Onto a big question mark. For those who don’t know, this is part of a weekly series where we analyse the potential contenders for the 2020/2021 Oscars season. This time around, we’re looking at Christopher Nolan’s ‘TENET’.
- Distributor: Warner Brothers
- Release Date: July 17th, 2019
- Cast: John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Kenneth Branagh
- Director: Christopher Nolan
- Composer: Ludwig Goransson
- Budget: $205M
Christopher Nolan’s eleventh feature isn’t targeting the Oscars, nor the box office. The director of ‘The Dark Knight Trilogy’, ‘Dunkirk’, ‘Interstellar’ and so much more has a cult following of fans, and is one of the highest grossing directors of all time, whilst managing to test the audience’s hubris in high-brow, big-budgeted intellectual thrillers.
However he hasn’t garnered attention from awards ceremonies. In his second feature, ‘Memento’, he took a nomination for Best Original Screenplay, but it wasn’t until 2008 when he unintentionally caused a major shift at the Academy Awards.
After receiving unconditional acclaim for ‘The Dark Knight’, with the film becoming only the third $1BN grossing film at the time, many thought that a Best Picture nomination was a shoe-in for the revolutionary film. This wasn’t the case. Whilst it took eight nominations, the film didn’t get a Best Picture nomination, which caused the Academy to expand its nominations from 5 to 10. This in turn helped 2010’s ‘Inception’ garner a Best Picture nomination.
In his career, Nolan hasn’t done bad with awards ceremonies, taking home five personal nominations at the Oscars, with his films taking 35 nominations and ten wins.
Could ‘TENET’ be the film to break his duck?
Despite dropping a trailer at the end of 2019, the plot is still unknown, although we do know its an international espionage thriller with a massive $205M budget.
Whilst I am skeptic about AMAPS nominating a film which is principally a Summer blockbuster, Nolan films are different blockbusters, with ‘Inception’ being released in July 2010, before taking home four Oscars eight months later.
It hasn’t been since ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ when a Nolan film hasn’t received any major accolades, but ‘TENET’ seems like its another ‘Inception – a high-brow, big-budgeted Summer blockbuster that will wow voters and moviegoers alike.
Due to this, I hold high hopes for ‘TENET’ when it comes to the Oscars, and if the competition is weak this year, then ‘TENET’ will be able to snag a nomination, however I won’t expect any directing or acting nominations for this one. It would take something mighty for that to happen.
Expect it to be a monster in below-the-line categories, which, in that case, could lead to a ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ situation where the film has so many nominations that is simply has to have a Best Picture nomination as well.
Predicted Nominations: (10)
- Best Picture
- Best Original Screenplay
- Best Original Score
- Best Film Editing
- Best Sound Editing
- Best Sound Mixing
- Best Production Design
- Best Cinematography
- Best Visual Effects
- Best Costume Design
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