The Gotham Awards set the tone

The 35th Gotham Awards took place last night in New York. The Gothams are interesting, partly because they’re so early, they get to set the mood for the rest of awards season, but also partly because the voting body is split into two parts: nominating committees made up of journalists, critics, and film programmers, and a final jury who picks the winners made up of industry professionals. So it’s a mix of tastemakers and the people who actually make films deciding nominations and winners, a unique combination among film awards.

As Lainey mentioned, the Best Supporting Actor race is still fluid, unlike other recent Oscar races. At the beginning of December, the day after the first big awards of the season, we do not have a frontrunner. The Gothams don’t help clarify the matter, as they combine all supporting nominees into one category. Wunmi Mosaku won for her role in Sinners, well deserved and an instant shot in the arm to her Best Supporting Actress campaign. Headlines make momentum, and this morning, the momentum is for Wunmi. Sinners hive arise! 

 

Wunmi was nominated along with her fellow Oscar contenders Teyana Taylor—who looked amazing, as usual, in a feathered Chanel skirt—Indya Moore (Father Mother Sister Brother), and Sentimental Value’s Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas. Teyana and Inga are strong contenders for Oscar, while Wunmi has, so far, been on the bubble. This win, while not correlating strongly to the Oscars, is still giving her the kind of momentum that pushes someone from the bubble to be firmly In Contention. 

Meanwhile, her win means we have no additional information regarding Best Supporting Actor. The Gotham nominees included top contenders Stellan Skarsgård, Benicio Del Toro, and Adam Sandler, as well as bubble boy Jacob Elordi, who came dressed as a Victorian detective. The category also included Alexander Skarsgård for his role in queer biker rom-dramedy Pillion, though that film’s commercial release in North America isn’t until February, so he won’t be eligible for this year’s Oscars. See what I mean about the Gothams being quirky?

So while Wunmi Mosaku picks up some heat, the Best Supporting Actor race remains unchanged. It’s still an open field, though Adam Sandler’s popularity is starting to feel like a gravitational field. He can’t really campaign on “it’s his time”, because he has been unserious for much of his career, but he can run on “he made an effort”. When Adam Sandler makes an effort, the results are almost always great, and that does not go unnoticed. A lot of people still feel that Uncut Gems snub on his behalf. 

There was also palpable momentum for Palme d’Or winner It Was Just an Accident. The film, from Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, is one of the year’s best, a frontrunner for Best International Feature, and a strong contender for Best Picture, too. Panahi picked up three wins: Best International Feature (alongside his fellow producer Philippe Martin), Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. We might be in for a 2019 style Oscar season dominated by a non-English language film from a charismatic filmmaker.

Panahi was imprisoned in Iran in 2022 for “propaganda against the system” after previously being banned from travel. He was released in 2023 following a hunger strike, and since the lifting of his travel ban, he has been spending time in France. However, he has returned to Iran, though he was at the Gothams last night, where he dedicated his screenplay award to his fellow Iranian filmmakers, saying, “I hope that this dedication would be considered a small tribute to all filmmakers who have been deprived of the right to see and to be seen but continue to create and to exist.” 

Panahi was also sentenced to prison in Iran in absentia yesterday. While we are wondering if we even WANT movies anymore, some filmmakers are making art at enormous personal risk. Jafar Panahi is a widely admired filmmaker who has made his last several films, including It Was Just an Accident, in secret because he is officially barred from filmmaking in Iran. And yet, he persists. 

His tenacity and dedication are matched by his talent, a combination that might prove irresistible throughout awards season. Of course, Panahi is facing grave real-world consequences far more important than trophies, but we’re here to talk Oscar, and in that context, his history of using film to reach past authoritarianism to find a global audience, to tell Iranian stories made in Iran under the most trying of circumstances, proving the value of film and storytelling to the human condition and the nourishment of the spirit under oppressive circumstances…well, the narrative writes itself. Get familiar with Jafar Panahi, because he’s about to be everywhere.