Oscars shortlists for 10 categories out; India's entry '2018' doesn't make it

Los Angeles, Dec 22

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced the shortlists in 10 categories for the upcoming 96th Oscars ceremony. The Malayalam film ‘2018 - Everyone is a Hero’, which was India’s official submission to this year’s Oscars, hasn’t made it to the list.

Overall, Greta Gerwig’s meta-comedy ‘Barbie’ had the most mentions with five including sound, original song for its three submissions from Billie Eilish (‘What I Was Made For?’), Dua Lipa (‘Dance the Night’) and Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt (‘I’m Just Ken’), and original score, from the latter duo, reports ‘Variety’.

The big miss for ‘Barbie’ was in makeup and hairstyling, which was the category that yielded the most surprises. In addition to ‘Barbie’, ‘The Color Purple’, and ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’ all failed to make the shortlist. Instead, the branch selected A24’s eccentric ‘Beau is Afraid’ and Universal Pictures’ horror summer film ‘The Last Voyage of the Demeter’.

In the music categories are compositions from Daniel Pemberton (‘Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse’), Ludwig Goransson (‘Oppenheimer’) and the late Robbie Robertson (‘Killers of the Flower Moon’). We also have a fair amount of veterans including Thomas Newman (‘Elemental’) and John Williams (‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’).

As per ‘Variety’, other movies with strong showings include Martin Scorsese’s ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ with four mentions overall including original song and J.A. Bayona’s ‘Society of the Snow’, which could emulate the path of last year’s surprise juggernaut ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’, which went on to win four Oscars.

The international feature race didn’t see many jaw-dropping snubs aside from Romania’s ‘Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World’ and Chile’s ‘The Settlers’ not being named. All the usual suspects are on board including the U.K.’s ‘The Zone of Interest’ and Spain’s ‘Society of the Snow’.

The Oscar nomination period will run from January 11 to January 16, with the official nominees named on January 23.