This year’s Oscars nominations are more surprising than they look

If this year’s Oscars nominations seem to fulfil expectations, that’s only because recent chatter proved accurate. Look at the list in the context of the awards’ history and it’s a surprising selection. Originality and weirdness are in. Conventional Hollywood is out. Oppenheimer’s three-hour science biopic (13 nods), steampunk kink flick Poor Things (11) and Greta Gerwig’s cotton candy ball of feminist-lite Barbie (8) follow the public’s defiantly original 2023 mood. For the first time ever, there are also three foreign language pics in the best picture category – Zone of Interest (German), Anatomy of a Fall (French and English) and Past Lives (English and Korean). In 2024, 40 sequels, prequels, spin-offs, reboots and remakes will be flooding the multiplex, but last year’s box office suggested we’re bored with the same old same old.