Will Timothée Chalamet and Demi Moore win Oscars? USA TODAY weighs in.
USA TODAY film critic Brian Truitt gives his Oscar predictions for best picture, actress and actor. The Academy Awards air Sunday on ABC and Hulu.
We here on the USA TODAY movie team watch a lot of movies. We don’t do much fighting.
That is, until the Oscars roll around, when we get into a steel cage, start dropping elbows off the top rope on each other and tussle for our favorite best picture contenders.
This Sunday’s 97th Academy Awards (ABC and Hulu, 7 p.m. EST/4 PST) have given us a crop of 10 acclaimed movies in the best picture category, from a papal thriller and a Bob Dylan music biopic to a historical epic and a bloody body-horror spectacle. As human beings, we all have different tastes. As movie reporters, we know our stuff. And as once-a-year grapplers, we go to bat for our favorites to win Hollywood’s biggest prize.
The members of this film-loving fight club are here to explain why each nominee is worthy of a best picture win. (And be sure to weigh on your favorites as well with the USA TODAY Movie Meter!)
‘Anora’
Sean Baker’s “Anora” begins as a messy, vape-fueled romance between a gum-smacking sex worker (Mikey Madison) and a boisterous Russian oligarch’s son (Mark Eydelshteyn). But like magic, the film shape-shifts into something wholly remarkable and unexpected: at once a screwball comedy, a profoundly human drama, and a searing indictment about how the ultra-rich couldn’t care less about the rest of us. In these troubled times, Baker’s deft handling of class and power dynamics only becomes more sadly topical, giving us a heroine for our time in Madison’s tinsel-haired, heel-clacking go-getter. ‒ Patrick Ryan
‘The Brutalist’
Played by a passionate Adrien Brody, a Hungarian architect sees the Statue of Liberty after surviving the Holocaust on the first day of the rest of his life. His quest for the American dream takes a few turns from there in director Brady Corbet’s historical epic, which weaves in postwar xenophobia, class warfare and legacy in a darkly honest immigrant story. Guy Pearce is an antagonistic delight wielding passive-aggressive hostility as the main character’s benefactor, and Felicity Jones, as the architect’s loyal wife, is the heart of the piece who steps up when her spouse can’t. Throw in a stunning epilogue and “Brutalist” is a monumental effort to be treasured. – Brian Truitt
‘A Complete Unknown’
Bob Dylan is a puzzle wrapped up in a riddle enveloped in a mystery. So good luck playing the Nobel-winning troubadour in a movie. And yet Timothée Chalamet embraced that tall order, spending a year learning how to sing and play like the master. Surrounded by an equally dedicated cast (Oscar nominees Edward Norton as Pete Seeger and Monica Barbaro as Joan Baez), Chalamet helps “A Complete Unknown” transport us all to a 1960s full of promise, purpose and poignant music. − Marco della Cava
‘Conclave’
Sure, the actual election of a new pope is probably nowhere near as white knuckle or scintillating an affair as director Edward Berger posits in this wowing thriller, but it’s still a heavenly watch with a heck of a twist. Ralph Fiennes stars as a cardinal in desperate need of a stress ball as the man running the conclave after the pontiff’s sudden death, and his crisis of faith takes a back seat to all the candidates of different political and social stripes gunning to run the church. It’s the old-school, does-everything-right kind of best picture the Oscars are known for, with holy flavor. – Truitt
‘Dune: Part Two’
With the exception of “The Godfather,” whose “Part II” also took home a best picture Oscar, sequels rarely eclipse the original. But “Dune: Part Two” has those sorts of chops. Fab computer graphics make people riding giant sandstorms genuinely riveting. Then there’s a positively creepy Austin Butler as chilling bad guy Feyd-Rautha. And thanks to Timothée Chalamet’s A-list status, his star turn as reluctant leader and hero Paul Atreides lends the film an even more irresistible glow that has lured in more than mere sci-fi fanatics. – della Cava
‘Emilia Pérez’
It’s a hotbed of controversy. It’s an unconventional musical that would break most Broadway babies’ brains. It’s proudly a disruptor in an industry that tends toward sameness. It’s also pretty darn good. Jacque Audiard’s neo-noir crime thriller comic telenovela showstopper takes you on the strange journeys of an ambitious lawyer (Zoe Saldaña), a cartel kingpin (Karla Sofia Gascón) who undergoes gender affirmation surgery, and a mom (Selena Gomez) with bad habits and worse taste in men. Saldaña has never been better, and Gascon is a revelation – albeit a problematic tweeter. If you’re willing to get past that, you can enjoy “Emilia” for the wild ride it is. − Truitt
‘I’m Still Here’
We’ve spilled a ton of ink about how astounding Fernanda Torres is in “I’m Still Here,” bringing warmth and restraint to the unflappable Brazilian activist Eunice Paiva. But what often goes unsaid is that Walter Salles’ film is so much more than just one transcendent performance: It’s a taut political thriller and an elegantly crafted family epic about how sometimes the most potent resistance is a smile. While that may sound awfully pat, Salles avoids mawkish sentimentality by simply sitting in silence, allowing Torres’ eyes to tell us everything we need to know. ‒ Ryan
‘Nickel Boys’
It may sound like eye-rolling hyperbole to say that “Nickel Boys” made us rethink what movies are capable of. But with his lyrical adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s 2019 book, filmmaker RaMell Ross has created a staggering empathy machine that puts us squarely in the shoes of our protagonists as they face the loss of both their freedoms and identities in the Jim Crow South. The racial drama is shot from a first-person perspective − with actors speaking directly to the camera − and yet you never second-guess the daring conceit, thanks in large part to the tender work of Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor and newcomer Brandon Wilson. “Nickel Boys” is the rare film you can genuinely call “boundary-breaking,” with a gut-punch finale that will linger in our minds for many years to come. ‒ Ryan
‘The Substance’
“The Substance” is an audacious, delightfully disgusting takedown of unrealistic beauty standards that deserves more love than just Demi Moore’s likely best actress win. Writer and director Coralie Fargeat should also be recognized for her striking, inventive visuals and crackling screenplay, which expertly balances gross-out gags and emotional beats without any tonal whiplash. It’s as wildly entertaining as it is thought-provoking, with a powerful message about self-acceptance, a pair of tour de force performances (by Moore and Margaret Qualley) and a bonkers finale that swings for the fences. No horror film has won best picture in 33 years, but “The Substance” is worthy of breaking the curse. − Brendan Morrow
‘Wicked’
Whoever thought “The Wizard of Oz,” that beloved and feared flick of a thousand childhoods, needed a prequel? But when the musical “Wicked,” which tells the origin story of the originally not-so-Wicked Witch of the West, scored with theatergoers, Hollywood swooped in. With soaring performances by Cynthia Erivo as the misunderstood Elphaba Thropp and Ariana Grande as her glamorous friend-turned-nemesis Glinda Upland, the movie takes the Broadway romp into explosive Busby Berkeley territory without sacrificing its enormous green heart. − della Cava
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