Since the Golden Globes split drama and comedy into separate categories—truly, their best innovation in the awards show space—they crown two best pictures, and this year, The Brutalist and Emilia Pérez were the respective winners, with Emilia Pérez netting four wins overall, and The Brutalist right behind with three. Emilia Pérez has been talked about in the same breath as the Oscars since Cannes, and The Brutalist since Venice, so these are two of the heaviest hitters going into the Oscar nominating period, which opens Wednesday.
The Globes also awarded Brady Corbet Best Director for The Brutalist. Given the difference in the number of nominees for Best Picture and Director at the Oscars, this is a split we may well see on Oscar night. I can very easily see the Academy rewarding Corbet as Best Director, while handing Emilia Pérez Best Picture (which will go down as a Crash or Green Book-level embarrassment, if it happens). Since there is a mismatch in the number of nominees, we can no longer take for granted that Best Picture will march in lockstep with other key categories like Best Director or Best Editing.
The Brutalist also snagged a trophy for Adrien Brody, who may well win his second Oscar for once again playing a Holocaust survivor. If it can’t be Ryland Brickson Cole Tews for Hundreds of Beavers—a person and a film I did NOT make up—then sure, let it be Adrien Brody. It’s not like Daniel Craig is applying himself. Also on The Brutalist front, Guy Pearce showed up looking like Brad Pitt thinks he looks, and Felicity Jones continues to be present.
On the Emilia Pérez side of the fence, Karla Sofía Gascón wore a two-tone orange dress that was already good, but then she said she chose the color not only to honor the film, but to represent light, which “always wins over darkness”:
Debatable! But a nice sentiment. And again, with Oscar nominations right around the corner, it’s important to drive home these points to potential voters. Emilia Pérez is designed to make you feel a lot of things, including hope, and that’s going to work for a lot of people. That’s why Emilia Pérez has an edge over The Brutalist in the Best Picture race. The Brutalist is not meant to make you feel good. Emilia Pérez, though, is a feel-good movie with pretensions of darkness. It feels Important, but not so Important that it actually challenges anything you already think or feel. And Academy voters love feeling Important without having their preexisting notions challenged. That’s exactly why films like Crash and Green Book win Best Picture. It might work for Emilia Pérez, too.
