Oscar Snubs: Martin Scorsese, ‘Sully’ & Taraji P. Henson Get No Academy Love
Nominations for the 89th Academy Awards were announced this morning in L.A., and if you are La La Land, Moonlight‘s Mahershala Ali or Elle‘s Isabelle Huppert, you’re probably feeling a mountain high — just like most of the Hollywood film industry now attending the Sundance Film Festival. However, for others including Silence director Martin Scorsese, Hidden Figures star Taraji P. Henson and Arrival‘s Amy Adams, their Oscars hopes just got buried.
Here are some of the most significant people and projects snubbed this year for the Oscars, which will be held February 26 on ABC and hosted by Jimmy Kimmel. Tell us who you think we might have missed.
Martin Scorsese – Denied a Golden Globe nomination and a DGA Awards nom, the silence is deafening on the Silence director this morning. Has the faith been lost?
Sully – The heroic story of pilot Chesley Sullenberger’s 2009 emergency landing of a US Airways flight on the Hudson River, and everyone on board escaping safely, was borderline miraculous. The fact that star and multiple Oscar winner Tom Hanks, director and multiple Oscar winner Clint Eastwood, and the film’s box office success were overlooked in the major categories is nothing short of a sin.
Michael Keaton – The past nominee deserved a break today for his performance as McDonald’s mogul Ray Kroc in The Founder. But no Happy Meal there.
Taraji P. Henson – The math just didn’t add up with Academy members for the Empire star’s performance as NASA human computer Katherine Johnson. Her Hidden Figures character helped get John Glenn into space and back home safely and received a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015, but not even a chance at a reward for past nominee Henson. Congrats to co-star and previous Oscar winner Octavia Spencer on her Best Supporting Actress nom though.
The King’s Choice – Norway’s big Oscar hope for Best Foreign Language Film tells the true tale of the monarch who resisted Hitler and the Nazis in some of the darkest days of WWII. History should never forget King Haakon VII, but Oscar voters sure did.
Amy Adams – Strangely there won’t be an Academy arrival this year for the Arrival actress even though the Denis Villeneuve-helmed movie picked up Best Picture and Best Director noms among six others.
RelatedOscar Nominations: ‘La La Land’ Ties Record With 14 Noms; ‘Arrival’ & ‘Moonlight’ Snag 8 Apiece
Matthew McConaughey – The actor radically transformed himself for Gold, but this past Best Actor winner did not find Oscar paydirt today.
Annette Bening – The previous Best Supporting Actress nominee didn’t see any 21st century appreciation this year for 20th Century Women.
Kevin Costner – The Dances With Wolves winner was the hidden weapon of Hidden Figures but didn’t take flight for his role in the NASA civil rights pic.
Trolls – Academy members really know just how to stop the Animated Feature feeling, don’t they? And don’t tell me that Original Song nomination was all this DreamWorks Animation flick deserved.
Adam Driver – The Star Wars alum put on a forceful campaign for his poetic New Jersey bus driver lead in Jim Jarmusch’s Paterson, but Oscar wasn’t along for the ride.
Tom Ford – The Nocturnal Animals helmer saw his well-appointed film win the Grand Jury Prize at Venice and score Golden Globe nominations (including for Ford himself) and nine BAFTA noms. But the designer and director won’t be wearing Oscar gold.
Eye In The Sky – Maybe it’s because the last film appearance of Alan Rickman was released in March, or maybe it was the topic of drone warfare, but the Helen Mirren-starring pic didn’t fly with voters.
Hugh Grant – The Florence Foster Jenkins star landed SAG and BAFTA nominations for Best Supporting Actor and a Golden Globes Lead Actor nom, but it was an Oscar funeral for Grant today.
“I See A Victory” – The Hidden Figures tune from 2014 nominee Pharrell Williams is a foot tapper and a musical window into the film’s subject of equality. Still, no one ever accused Oscar voters of having too much introspection or swing at the same time, and they proved it again with this snub.
Deadpool – Yes, he comes out of the superheroes of the Marvel Universe, but you know in your heart that the merc with a mouth deserved to see the genre barrier broken with a Best Picture nomination. Almost never made, the witty and unconventional Fox pic was a real Hollywood success story for star Ryan Reynolds and director Tim Miller. Blockbusters are movies too, AMPAS members.
Aaron Taylor Johnson – A Golden Globes win for the Nocturnal Animals actor and a BAFTA nomination, but nothing from Oscar.
The Birth Of A Nation – Just one day short of a year ago, the pic starring and directed by Nate Parker about the 1831 Nat Turner-led slave rebellion debuted at Sundance and was garlanded with Oscar hopes. A record-breaking pickup by Fox Searchlight followed and then Audience and Grand Jury Sundance awards, and it looked like TBOAN was a contender. Then a 1999 sexual assault allegation against Parker resurfaced, plus box office disappointment. And even with a first-time feature directing nom from the DGA, Birth was ignored by Academy members.
Related stories
Justin Timberlake On First Oscar Nomination: "I'm Really Humbled"
As Hollywood's Agencies Count, WME Leads The Oscar Nominations, Unless CAA Does
Constanza Romero Wilson On Her Late Husband August Wilson's Oscar Nomination
Get more from Deadline.com: Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Newsletter
