The winners of the 2019 Oscars have been announced by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. And boy what an Oscar it turned out to be. Surprisingly unpredictable from start to finish and the announcement of the winner — Green Book — left some people in a state of shock and annoyance, with Spike Lee even trying to storm out of the building. But we’re not here to talk about that right now. We’re here to highlight some of the positives, mainly the ones that relate to geekdom.
This was already a huge year for comic book fans heading into the Oscars. Black Panther was nominated in the Best Picture category making it the first comic book movie ever to receive that prestigious nod. Sure we can be bitter, and question why Black Panther received a nomination when The Dark Knight didn’t. Or we can choose to be excited that the glass ceiling has finally been broken and the door that has stood rigid for so long has been knocked down. This will pave the way for more comic book movies in the future to receive nominations. One can hope at least.
On to the Oscars themselves. While Black Panther didn’t actually clinch the Best Picture award (to be fair, nobody expected it to), comic book movies did manage to nab FOUR other Oscars.
Best Animated Feature
- Incredibles 2, Brad Bird
- Isle of Dogs, Wes Anderson
- Mirai, Mamoru Hosoda
- Ralph Breaks the Internet, Rich Moore, Phil Johnston
- WINNER: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman, Phil Lord, Christopher Miller
Best Original Score
- WINNER: Black Panther, Ludwig Goransson
- BlacKkKlansman, Terence Blanchard
- If Beale Street Could Talk, Nicholas Britell
- Isle of Dogs, Alexandre Desplat
- Mary Poppins Returns, Marc Shaiman, Scott Wittman
Best Costume Design
- The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, Mary Zophres
- WINNER: Black Panther, Ruth E. Carter
- The Favourite, Sandy Powell
- Mary Poppins Returns, Sandy Powell
- Mary Queen of Scots, Alexandra Byrne
Best Production Design
- WINNER: Black Panther, Hannah Beachler; Set Decoration, Jay Hart
- The Favourite, Nathan Crowley, Kathy Lucas
- First Man, Fiona Crombie, Alice Felton
- Mary Poppins Returns, John Myhre, Gordon Sim
- Roma, Eugenio Caballero, Bárbara Enrı́que
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse‘s victory in the Best Animated Feature category stands out for a number of reasons. For one, it’s a comic book movie and as we all know, comic book movies centred around superheroes don’t usually fare well at the Oscars. (Though The Incredibles, a non-comic book based superhero movie did win the Best Animated Feature Oscar in 2005.)
Apart from that, the Best Animated Feature category has been mostly dominated by Disney/Pixar movies. In fact, the last non-Disney/Pixar animated film that won in this category was Rango back in 2012. In a stacked year, Into the Spider-Verse, a Sony Pictures Animation film went up against two Disney/Pixar flicks and a Wes Anderson stop motion picture and came out victorious.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0BTGEIZsrk&list=PLgRVXI5rmojuDoGd2wzOo1HJXXXWi1ybp
But we also cannot look past Black Panther‘s hattrick. An award like Best Costume Design is typically given to a period piece. So it brings me nothing but joy that the Ryan Coogler film managed to clinch the award when the nominees also included Mary Poppins Returns and Mary Queen of Scots. Black Panther also nicked the Best Production Design award.
The highlight, though, has got to be Ludwig Goransson’s victory in the Best Original Score category. Many were certain that Alexandre Desplat would bag the award for his work in Anderson’s Isle of Dogs, especially since he’s an Oscar darling (two wins out of ten nominations). However, there’s no denying Goransson’s powerful evocative music in Black Panther. A well deserved victory indeed.
Click below to check out the full list of winners.
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