*Award season has arrived, and based on what happened at the Gotham Awards last night, it looks like “Moonlight” may be a serious contender in the run up to the Academy Awards.
As The Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Feinberg puts it, The Gotham Awards are to the Oscars what the Iowa caucuses are to a presidential election and the NFL’s preseason games are to its regular season: they’re the first “results” to come in, so they get a lot of attention.” He adds, however, “The reality is they don’t really tell us much of anything about what’s to come.”
Whatever is to come, “Moonlight” dominated the 26th annual Gotham Awards, nabbing best feature, best screenplay, a special ensemble prize and the audience award.
Director Barry Jenkins‘ film about a young black man coming of age during Miami’s “War on Drugs” era has certainly put Oscar favorite “La La Land” on notice.
According to THR, the Gotham winners are selected by a chosen few within the industry, whereas Oscar nominations “are chosen by hundreds, and Oscar winners are determined by thousands. Needless to say, the handful of Gotham voters is miles away from being a scientific sample for the large pool of ultimate Academy voters.”
Via THR’s Feinberg:
If one wants to get a good read on how the indie film community feels about this year’s crop of films, better just to try to read the applause in the room at Cipriani Wall Street, which was audibly in “Moonlight’s” corner — or, better yet, to pay attention to the Spirit Award nominations (which were announced last week, with “Moonlight” and “American Honey” leading the field with six noms each) and the eventual Spirit winners (which are revealed the day before the Oscars).
What the Gothams can — and may well — do is point Oscar voters’ attention in certain directions. The ceremony was live-streamed, not televised, and few ever watch what actually goes down. Instead, they see, if anything, news reports about the results (which, without context, fuel the perception that more people were behind the prizes than actually were) and/or see photos (and there’s something about seeing someone at a podium that subliminally makes people assume that person deserves to be there).
In other words, some illusions can become reality. “Birdman” and “Spotlight” were the last two films to win the best feature Gotham Award, and both went on to win the best picture Oscar. There was no direct correlation for them between the Gothams and the Oscars, either, but it certainly didn’t hurt to be crowned as awards-worthy early on in the season.
Other Gotham winners last night were Casey Affleck (Manchester by the Sea) for best actor, Isabelle Huppert (Elle) for best actress and Ezra Edelman, director of best documentary O.J.: Made in America.
“Moonlight,” starring Trevante Rhodes, André Holland, Janelle Monáe, Ashton Sanders, Jharrel Jerome, Naomie Harris and Mahershala Ali, is in theaters nationwide.
Watch a featurette below:
We Publish News 24/7. Don’t Miss A Story. Click HERE to SUBSCRIBE to Our Newsletter Now!
