For many Oscar fans worried about the direction of the Motion Picture Academy, this year's pack of nominations might have seemed like a ray of hope. Sure, many of the above-the-line nominations lacked racial and gender diversity (particularly the six people nominated for best director, only one of whom is not a white man), but even a look at the 10 Best Picture nominees shows how committed the Academy seems to be in making good on its 2009 promise to celebrate a wider range of films, not simply the usual Oscar bait that, for better or worse, has dominated the field for decades.
There's a good mix of classic prestige art films ("TÁR," "The Banshees of Inisherin," "Women Talking"), a few biopics ("Elvis," "The Fabelmans") some of the year's biggest blockbusters ("Avatar: The Way of Water," "Top Gun: Maverick") and movies that indicate the Academy is willing to explore beyond it previous boundaries (case in point: the 10-minute vomiting extravaganza in "Triangle of Sadness").
