Sinners starring Michael B. Jordan scores a whopping 16 nods, making Hollywood history.Courtesy of Warner Bros. Picture/Warner Bros.
It feels only too appropriate that Sinners scored a record 16 Academy Award nominations Thursday morning while One Battle After Another earned 13 – this year feels as if it will be a true battleground in the war for Hollywood itself, with the very soul of the industry up for grabs.
But if we can put away the film industry’s many existential concerns when it comes to mergers, to streaming, to the economy, and to political overreach, then the nominations for the 98th annual Oscars arrived like a breath of fresh air, minus the occasional head-scratcher.
Here are all the surprises and snubs from the 2026 Oscar noms.
All saints
Going into Thursday morning, there was chatter that Ryan Coogler’s horror-thriller-racial-drama-musical phenomenon Sinners had the chance to score 15 nominations, breaking the record jointly held by All About Eve/Titanic/La La Land (all three of those films earned 14). Well, that estimate was off: Coogler’s vampire film actually garnered a whopping 16 nods to make Hollywood history, with the film competing in all the major categories, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (for Michael B. Jordan, who handled a dual role), Best Supporting Actor (Delroy Lindo, somewhat of a surprise), Best Supporting Actress (Wunmi Mosaku), and even the new category of Best Casting.
The good fight
Paul Thomas Anderson’s masterpiece One Battle After Another has been scoring wins at every Academy Awards precursor there is, from various critics guilds across North America (Los Angeles, New York, Toronto) to the Golden Globes. So it was little surprise that the Leonardo DiCaprio-led epic was nominated for 13 Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and acting honours for DiCaprio (Best Actor), Teyana Taylor (Best Supporting Actress), Sean Penn (Best Supporting Actor), and Benicio del Toro (ditto). The only ostensible snub here is Chase Infiniti, who missed out on the Best Actress category. Now the big question will be whether the film can maintain its freight-train momentum – and which of its supporting actors will triumph, or whether both Penn and Del Toro will fall to someone like Stellan Skarsgard in Sentimental Value. Speaking of which …
Sentimental Value stars Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas in a scene from Joachim Trier’s family drama.Kasper Tuxen/The Associated Press
Value-add
Joachim Trier’s Cannes-certified family drama Sentimental Value not only earned nominations for Skarsgard as Best Supporting Actor (even though the role is clearly a lead) but also Renate Reinsve as Best Actress, both Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Elle Fanning for Best Supporting Actress, and five other honours, including the big one, Best Picture. Back in the late fall, it seemed as if Trier was losing steam as the enthusiasm shifted to the season’s other big non-English-language film, Kleber Mendonça Filho’s Brazilian drama The Secret Agent. But never doubt the value of, well, sentimentality. And on that note …
Secret no more
As the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has expanded its membership to internationally based members, so, too, has the Oscars begun to lean further into awarding foreign-language cinema. Just look at Mendonça Filho’s Brazilian-set thriller The Secret Agent, which came out of Cannes blazing and just kept turning up the heat as it conquered various fall festivals (with Brazil’s exceptionally vocal film fandom fanning the flames online). The wry and idiosyncratic political drama will now get to test global cinema’s power inside Hollywood, going into the Oscars with four nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Wagner Moura, Best International Feature, and Best Casting.
Timothée Chalamet in a scene from Marty Supreme. The film ping-ponged its way to eight nominations, including a Best Actor nod for Chalamet.The Associated Press
Marty’s supremacy
Marty Supreme’s Timothée Chalamet has done more to promote his star vehicle than a dozen Tom Cruises put together, from viral online stunts to surprise merchandise drops to climbing atop the Sphere in Las Vegas. And the actor’s blood, sweat and tears (for Fears, given the film’s synth-heavy soundtrack) were rewarded handsomely by the Academy, with the film ping-ponging its way to eight nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director for Josh Safdie, and, of course, Best Actor for Chalamet. Perhaps if Canadian Kevin O’Leary, who so memorably plays Chalamet’s venomous on-screen nemesis, had dropped an outrageous rap video or brought a carton of orange table-tennis balls to Mar-a-Lago, he could’ve scored an Oscar nomination, too. Next time, Mr. Wonderful.
Surely an accident?
The Academy had the opportunity to not only award one of the year’s most essential films but also stick it to the Iranian regime by honouring Jafar Panahi’s powerful Tehran-set drama It Was Just an Accident. And yet despite the film feeling like a pinnacle moment in the career of the prolific and provocative Panahi, the Oscars chose to only acknowledge its existence with nominations for Best Original Screenplay and Best International Film, the film failing to squeeze itself into the Best Picture or Best Director arenas. With any justice, at least, Panahi will sweep both its categories with ease.
The Netflix chill
Going into the awards season, there was a feeling that the industry might decide to ignore Netflix’s slate of Oscar contenders as a form of collective punishment against the streaming giant’s ambitions to swallow Warner Bros. Discovery (and, perhaps, drive one more stake into the heart of theatrical exhibition.) Yet Netflix’s two major titles all got their fare share of recognition, with Frankenstein earning nine nods (including Best Picture and Best Supporting Actor for Jacob Elordi) and Train Dreams netting four (including Best Picture). Not every Netflix contender walked away happy: Poor ol’ Jay Kelly failed to squeak in, with not even Adam Sandler scoring a Best Supporting Actor nod for his acclaimed work.
F-won
Even though many in the industry sneered when Joseph Kosinski’s race-car thriller F1 was mentioned as a Best Picture contender, observers simply didn’t count on what I’m calling the Top Gun: Maverick factor. Of course the Academy Awards would want to single out a movie that not only trumpeted the strengths of the big-screen experience but also actually found favour with audiences around the world. And so now the Brad Pitt-led vehicle (in more ways than one, wink wink) will waltz into the Oscars with four nominations, including Best Picture. I am under no illusions than the film will win, but sometimes getting close enough to the finish line is enough.
Wicked: For Good starring Ariana Grande walked away without any nominations.Giles Keyte/Universal Pictures/The Associated Press
Wicked games
Heading into the Christmas season, it seemed as if Wicked: For Good would if not surpass the Oscar tally of its 2024 predecessor than at least come close to matching it, especially when it came to stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande. But the grin-and-bear-it reception to the sequel – which felt at best unnecessary, at worst like a form of subtle musical-theatre torture – quickly quashed any large-scale hopes. And so 2 Wicked 2 Furious, as I’ll dub it, walked away completely emptyhanded.
Apostates vs. Ann Lee
If the Academy Awards wanted to honor a genuinely great musical, though, they had the opportunity to do so with Mona Fastvold’s beguiling The Testament of Ann Lee. Yet the film was unjustly ignored by the Oscars, with only Amanda Seyfried being singled out (rightfully) for her incendiary performance as the title character, who founded the Shaker movement in 1700s England before transporting the spiritual sect to the Americas. As Ann herself might say, “Shame!”
Bugo-meh
Yorgos Lanthimos might have sauntered into the awards race this year feeling confident with his new Emma Stone comedy Bugonia. After all, his 2024 collaboration with Stone, Poor Things, garnered 11 Oscar nominations and won four of those categories, including Stone for Best Actress. But voters have not shown the same kind of kindness to the Greek provocateur this time around, with Bugonia – a more difficult and queasy film, even compared to Poor Things‘ take on sexual agency – only scoring four nominations (Best Original Score, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actress for Stone and, perhaps remarkably, Best Picture).
No need to feel Blue
It was something of a long shot going into Thursday, but after earning the best reviews of her career since Almost Famous (which arrived way back in 2000), Kate Hudson ended up serenading the Academy with her performance as one half of a Neil Diamond tribute band in the drama Song Sung Blue. I doubt she’ll go all the way (this category feels like Rose Byrne’s to lose), but if there was a category for Best Regional Accent, though, Hudson’s Milwaukee drawl would win the contest hands down. I’m a believer!