2023 Oscar Nominations: Genre Fare Like Avatar 2 & Everything Everywhere Score Big

It’s that time of year again. Time to debate why we care about the Oscars. Time to talk about how it’s all a big waste of time. Time to scoff at the nominees and remark how the Academy is out of touch. Time to watch it all anyway and enjoy the heck out of it. The Academy Awards announced the 2023 Oscar nominees today, and genre fare came up big in the nominations that would have, in years past, never had a chance to be considered thanks to being “not serious” enough. These include Best Picture nominations for sci-fi film Avatar: The Way of Water, kung-fu / sci-fi / action flick Everything Everywhere All at Once, and the action sequel Top Gun: Maverick.

Of course, the expanded Best Picture list (10 nominees) helps with this, but the Academy has been working to diversify its voting base as well and stop all the votes coming from stodgy old white guys who only respect dramatic things that are really, really serious. Then again, Everything Everywhere All at Once landing an Oscar nomination isn’t much of a surprise given its success throughout the awards season, but Avatar‘s pickup of a Best Picture nod is a bit surprising as it hadn’t had many nominations outside of technical ones leading up to this. The lesson here is to never count James Cameron out. Top Gun: Maverick pulling into the 2023 Oscar Best Picture contention is also a slight surprise as the film was favored early but had fallen out of the running after missing a bunch of nominations in other awards shows.

Joining these three films in the Oscar race for Best Picture are more traditional nominations: All Quiet on the Western Front, The Banshees of Inisherin, Elvis, The Fabelmans, Tár, Triangle of Sadness, and Women Talking. Though, it should be noted that both Banshees and Triangle of Sadness are dark comedies (and fantastic).

A few other major nominations came in with Jamie Lee Curtis picking up her first Oscar nomination ever with EEAO, for Supporting Actress, and the movie was one of the leaders in nominations for the 2023 awards. Angela Bassett also became the first person ever to be nominated for a role in a Marvel film, which had to happen at some point just by the law of averages, but it is incredibly deserved for her powerful performance. We’d also be remiss if we didn’t mention that RRR made it to the Oscars as well, landing a nomination for Best Song for “Naatu Naatu,” an absolute jammer. This marks the first time ever an Indian song has been nominated for the award, which seems bonkers considering Bollywood does nothing but churn out musicals (though RRR is Tollywood).

You can check out the full list below.

The Academy Awards 2023: A List of All Oscar Nominations

Best Supporting Actor

• Brendan Gleeson (“The Banshees of Inisherin”)
• Brian Tyree Henry (“Causeway”)
• Judd Hirsch (“The Fabelmans”)
• Barry Keoghan (“The Banshees of Inisherin”)
• Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”)

Best Supporting Actress

• Angela Bassett (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”)
• Hong Chau (“The Whale”)
• Kerry Condon (“The Banshees of Inisherin”)
• Jamie Lee Curtis (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”)
• Stephanie Hsu (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”)

Best Animated Feature Film 

• “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” (Netflix)
• “Marcel the Shell With Shoes On” (A24)
• “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” (DreamWorks Animation)
• “The Sea Beast” (Netflix)
• “Turning Red” (Pixar)

Best Animated Short Film

• “The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse” (Apple TV+)
• “The Flying Sailor”
• “Ice Merchants”
• “My Year of Dicks”
• “An Ostrich Told Me the World Is Fake and I Think I Believe It”

Best Costume Design 

• “Babylon” (Paramount Pictures)
• “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” (Marvel Studios)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros)
• “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24)
• “Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris” (Focus Features)

Best Live Action Short

• “An Irish Goodbye” (Floodlight Pictures)
• “Ivalu” (M&M Productions)
• “Le Pupille” (Disney+)
• “Night Ride”
• “The Red Suitcase” (Cynefilms)

Best Makeup and Hairstyling 

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “The Batman” (Warner Bros.)
• “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” (Marvel Studios)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
• “The Whale” (A24)

Best Original Score 

• “All Quiet on the Western Front”
• “Babylon”
• “The Banshees of Inisherin”
• “Everything Everywhere All at Once”
• “The Fabelmans”

Best Sound

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Avatar: The Way of Water” (20th Century Studios)
• Ben Platt On Working With Paul Mescal For ‘Merrily We Roll Along’
• “The Batman” (Warner Bros.)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
• “Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount Pictures)

Best Adapted Screenplay

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” (Netflix)
• “Living” (Sony Pictures Classics)
• “Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount Pictures)
• “Women Talking” (MGM/United Artists Releasing)

Best Original Screenplay

• “The Banshees of Inisherin” (Searchlight Pictures)
• “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24)
• “The Fabelmans” (Universal Pictures)
• “Tár” (Focus Features)
• “Triangle of Sadness” (Neon)  “An Irish Goodbye” (Floodlight Pictures)

Best Cinematography 

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths” (Netflix)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
• “Empire of Light” (Searchlight Pictures)
• “Tár” (Focus Features)

Best Documentary Feature Film 

• “All That Breathes” (HBO Documentary Films)
• “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” (Neon)
• “Fire of Love” (National Geographic Documentary Films/Neon)
• “A House Made of Splinters”
• “Navalny” (CNN/Warner Bros.)

Best Documentary Short Film 

• “The Elephant Whisperers” (Netflix)
• “Haulout”
• “How Do You Measure a Year?” (Jay Rosenblatt Films)
• “The Martha Mitchell Effect” (Netflix)
• “Stranger at the Gate”

Best Film Editing

• “The Banshees of Inisherin” (Searchlight Pictures)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
• “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24)
• “Tár”
• “Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount)

Best International Feature Film 

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Germany)
• “Argentina, 1985” (Argentina)
• “Close” (Belgium)
• “EO” (Poland)
• “The Quiet Girl” (Ireland)

Best Original Song 

• “Applause” from “Tell It Like a Woman”
• “Hold My Hand” from “Top Gun: Maverick”
• “Lift Me Up” from “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”
• “Naatu Naatu” from “RRR”
• “This Is a Life” from “Everything Everywhere All at Once”

Best Production Design 

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Avatar: The Way of Water” (20th Century Studios)
• “Babylon” (Paramount Pictures)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros)
• “The Fabelmans” (Universal Pictures)

Best Visual Effects

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Avatar: The Way of Water” (20th Century Studios)
• “The Batman” (Warner Bros.)
• “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” (Marvel Studios)
• “Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount Pictures) Austin Butler (“Elvis”)

Best Lead Actor

• Austin Butler (“Elvis”)
• Colin Farrell (“The Banshees of Inisherin”)
• Brendan Fraser (“The Whale”)
• Paul Mescal (“Aftersun”)
• Bill Nighy (“Living”)

Best Lead Actress

• Cate Blanchett (“Tár”)
• Ana de Armas (“Blonde”)
• Andrea Riseborough (“To Leslie”)
• Michelle Williams (“The Fabelmans”)
• Michelle Yeoh (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”)

Best Director 

• Martin McDonagh (“The Banshees of Inisherin”)
• Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”)
• Steven Spielberg (“The Fabelmans”)
• Todd Field (“Tár”)
• Ruben Östlund (“Triangle of Sadness”)

Best Picture

• “All Quiet on the Western Front” (Netflix)
• “Avatar: The Way of Water” (20^th Century Studios)
• “The Banshees of Inisherin” (Searchlight Pictures)
• “Elvis” (Warner Bros.)
• “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24)
• “The Fabelmans” (Universal Pictures)
• “Tár” (Focus Features)
• “Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount Pictures)
• “Triangle of Sadness” (Neon)
• “Women Talking” (MGM/United Artists Releasing)

If you have opinions about the 2023 Oscar nominations or Academy Awards preference, let us hear ’em.