picture
nominees
director
"There’s so many things that have to happen for me to just do my job. To do acting. There’s so many pieces. So many stars have to align. But a major piece (that) has to be there for me to do my job is belief and someone believed in me... I don’t know why we live in a world where because of who I am and the hue I have people don’t. And that’s tough. So when Jordan did it meant the world to me and I just didn’t want to let him down." -Daniel Kaluuya
nominees
Paul Thomas Anderson, PHANTOM THREAD
Greta Gerwig, LADY BIRD
Luca Guadagnino, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
Andrey Zvyagintsev, LOVELESS
Andrey Zvyagintsev, LOVELESS
actor
Timothée Chalamet, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
"There is a universally human quality to Elio... There’s a tension on the surface of his existence, and he’s in a transitionary period in his life, becoming a man and dealing with feelings of sexual impulse for the first time. It felt rare to read a story about a young person who’s this complex. It’s no surface representation of what young people are. And as an actor, you seize that kind of opportunity." -Timothée Chalamet
nominees
Daniel Day-Lewis, PHANTOM THREAD
Adan Jodorowsky, ENDLESS POETRY
Daniel Kaluuya, GET OUT
Robert Pattinson, GOOD TIME
actress
"What’s amazing about A Quiet Passion is that we’re showing Emily in very different stages of her life. We begin with her youthful optimism and hope and we just follow her until the end of her life, when she’s already bitterly disappointed and in terrible pain, suffering from a horrible illness. There are a lot of different Emily Dickinsons out there. She and her poetry have such a following that it’s easy to find different camps of people who feel that they know Emily so well. But each of them knows a different version of their favorite poetess." -Cynthia Nixon
nominees
Vicky Krieps, PHANTOM THREAD
Saoirse Ronan, LADY BIRD
Meryl Streep, THE POST
Daniela Vega, A FANTASTIC WOMAN
supporting actor
Armie Hammer, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
"I'm not gonna lie, dancing scenes are pretty tough. ... It's really funny about filming a dancing scene because most people who aren't in the business don't realize that there is absolutely no music going on. If you're lucky, you get a click track that just is literally just clicking so that you can keep a rhythm of what you're doing. But then having no music, being completely sober, having everyone stare at you — it does not for an easy scene make. ... And I'm 6'5", so I feel like I'm ... flailing more than anything else. But so much of that scene was about watching someone be totally enraptured and just lost in a moment and enjoying themselves, because that's one of the things that Oliver is able to do that Elio really appreciates." -Armie Hammer
nominees
Willem Dafoe, THE FLORIDA PROJECT
Garrett Hedlund, MUDBOUND
Barry Keoghan, THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER
Michael Stuhlbarg, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
supporting actress
Laurie Metcalf, LADY BIRD
“I loved that it was a very balanced relationship, that one of them wasn’t just a monster,” Metcalf said. “I think she’s being a great mom and doing everything within her powers to help her child succeed... It’s all coming from a positive place. It’s just a moment in their lives where there’s so much miscommunication and frustration and tension that everything escalates too fast.” -Laurie Metcalf
nominees
Joanna Bacon, A QUIET PASSION
Kirin Kiki, AFTER THE STORM
Melissa Leo, NOVITIATE
Lesley Manville, PHANTOM THREAD
original screenplay
Jordan Peele, GET OUT
"The first time I actually put pen to paper to write this script was three years ago, so the whole idea was marinating for awhile. Then in the shooting of the movie and the drafts that went into shooting it, the last 5, 10% sort of came together. I pitched the movie before I wrote it, and I pitched the movie as you see it, except for a couple of real distinct differences. But that’s my style. I only actually put pen to paper when I know the big picture." -Jordan Peele
nominees
Paul Thomas Anderson, PHANTOM THREAD
Terence Davies, A QUIET PASSION
Greta Gerwig, LADY BIRD
Kogonada, COLUMBUS
adapted screenplay
James Ivory, CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
"I just sat with the novel and I would just write out the script in longhand. I would just go through it bit by bit, scene by scene. Sometimes I would invent things. I mean the whole business of the statue that they find at the bottom of the lake, that's all an invented thing. You have to drop great chunks of things from the book and come up with other things. But it's a slow process.
I would basically just write in longhand, and after I got something that I liked, I would type that up on a typewriter. I never work on a computer. I can't write on a computer. It's just not possible for me to do that. And so gradually, bit by bit by bit, over many, many months, it all came together." -James Ivory
nominees
Hampton Fancher & Michael Green, BLADE RUNNER 2049
François Ozon & Philippe Piazzo, FRANTZ
Dee Rees & Virgil Williams, MUDBOUND
Aaron Sorkin, MOLLY’S GAME
ensemble
"Watching a film like Get Out, it’s clear that Terri Taylor put a tremendous amount of thought into each role, mirroring the director’s wit and darkly subversive tone with the actors she put forth. Anchored by a searing and inspired performance by Daniel Kaluuya, each actor walks the fine line between naturalism and absurdity. Their grounded performances disarm and create more dissonance as the audience is riveted to the unfolding twists and turns. From the opening scene, Lakieth Stanfield’s understated banter shocks us into a reality where things are not as they seem. Allison Williams’ lighthearted charm and effervescent chemistry with Daniel later makes the turn all the more devastating. The veteran heavyweight Catherine Keener stuns in a revelatory role, the unassuming Bradley Whitford leads us effortlessly, while the dynamic Caleb Landry Jones brings danger and LilRel Howery provides a crucial and comedic link. Each and every actor adds intrigue and heightens the unfolding drama without tipping their hand. And while they have very different backgrounds and styles, on screen the actors effortlessly inhabit the same shifting landscape and display both comedic and dramatic chops." -Sarah Finn
nominees
BPM (Beats per Minute)
LADY BIRD
MUDBOUND
foreign language film
LOVELESS
"I’m not a teacher, here to preach to viewers. I don’t really think about the lessons that people take away from watching my films. Just like any other film, Loveless is basically all the concentrated experience of somebody else’s emotions and reflections of life, which we offer to the viewer. They can sit on comfortable chairs and all of this is given to them on a plate but in a concentrated form. They can watch somebody else’s destiny, somebody else’s mistakes. Loveless, is all about how people communicate in their relationships. Of course it is then up to the individual, how they will take and use all the experiences they view and they will form whatever thoughts they want." -Andrey Zvyagintsev
nominees
BPM
AFTER THE STORM
ENDLESS POETRY
FRANTZ
documentary
IN TRANSIT
"If life is a journey, we are all fellow travelers. When I have journeyed on trains, I have seen people come together who in no other way would possibly meet. On trains, we discover a unique intimacy, where normal conventions dissolve and we open our lives to complete strangers. Maybe it is because the train holds us in limbo, a moment of truth between stations.
For over thirty years, it has been my dream to make a film about trains. Really, it is a film about the unity of humankind, in which viewers come to experience directly the feelings, hopes, and problems of others. And through this process of getting to know each other, we build the foundation for loving one another." -Albert Maysles
nominees
FACES PLACES
I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO
STRONG ISLAND
UNCERTAIN
cinematography
Elisha Christian, COLUMBUS
"The deliberate framing by Kogonada and cinematographer Elisha Christian emphasizes the interplay of space, structure, and the human form. People pose against the buildings, amble through their interiors, stare up at facades. Sensitive to the way we move in and relate to our environment, Columbus evokes a modernism its practitioners intended—an architecture that may be imposing and grounded in the theoretical, but is ultimately inextricable from a community’s life." -Elbert Ventura
nominees
Roger Deakins, BLADE RUNNER 2049
Mikhail Krichman, LOVELESS
Rachel Morrison, MUDBOUND
Alexis Zabe, THE FLORIDA PROJECT
film editing
Lee Smith, DUNKIRK
"With the rhythms of the film, if you put it in the wrong place it felt forced. Where it landed was where it worked the best. And we always knew he had an emotional cannon to fire. But it was a cannon that the film needed right there. You had to have that emotional rush because otherwise the tension, I think, would have probably killed some people. (laughs) It’s the same with the boys when they land back on the beach and a soldier walks into the surf and the guys build the pier out of the trucks and the guys being washed back onto the beach. That in itself was a kind of break. It was tense, but in a different way. So it was intriguing how that needed to be very carefully placed." -Lee Smith
nominees
Robin Campillo, BPM
Maxime Pozzi Garcia, FACES PLACES
Gregory Plotkin, GET OUT
Lynn True, IN TRANSIT
score
Jonny Greenwood, PHANTOM THREAD
"I spent a long time trying to work out how to avoid pastiche, but at the same time ensure the music was in keeping with the 1950s. I even explored so-called Brixotica (the U.K. versions of Les Baxter) and other British trends from that period. The problem was that there’s no way to use much of it without being tongue-in-cheek—and if Reynolds is anything, he’s not that. He’s not ironic in any way. So instead, I focused on what I imagined Reynolds would have listen to at the time, and settled on things like the Glen Gould recordings of Bach and some of the string-heavy jazz records from that decade, like Ben Webster’s Music for Loving." -Jonny Greenwood
nominees
Michael Abels, GET OUT
Adan Jodorowsky, ENDLESS POETRY
Oneohtrix Point Never, GOOD TIME
Philippe Rombi, FRANTZ
song
“I’ve always been resistant to work in film... I think it’s because I’m always a little suspicious of the role of music in cinema. But Luca is an exception, because he’s one of those rare directors who uses music and sound so fiercely and with such mastery that you cannot imagine the films without the music.” -Sufjan Stevens
nominees
"If I Dare," BATTLE OF THE SEXES
“Mystery of Love,” CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
"The Pure and the Damned," GOOD TIME
"Was He Slow?", BABY DRIVER
art direction / set decoration
THE SHAPE OF WATER
"It had these symmetrical fire escapes radiating both ways from a central red door high up... And the idea was that the space above the theater at one time would’ve been a grander place for parties and got truncated and split in half in the '20s or '30s when it became a movie theater. And her side was used for film canister storage, and there’s some remnants of that with some racks near her bedroom that she’s modified for her shoe fetish. And what we decided was that her room fell to disuse and the other side [where Giles lives] got used and renovated... We thought there might’ve been a small fire that made the roof leak and water permeates that. And so the room got shaped over time by water. And it rotted the floors and stripped off the hardwood, and and we allowed for the sub floor below to have gaps for the movie theater lights to emanate through the floor boards." -Paul Austerberry
nominees
THE BAD BATCH
BLADE RUNNER 2049
ENDLESS POETRY
MOTHER!
costume design
Mark Bridges, PHANTOM THREAD
"I simply adore Phantom Thread’s costumes in the way they display both a superior level of craftsmanship and tempered character development, but perhaps this is a good time to remember that not everyone is thrilled by the creations of ‘The House of Woodcock’. In some reviews and through telling twitter chatter, I noticed that the film’s fashion was found a bit too rigid (and somewhat safe and boring, too), unlike, say, the signature designs of Cristóbal Balenciaga and Charles James; two designers that are often cited as inspirations for Phantom Thread. First, allow me to speculate that ‘rigidity’ was precisely the point Bridges was trying to make with the fashion of The House. Considering how particular and set-in-his-ways Reynolds is (he puts great emphasis on his breakfast rituals and is particular about his asparagus, for instance), it makes sense that his severity that jails the co-habitants of his house would also restrain his designs, the compilation of which unmistakably represents a singular point-of-view. In other words, kudos to Bridges, Phantom Thread’s ‘The House of Woodcock’ costumes unambiguously represent the authorship of Reynolds Woodcock, with several details, silhouettes and even garments thoughtfully repeating over the course of the film." -Tomris Laffly
nominees
Catherine Marchand, A QUIET PASSION
Pascale Montandon-Jodorowsky, ENDLESS POETRY
Ann Roth, THE POST
Mary Zophres, BATTLE OF THE SEXES
sound
GET OUT
"As soon as I saw the dailies, I called the sound mixer and said, “I need a clean version of that teacup, so please go on set, take the teacup, and just stir the spoon around it.” It became this hypnotic sound we carried throughout. I wanted the sequence to work as a straight drama between Chris and Missy. And then, when it felt right — I think when Missy says, “What about your mother? Where were you when she died?” and he says, “I don’t want to think about that” — I cut to the teacup to show she’s turning the spoon, and then Chris acquiesces and says, “Home. Watching TV.” The teacup in that scene became a character." - Film Editor Gregory Plotkin
BABY DRIVER
BLADE RUNNER 2049
GOOD TIME
PHANTOM THREAD
sound editing
nominees
THE BAD BATCH
BLADE RUNNER 2049
DUNKIRK
MOTHER!
visual effects
BLADE RUNNER 2049
"We really wanted to use the new technology, but we also had miniatures, as a nod to the first movie, and to make it feel different. I did the same thing with matte paintings. We worked with Deak Ferrand from Rodeo [FX], one of the best matte painters in the world. It made the film seem warmer, and we really wanted the film to feel analogue.
We wanted to shoot as much as we could, and build as much set around the actors as we could, but we were limited by the size of our backlots, and the nature of what we’re doing is, no city looks like what we put in the movie. So we did massive amounts of work, and really, I think every wide shot in the film would be a visual effect. The point is that we had the new technology, but we consciously reined in our effects a bit, and I think we’re a better film for it. CG does shiny things well, but we didn’t like shiny things in our movie. We liked dirty, wet, grimy." -Visual Effects Supervisor John Nelson
nominees
OKJA
THE SHAPE OF WATER
STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI
WAR FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES