Oscars 2024: ‘Barbie,’ ‘Oppenheimer’ Top Oscar Score Race List

J. Kim Murphy Filmmaker Michael Goorjian set out to create a different kind of film about Armenian nationality when developing “Amerikatsi,” the country’s submission in the international feature category for this year’s Academy Awards. Along with directing, Goorjian also stars as Charlie, an American who repatriates to Armenia after World War II — but ends up in a Soviet prison for simply wearing a tie.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor The Oscars shortlist voting period has closed as of 5:00 p.m. PT. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will announce the finalists in 10 categories — documentary feature (15), documentary short subject (15), international feature (15), makeup and hairstyling (10), sound (10), original score (15), original song (15), animated short film (15), live action short film (15), and visual effects (10) — on Thursday, Dec.

John Bleasdale Guest Contributor When writer-director Mohamed Kordofani first conceived of the film “Goodbye Julia,” he realized that he didn’t have a single friend from South Sudan — “and there are millions who live in Khartoum.” Now he has hundreds, he tells Variety. The first Sudanese film to premiere in the Un Certain Regard sidebar in Cannes, his debut feature won the Prix de la Liberté and is now the official Sudanese entry for the Academy Awards, with Lupita Nyong’o on board as an executive producer. The film had its Middle East and North Africa premiere this week at El Gouna Film Festival, where Kordofani was awarded the Variety MENA Region Talent Award.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large The 2nd annual Children’s & Family Emmys got underway on Saturday night, starting with the Children’s & Family Creative Arts Emmys at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. According to early results — pending final tallies — Disney+ and Netflix tied the lead with nine wins overall. The most honored program of the evening was actually Netflix’s “Lost Ollie,” which scored five trophies.

The official German Oscar entry for Best International Feature is an insular, pulse-pounding thriller set within the confines of a school that, for cinematic purposes, doubles as a microcosm of society in general circa 2023 where facts don’t matter, misinformation is rampant, suspicions run hot, divisions run deep, racism still rears its ugly head, and no one can be quite sure where, and even if they want to, fit in.

Some of Hollywood’s biggest stars travelled to Las Vegas, Nevada to attend the grand opening of the new resort Fontainebleau on Wednesday night (December 13).

Naman Ramachandran A brace of films exploring important subjects are in contention from India in the best live action short film category at the 96th Academy Awards. Reema Maya’s “Nocturnal Burger,” an investigation of child abuse at a dysfunctional police station in Mumbai, had its world premiere at Sundance. It has since traveled to more than 50 film festivals globally and won 34 awards including the Oscar-qualifying Golden Chair for best international short at KortfilmFestivalen, Norway.

In a clip from the documentary, Little Richard: I Am Everything, we hear the young entertainer singing an early version of what would become his signature tune, “Tutti Frutti.” But surprise! The original lyrics were different than the ones we know today: “Tutti frutti, good booty/Tutti frutti, good booty!”

Barbie has scored the most nominations for next year’s Golden Globes, inching slightly ahead of former summer box office rival Oppenheimer.The nominations for the upcoming ceremony were announced today (December 11), starting awards season off.Both films became huge critical and commercial successes after being released this summer, starting the ‘Barbenheimer’ trend of fans going to see both films on the same day.It now looks like both could be set to dominate awards season, with Barbie scoring nine nominations including Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, Best Director for Greta Gerwig and Best Actress – Musical or Comedy for Margot Robbie.The film also earned three Best Original Song nods, for ‘What Was I Made For?’ by Billie Eilish and Finneas, ‘Dance the Night’ by Caroline Ailin, Dua Lipa, Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt, and ‘I’m Just Ken’ by Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt.Oppenheimer follows behind with eight nominations, including Best Director for Christopher Nolan, as well as acting nods for Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt and Robert Downey Jr.Both films are also up for the new category of Cinematic and Box Office Achievement in Motion Pictures. Other nominees include Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3, John Wick: Chapter 4, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One, Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse, The Super Mario Bros Movie and Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.Other notable nominees across the board include Poor Things and Killers Of The Flower Moon, which both trail behind with seven nominations each.

The 2024 Golden Globe nominations have officially been announced!

Bradley Cooper for an apparent dig he made toward Cillian Murphy.Cooper made the comments in Variety‘s series ‘Actors on Actors’, where he appeared with Emma Stone. The director and lead actor of Maestro spoke to Stone about the preparation she did for upcoming film Poor Things.Both Maestro and Poor Things took six years to make: “I feel like you couldn’t have made Poor Things if you didn’t have a tremendous amount of prep, and it’s the same thing with Maestro,” he said.It was Cooper’s next comment that fans thought was directed to Murphy: “This wasn’t like you got a call, and in six months you’re going to do it,” he said.

Omen is the official submission from Belgium for the International Feature Oscar category and comes from multi-hyphenate interdisciplinary artist Baloji, who makes his feature directing debut. The film had its world premiere in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section this year where it won the New Voice Prize, before going on to play myriad festivals. Utopia is the North American distributor. 

Michael Nordine author Greed may not be good, but it is universal. And while America would appear to have a monopoly on movies about the pursuit of wealth for wealth’s sake, plenty of other nations have exported their version of the rags-to-riches tale — of which Saudi Arabia’s Oscar submission, “Alhamour H.A.,” is just the latest.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor The top 20 finalists for the visual effects Oscar have been notified they have made it to the next round of voting. With Oscars shortlist voting opening in eight categories on Thursday, Dec. 14, Variety has learned exclusively that the visual effects finalists include Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie,” Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things,” Zack Snyder’s “Rebel Moon: Part One – A Child of Fire” and the lone animated feature contender, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.” Read: Variety’s Awards Circuit for the latest Oscars predictions in all categories.

The American Film Institute has announced their annual year-end top 10 lists and, as always, it was filled with several awards contenders. This year’s crop of film honorees includes “American Fiction,” “Barbie,” “The Holdovers,” “Killers of the Flower Moon,” “Maestro,” “May December,” “Oppenheimer,” “Past Lives,” “Poor Things” and “Spider-Man: Across the Universe.” The television selections are “Abbott Elementary,” “The Bear,” “Beef,” “Jury Duty,” “The Last of Us,” “The Morning Show,” “Only Murders in the Building,” “Poker Face,” “Reservation Dogs” and “Succession.” READ MORE: “American Fiction,” “May December” and “Past Lives” top 2024 Spirit Awards Nominations It should be noted, that the AFI committee is not always the best predictor for a Best Picture nomination.

The list of the 10 films chosen for the prestigious AFI Awards is out, and it is good news for Barbenheimer.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor The “Barbenheimer” craze continues with Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” being named among AFI Awards 2023 top 10 best films of the year. Netflix led studios with two movies making the list — Bradley Cooper’s Leonard Bernstein biopic “Maestro” and Todd Haynes’ black comedy “May December.” With an eclectic mix of critically acclaimed and consumer friendly titles, the list of top movies also includes films by newcomers (Cord Jefferson’s “American Fiction” and Celine Song’s “Past Lives”), veterans (Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” and Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers”) and stylish visionaries (Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things” and Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K.

Margot Robbie and Cillian Murphy — she the star of “Barbie,” he of “Oppenheimer” — have shared an experience, one unique in film history. On July 21, 2023, their two movies came out, and instead of cannibalizing one another during a time when box office receipts were sluggish, they actually boosted each other, creating the global phenomenon known as “Barbenheimer.” On paper, the two movies couldn’t be more different.

Oppenheimer” director Christopher Nolan is being accorded a BFI Fellowship, the highest honor bestowed by the British Film Institute. “The fellowship recognizes Nolan’s extraordinary achievements and enormous contribution to cinema as one of the world’s most successful and influential film directors, constantly pushing the limits of what large-scale filmmaking can be whilst retaining a reverence for the history of the medium and the primacy of cinema-going,” the BFI said in a statement. The fellowship will be presented to Nolan at the BFI chair’s dinner in London on Feb.

Oscar Pistorius will soon be out of prison.