Alternative Oscars 2021: What if genre films, trailers, posters, emerging filmmakers and actors had their own categories?

Come Sunday night, the 2020-21 Awards Season Extended Cut finally wraps up. It’s been longer and more exhausting than usual — what with the pandemic-enforced delays. Once the Oscars are given out, it will no doubt provoke lots of rhetoric (and column space) on who won and who should have. Just as the nominations did. Some of the best films that saved us in the pandemic year — ones we thought should have been awards season mainstays — were entirely walled off by the Academy. That’s where we come in. To celebrate such galling snubs, we came up with the Alternative Oscars last year. We handed out our own awards (in name only, no hardware) in the same categories as the Academy does, plus a few bonus ones to honour the best in genre cinema. This year, we’re tweaking things a little. First, we’re not going to simply handpick an entire slate of Best Pictures, Actors and Directors who should have been contenders in the same categories on Sunday night. Our goal is to recognise crafts intrinsic (like casting) and extrinsic (like poster design) to cinema that the Academy in their myopic view overlook. Second, we’re making the genre films our marquee categories. They may be ignored by the Oscar voters, but it’s impossible to get a complete picture of the year’s cinematic riches without them. Call it a futile attempt to goad the Academy into looking beyond the traditional Oscar-bait. Third and final, because it has to be said, we’re not suggesting the films mentioned here are superior to every film nominated for Oscars, but we believe they deserved a seat at the table too. Consider the Alternative Oscars a collateral journey through 2020, the year in cinema. Genre films give us a fuller sense of just how rich the creative space of filmmaking is. No superheroes or summer blockbusters in 2020 allowed smaller films to shine. Horror had a commendable year. While sci-fi didn’t produce an embarrassment of riches, it still remained the canvas on which all the big ideas and bold narrative choices were painted. Genre purists beware: We’ve let crime and all its noir siblings (neo, Nordic, etc.) bleed into one category. 2020, rather fittingly, served plenty of mind-fucks: genre-bending films that made your brain hurt, but in a good way. We didn’t get the best action movies, but they still pumped much-needed adrenaline jolts in shorter bursts — and our category reflects that. Similarly, there were unforgettable music moments, if not unforgettable musicals. Honestly, every category is self-explanatory. Best Horror Film Winner: La Llorona Other Nominees His House Impetigore Relic The Beach House The Invisible Man Best Sci-fi Film Winner: The Vast of Night Other Nominees Archive Lapsis Minor Premise Synchronic Vivarium Best Comedy Film

Winner: Why Don’t You Just Die! Other Nominees Extra Ordinary Saint Frances Spontaneous The Forty-Year-Old Version Yes, God, Yes Best Crime/Noir Film

Winner: A Sun Other Nominees Beasts Clawing at Straws Blow the Man Down I’m Your Woman The Kid Detective The Wild Goose Lake Best Mindfuck

Winner: Possessor Other Nominees Black Bear Color Out of Space I’m Thinking of Ending Things Shirley Swallow Best Action Sequence

Winner: Hassan and Zain vs Ifrit -  Wira Other Nominees Harley Quinn’s assault on police precinct + warehouse - Birds of Prey Inverted car chase  -  Tenet Escape from police station - Lost Bullet Set-up and resurrection - The Old Guard The One-Shot - Extraction  Best Needledrop Moment

Winner: “Bizness” by tUnE-yArDs and “Come Meh Way” by Sudan Archives - Babyteeth Other Nominees “Got To Give It Up” by Marvin Gaye - Da 5 Bloods “What a Life” by Scarlet Pleasure - Another Round “Toxic” (Orchestral version) by Britney Spears - Promising Young Woman “Silly Games” by Janet Kay - Lovers Rock “Mr Lonely” cover by Angel Olsen - Kajillionaire Best “Pure Cinema” Moment

Winner: Making/selling oily Cakes - First Cow Other Nominees Childbirth - Pieces of a Woman Dinner with the parents - I’m Thinking Of Ending Things Questionnaire - Never Rarely Sometimes Always Opening escape scene - The Invisible Man Opening assassination scene - Possessor The Oscars are long enough as it is. So, the next set of categories look unlikely to be added to their existing slate. Breaking into the industry is no easy task. While established filmmakers have the studio-backed luxury of big budgets, emerging filmmakers and screenwriters don’t. Making a movie on a smaller scale but still making a big impression on filmgoers warrants a category of its own. The same goes for breakout actors, who often get passed over for veterans at the Oscars. But veteran or debutant, these actors wouldn’t have attracted our attention if not for the casting director who saw them fit to take on awards-worthy roles. Be it an ensemble, pairing two actors, or even a single tour-de-force, the casting process often makes or breaks the movie. Best First Film

Winner: Swallow (Carlo Mirabella-Davis) Other Nominees Babyteeth (Shannon Murphy) Blow the Man Down (Danielle Krudy, Bridget Savage Cole) Emma (Autumn de Wilde) The 40-Year-Old Version (Radha Blank)   The Vast of Night (Andrew Patterson) Best First Screenplay

Winner: Lovers Rock (Courttia Newland) Other nominees Emma (Eleanor Catton) Miss Juneteenth (Channing Godfrey Peoples) Shirley (Sarah Gubbins) The Assistant (Kitty Green) The Forty-Year-Old Version (Radha Blank) Best Breakthrough Performance

Winner: Sidney Flanigan and Talia Ryder, Never Rarely Sometimes Always Other Nominees Kelly O’Sullivan, Saint Frances Kingsley Ben-Adir, One Night in Miami Levan Gelbakhiani, And Then We Danced Lovie Simone, Selah and the Spades Orion Lee, First Cow Best Casting

Winner: Bacurau - Marcelo Caetano Other Nominees Da 5 Bloods - Kimberly Hardin Emma - Jessica Ronane Rocks – Lucy Pardee The Assistant - Avy Kaufman The Personal History of David Copperfield - Sarah Crowe Before we watch a film, the poster is what teases the experience to come. At times, all it takes is a single defining image in the right colour scheme, and you’re sold on the movie. Graphic designers keep elevating the craft to whole new levels each year, and recognising their work should be a no-brainer. If poster design is an artform in itself, the launch of trailers has become an event. A well-edited trailer doesn’t simply reveal the entire damn plot, but cuts it down to its barebones, attracting the audience to the real thing. Often, when they use familiar songs, it leaves an impression stronger than the movie. Best Poster

Winner: Da 5 Bloods (Design by GRAVILLIS) Other Nominees Colour Out of Space (Design by Tom Hodge) Gamak Ghar (Design by Som) I’m Thinking of Ending Things (Design by Akiko Stehrenberger) Promising Young Woman (Design by Art Machine) Tesla (Design by Brandon Schaefer) Best Trailer

Winner: Possessor  Other Nominees The Green Knight  The French Dispatch  Dick Johnson Is Dead  Promising Young Woman  I’m Thinking of Ending Things