This year’s Oscar ceremony will take place on 28 March and some huge films are hoping to take home one of the Academy’s famous statuettes.
From Dune and The Power of the Dog to West Side Story and Encanto, here’s a rundown of some of the great films hoping to take home the Academy Award for best picture, as well as some other top prizes.
1. Dune
Director Denis Villeneuve followed the unexpected success of the critically-acclaimed sequel Blade Runner 2049, by returning to science-fiction. Frank Herbert’s Dune is a masterpiece of the genre and has already been filmed by David Lynch.
Villeneuve’s version has already garnered five-star reviews and has been tipped for Oscars success. At the recent Baftas, it missed out in the best picture category but did take home prizes for original score, cinematography, and production design.
The first of a proposed two-part release, the film stars Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya and is an epic, panoramic space opera centred around the planet Arrakis and its supply of the coveted spice “melange”.
2. The Power of the Dog
Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog won the best picture and best director awards at the Baftas, surely an indicator of potential Oscars success. It has received 12 Academy Award nominations.
The film stars Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange) as cattle-driver Phil Burbank in a Western psychological drama that co-stars Kirsten Dunst and Jesse Plemons.
3. Summer of Soul (…or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)
This concert film won the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award in the documentary category at the 2021 Sundance Film festival.
Directed by Questlove, the film uses footage from the 1969 Harlem Cultural festival and features performances from Sly and the Family Stone, Mavis Staples, and Nina Simone (among others).
Interspersed with concert footage are newsreels: as Neil Armstrong walks on the moon, the civil rights movement continues back on Earth, one year on from the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
Fresh from its Bafta success, Summer of Soul is nominated in the best documentary category.
4. Drive My Car
Nominated for best picture, best director, best international feature film, and best adapted screenplay, Drive My Car is based on the short story of the same name by Japanese bestselling author Haruki Murakami.
It recently won the Bafta for best international film.
Yūsuke Kafuku (played by Hidetoshi Nishijima) grapples with his complex marriage and the imminent loss of sight in one eye. As he takes up a residency in Hiroshima where he is to direct a production of Anton Chekov’s Uncle Vanya, it becomes clear he will need a driver for his trusty Saab 900.
5. Encanto
Disney’s latest outing is a Columbia-set tale of an outsider, the bespectacled Mirabel.
The only member of her family not to possess magical powers, her chance to shine comes when the family’s enchanted candle begins to dim, and with it, her family’s hold over their magic.
With a soundtrack written by the multi-award-winning Lin-Manuel Miranda and the voice acting talents of Jessica Darrow, Carolina Gaitán and Stephanie Beatriz, Encanto is nominated in the best animated feature category.
6. Belfast
Kenneth Branagh’s semi-autobiographical, coming-of-age story has already won the People’s Choice Award at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival and the Bafta for outstanding British film.
Set in Belfast during the 1960s and filmed in black-and-white, the film stars Ciarán Hinds (Silence) and Dame Judi Dench (Philomena) as the grandparents of newcomer Jude Hill as Buddy, the young son of a working-class family.
7. Nightmare Alley
Guillermo del Toro won an Oscar for best director with The Shape of Water and returns with a noir thriller set in the carnivals of late-30s America.
Bradley Cooper’s ambitious carnival worker meets his match in psychiatrist Dr Lilith Ritter, played by Cate Blanchett. Ron Pearlman co-stars as Bruno.
The 1946 book from which the film is adapted was previously filmed in 1947.
As well as best picture, the film is nominated for costume design, production design, and cinematography.
8. West Side Story
Based on the Broadway musical of 1957, with Leonard Bernstein’s score and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, West Side Story is director Steven Spielberg’s first musical.
The Romeo and Juliet-inspired story follows the star-crossed lovers Tony and María as their love transcends the boundaries of rival gangs, the Jets and the Sharks, in 1950s New York.
Ariana DeBose stars as Anita, a role originally played by Rita Moreno. The former won best supporting actress at the recent Baftas.