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Oscar nominations take 'Shape' for 2018

Posted Tuesday, January 23, 2018 at 11:16 AM Central
Last updated Tuesday, January 23, 2018 at 11:20 AM Central

by John Couture

What's the old saying? "It's just an honor to be nominated." Well, for The Shape of Water, they got to feel that honor 13 times, almost twice as many as any other film when the nominations for the 90th Annual Academy Awards were announced this morning.

The awards season has shaped up to be a showdown between The Shape of Water and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri with the latter film winning the acting awards in a convincing fashion leading up to today's nominations for the granddaddy of all the awards shows, The Oscars. But, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri only managed to score six nominations, so does that mean that we should crown The Shape of Water the winner?

Not so fast. While yes, it's true that films that pile up Oscar nominations tend to perform well at the Oscars overall, this year is anything but your typical year in Hollywood. The impact of the "Time's Up" and "Me Too" movements has already been felt with the pretty sizable omission of Golden Globe winner James Franco from the Best Actor category. Before the Globes announcement and the subsequent fallout from alleged allegations of sexual misconduct by the actor following his win, Franco was considered by many experts to be a near-lock for a nomination for his performance in The Disaster Artist.

Another unlikely development was the Best Supporting Actor nomination for Christopher Plummer for his work in All the Money in the World. As you may recall Plummer replaced Kevin Spacey in the project after filming was complete when the latter actor also came under fire various indiscretions in his past. Plummer reshot all of Spacey's scenes over 10 days and the rest is history.

This year's nominations included several firsts including Rachel Morrison's nomination for Best Cinematography for her work on Mudbound. Rachel is the first woman to ever be nominated for the Oscar in this category. Also, I haven't fully researched this, but I do believe that Kobe Bryant's nomination for Best Animated Short Film (Dear Basketball) is the first time that a former basketball player has secured an Oscar nomination. I'm pretty sure that Shaquille O'Neal didn't get one for Kazaam.

This year's awards show should be wide open. I fully expect both The Shape of Water and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri to bring home multiple Oscars with Dunkirk scoring wins in the technical categories. I wouldn't be shocked to see a surprise or two either. The 90th Annual Academy Awards will handed out live on March 4 and with last year's debacle during the Best Picture category, the show promises to be must-see TV all the way until the end.

The full nominations are listed below. I went ahead and marked my first impression guesses as to who will win, take that for what you will. Just a reminder that I did very poorly when I tried to predict the Golden Globes this year.

Best Picture

Actor In A Leading Role

Actress In A Leading Role

Actor In A Supporting Role

Actress In A Supporting Role

Directing

Original Screenplay

Adapted Screenplay

Animated Feature Film

Art Direction

Cinematography

Costume Design

Documentary Feature

Documentary Short Subject

  • Edith+Eddie
  • OUR PICK - Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405
  • Heroin(e)
  • Knife Skills
  • Traffic Stop

Film Editing

Foreign Language Film

Makeup

Music (Original Score)

Music (Original Song)

Short Film (Animated)

  • Dear Basketball
  • Garden Party
  • OUR PICK - Lou
  • Negative Space
  • Revolting Rhymes

Short Film (Live Action)

  • OUR PICK - DeKalb Elementary
  • My Nephew Emmett
  • The Eleven O'Clock
  • The Silent Child
  • Watu Wote / All of Us

Sound Editing

Sound Mixing

Visual Effects