Oscar Nominations 2016: ‘The Revenant’, ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ Lead

By Anthony Hernandez

What is turning out to be a huge year for Alejandro Iñárritu, his latest (and arguably greatest) film The Revenant – which is now a huge critical and box office success – just earned 12 Academy Award nominations including Best Actor for Leonardo DiCaprio. Will this finally be Leo’s year to take home the gold? The answer is most likely a BIG “yes”.

Mad Max: Fury Road – another critical and audience favorite (and one of my favorite films of the year) follows with 10 nominations, including Best Director for George Miller, who took a genre he created and turned it back on its head, making one hell of a fun ride at the movies. It is good to see so much love for this film from the usually stuffy Academy.

The Martian and Spotlight (the likely winner) follow up with 7 and 6 nominations respectively. Though now it is difficult to see any other picture other than Mad Max or The Revenant going all the way.

There were a few terrible snubs as well. The beautiful, wonderfully acted and directed film Carol received neither a nomination for Best Director or Picture. Thankfully Cate Blanchette and Rooney Mara were nominated for Best Actress and Supporting Actress respectively. With no Best Director nomination for Ridley Scott, it seems The Martian’s chances at winning Best Picture have been thwarted. And no Best Picture nomination for Creed, Straight Outta Compton, or Inside Out? C’mon Academy!

Stay tuned for more Oscar coverage as we count down the days to the big ceremony hosted by Chris Rock on February 28th! And check out the full list of nominees below:

Best Motion Picture of the Year

• “The Big Short” Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner, Producers
• “Bridge of Spies” Steven Spielberg, Marc Platt and Kristie Macosko Krieger, Producers
• “Brooklyn” Finola Dwyer and Amanda Posey, Producers
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Doug Mitchell and George Miller, Producers
• “The Martian” Simon Kinberg, Ridley Scott, Michael Schaefer and Mark Huffam, Producers
• “The Revenant” Arnon Milchan, Steve Golin, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Mary Parent and Keith Redmon, Producers
• “Room” Ed Guiney, Producer
• “Spotlight” Michael Sugar, Steve Golin, Nicole Rocklin and Blye Pagon Faust, Producers

Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

• Bryan Cranston in “Trumbo”
• Matt Damon in “The Martian”
• Leonardo DiCaprio in “The Revenant”
• Michael Fassbender in “Steve Jobs”
• Eddie Redmayne in “The Danish Girl”

Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

• Cate Blanchett in “Carol”
• Brie Larson in “Room”
• Jennifer Lawrence in “Joy”
• Charlotte Rampling in “45 Years”
• Saoirse Ronan in “Brooklyn”

Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

• Christian Bale in “The Big Short”
• Tom Hardy in “The Revenant”
• Mark Ruffalo in “Spotlight”
• Mark Rylance in “Bridge of Spies”
• Sylvester Stallone in “Creed”

Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

• Jennifer Jason Leigh in “The Hateful Eight”
• Rooney Mara in “Carol”
• Rachel McAdams in “Spotlight”
• Alicia Vikander in “The Danish Girl”
• Kate Winslet in “Steve Jobs”

Best Animated Feature Film

• “Anomalisa” Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson and Rosa Tran
• “Boy and the World” Alê Abreu
• “Inside Out” Pete Docter and Jonas Rivera
• “Shaun the Sheep Movie” Mark Burton and Richard Starzak
• “When Marnie Was There” Hiromasa Yonebayashi and Yoshiaki Nishimura

Achievement in Cinematography

• “Carol” Ed Lachman
• “The Hateful Eight” Robert Richardson
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” John Seale
• “The Revenant” Emmanuel Lubezki
• “Sicario” Roger Deakins

Achievement in Costume Design

• “Carol” Sandy Powell
• “Cinderella” Sandy Powell
• “The Danish Girl” Paco Delgado
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Jenny Beavan
• “The Revenant” Jacqueline West

Achievement in Directing

• “The Big Short” Adam McKay
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” George Miller
• “The Revenant” Alejandro G. Iñárritu
• “Room” Lenny Abrahamson
• “Spotlight” Tom McCarthy

Best Documentary Feature

• “Amy” Asif Kapadia and James Gay-Rees
• “Cartel Land” Matthew Heineman and Tom Yellin
• “The Look of Silence” Joshua Oppenheimer and Signe Byrge Sørensen
• “What Happened, Miss Simone?” Liz Garbus, Amy Hobby and Justin Wilkes
• “Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom” Evgeny Afineevsky and Den Tolmor

Best Documentary Short Subject

• “Body Team 12” David Darg and Bryn Mooser
• “Chau, beyond the Lines” Courtney Marsh and Jerry Franck
• “Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah” Adam Benzine
• “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness” Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy
• “Last Day of Freedom” Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman

Achievement in Film Editing

• “The Big Short” Hank Corwin
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Margaret Sixel
• “The Revenant” Stephen Mirrione
• “Spotlight” Tom McArdle
• “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey

Best Adapted Screenplay

• “The Big Short” Screenplay by Charles Randolph and Adam McKay
• “Brooklyn” Screenplay by Nick Hornby
• “Carol” Screenplay by Phyllis Nagy
• “The Martian” Screenplay by Drew Goddard
• “Room” Screenplay by Emma Donoghue

Best Original Screenplay

• “Bridge of Spies” Written by Matt Charman and Ethan Coen & Joel Coen
• “Ex Machina” Written by Alex Garland
• “Inside Out” Screenplay by Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve, Josh Cooley; Original story by Pete Docter, Ronnie del Carmen
• “Spotlight” Written by Josh Singer & Tom McCarthy
• “Straight Outta Compton” Screenplay by Jonathan Herman and Andrea Berloff; Story by S. Leigh Savidge & Alan Wenkus and Andrea Berloff

Best Foreign Language Film

• “Embrace of the Serpent” Colombia
• “Mustang” France
• “Son of Saul” Hungary
• “Theeb” Jordan
• “A War” Denmark

Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling

• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega and Damian Martin
• “The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed out the Window and Disappeared” Love Larson and Eva von Bahr
• “The Revenant” Siân Grigg, Duncan Jarman and Robert Pandini

Achievement in Music (Original Score)

• “Bridge of Spies” Thomas Newman
• “Carol” Carter Burwell
• “The Hateful Eight” Ennio Morricone
• “Sicario” Jóhann Jóhannsson
• “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” John Williams

Achievement in Music (Original Song)

• “Earned It” from “Fifty Shades of Grey”
  Music and Lyric by Abel Tesfaye, Ahmad Balshe, Jason Daheala Quenneville and Stephan Moccio
• “Manta Ray” from “Racing Extinction”
  Music by J. Ralph and Lyric by Antony Hegarty
• “Simple Song #3” from “Youth”
  Music and Lyric by David Lang
• “Til It Happens To You” from “The Hunting Ground”
  Music and Lyric by Diane Warren and Lady Gaga
• “Writing’s On The Wall” from “Spectre”
  Music and Lyric by Jimmy Napes and Sam Smith

Achievement in Production Design

• “Bridge of Spies” Production Design: Adam Stockhausen; Set Decoration: Rena DeAngelo and Bernhard Henrich
• “The Danish Girl” Production Design: Eve Stewart; Set Decoration: Michael Standish
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Production Design: Colin Gibson; Set Decoration: Lisa Thompson
• “The Martian” Production Design: Arthur Max; Set Decoration: Celia Bobak
• “The Revenant” Production Design: Jack Fisk; Set Decoration: Hamish Purdy

Best Animated Short Film

• “Bear Story” Gabriel Osorio and Pato Escala
• “Prologue” Richard Williams and Imogen Sutton
• “Sanjay’s Super Team” Sanjay Patel and Nicole Grindle
• “We Can’t Live without Cosmos” Konstantin Bronzit
• “World of Tomorrow” Don Hertzfeldt

Best Live Action Short Film

• “Ave Maria” Basil Khalil and Eric Dupont
• “Day One” Henry Hughes
• “Everything Will Be Okay (Alles Wird Gut)” Patrick Vollrath
• “Shok” Jamie Donoughue
• “Stutterer” Benjamin Cleary and Serena Armitage

Achievement in Sound Editing

• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Mark Mangini and David White
• “The Martian” Oliver Tarney
• “The Revenant” Martin Hernandez and Lon Bender
• “Sicario” Alan Robert Murray
• “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Matthew Wood and David Acord

Achievement in Sound Mixing

• “Bridge of Spies” Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom and Drew Kunin
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Chris Jenkins, Gregg Rudloff and Ben Osmo
• “The Martian” Paul Massey, Mark Taylor and Mac Ruth
• “The Revenant” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño, Randy Thom and Chris Duesterdiek
• “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Andy Nelson, Christopher Scarabosio and Stuart Wilson

Achievement in Visual Effects

• “Ex Machina” Andrew Whitehurst, Paul Norris, Mark Ardington and Sara Bennett
• “Mad Max: Fury Road” Andrew Jackson, Tom Wood, Dan Oliver and Andy Williams
• “The Martian” Richard Stammers, Anders Langlands, Chris Lawrence and Steven Warner
• “The Revenant” Rich McBride, Matthew Shumway, Jason Smith and Cameron Waldbauer
• “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Roger Guyett, Patrick Tubach, Neal Scanlan and Chris Corbould