on the matter.
Sony PicturesSURPRISE: Best Picture, I’m Still HereSo many film lovers were crossing their fingers that Fernanda Torres would make it into the Best Actress nominees, even if that meant a “so sorry, maybe next time” for popular potential contenders like Pamela Anderson for The Last Showgirl (or worse, for Marianne Jean-Baptiste for Hard Truths). Her portrayal of a woman navigating decades of life under a military dictatorship is a hell of a showcase, to be sure. Yet the inclusion of Walter Salles’ political drama in the top category was, frankly, a bit of a jaw-dropper. There was precious little chatter about the film other than main performance, even with positive word of mouth on the fest circuit. Still, this is the first Brazilian film to make the Best Picture category, and we’re stoked that a whole new audience of viewers are about to catch up with it now.
Niko Tavernise/A24SNUB: Best Actress, Nicole Kidman (Babygirl)What, no love for a woman of a certain age who finds sexual liberation, one guzzled glass of milk at a time? There are committed performances, and there’s Nicole Kidman’s all-or-nothing interpretation of a CEO diving headfirst into an affair with a younger man in Halina Reijn’s conversation-starter of a romantic melodrama. It’s such a vulnerable, naked-in-every-sense-of-the-word interpretation of female desire that we understand why some voters might have felt too much like voyeurs watching her play this character, and thus responded accordingly. But if this isn’t career-best work from an actor who’s never been afraid to go deep and go dark, and who’s so beloved by many inside and outside the Academy, it’s damn near close. And that makes this snub feel particularly heinous.
Pief WeymanSURPRISE: Best Actor, Sebastian Stan (The Apprentice)Like so many critics, pundits and wags, we’d assumed that a biopic about the early years of the most divisive political figure in recent memory — not to mention one in which the main character rapes his wife — was more or less dead in the water even before a certain November election. The fact that Sebastian Stan was nominated for his portrayal of Donald Trump given the current climate may double as a passive-aggressive protest vote, but who the fuck cares! Stan is bringing it in this role; ditto Jeremy Strong as his Satanic majesty Roy Cohn, and who also scored a Best Supporting Actor nod this morning. As someone on social media was saying, it’s simply wild that such a portrayal of a sitting President, which neither outright demonizes him nor does him any favors, could earn the person behind said portrayal a possible gold statuette. Only in America!
Niko Tavernise / Metro Goldwyn MSNUB: Best Score, ChallengersBut Emila Pérez‘s score gets in? Hmm. Our heartfelt apologies Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. We knew Challengers would be a, er, challenge to sell to voters in a stacked year like this, but we had assumed that their absolute banger of a score would be not just a nominee but a frontrunner. What else to say, but: 40, love.
Augusta QuirkSURPRISE: Best Supporting Actor, Yura Borisov (Anora)This one wasn’t the biggest surprise of this morning’s announcements, but it was definitely one of the best. The Russian actor is sort of the stealth MVP in Sean Baker’s sex-worker screwball comedy, especially when he becomes a more prominent presence in the second and third acts — and his soulful thug-slash-confidante to the title character is part of what the movie work so beautifully. Borisov’s name had been floated in early chatter around who might make the grade for this category, but it still felt like a long shot. A reminder: Sometimes long shots pay off. We’re so jazzed he’s in here.
Cuba Scott/Paramount PicturesSNUB: Best Supporting Actor, Denzel Washington (Gladiator II)Ok, so this may be more of a personal disappointment. The Best Supporting Actor section was always going to be a crowded one, and people were mixed overall about Ridley Scott’s sequel to his 2000 Oscar-winner. But come on! The Best Supporting categories have always been about rewarding outside-the-box performances, be they funny (Kevin Kline in A Fish Called Wanda, Marisa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny), crazy-quirky (Kevin Spacey in The Usual Suspects) or scene-stealing and outrageous (Joe Pesci in Goodfellas, Dianne Wiest in Bullets Over Broadway). All of those adjectives describe Denzel Washington’s extraordinary DGAF take on a Roman empire power player, and long after we’ve forgotten most aspects of this blockbuster, we’ll remember Denzel lacing cunning and menace into throwaway lines, giddily yelling “More wine!” before pumping a drinking partner for intel and camping it up with a severed head. We knew he likely would not get nominated. But the omission still feels like a crime.
