ASC announced their nominations today, and we just got a bunch of help for the Cinematography category. Based on what I’ve seen from BAFTA and BFCA, there’s probably only about seven real contenders for this category, but the guild is the foremost expert on it, so I’m curious to see what they went for.
Best Cinematography
Cherry
Mank
News of the World
Nomadland
The Trial of the Chicago 7
Cherry. Interesting. That’s been largely absent from things this year, which makes me leery about the odds it has of making the final category. It was shot by Newton Thomas Sigel, who’s shot some great films like The Usual Suspects and Three Kings. Most recently he’s done Drive and Bohemian Rhapsody. And he also shot Da 5 Bloods and Extraction this year. This is his first ASC nomination too. Good for him.
Otherwise, Mank, News of the World and Nomadland have been mainstays. I’ve been waiting to see if Chicago 7 would get on. That’s Phedon Papamichael, who hit the guild last year too for Ford v Ferrari (though his only Oscar nomination is for Nebraska).
They also nominated for the Spotlight award: Swallow (which was immaculately shot), Two of Us and Dear Comrades. In case any of that sways people to guess them for the category. Which, honestly… it might. Also, Truffle Hunters, Gunda and Notturno were nominated in their Documentary category (which… if I was gonna tell you three docs on the shortlist that had great cinematography, those would be the ones I picked.
This is gonna be an interesting one in that you only really have three locks, and anything past that is gonna be intriguing. You might get a sneaky foreign film on this year like we did with Never Look Away in 2018. I’m gonna have to think on this one before Sunday.
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