Oscar snubs are to be expected. But these ones hurt.
ADVERTISEMENTEvery year, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announces its nominees... and with them come raised eyebrows about Oscar omissions.
It’s sadly inevitable that some films miss out on heading to the big ceremony and when looking at the 2025 nominations, voters did get a lot right.
As expected, Emilia Pérez and The Brutalist dominated; Anora, I'm Still Here and The Substance got some much deserved love; and even the underrated The Apprentice nabbed two nominations.
OK, Wicked did get more noms than one of the best films of the year, Nickel Boys, but anyone who’s ever seen the Oscars knew that injustice was bound to happen.
It would have been nice to see Nicole Kidman get some recognition for her performance in Babygirl; but at least we got Fernanda Torres for I’m Still Here. Granted, Selena Gomez was great in Emilia Pérez; but was her performance really Oscar-worthy? We think not. Yes, Denzel Washington was the best part of Gladiator II; but were you really that entertained by the lukewarm retread of the far superior original? And while we would have loved to see Hard Truths get a Best Picture nod, it’s wonderful to see the usually horror-resistant Oscars nominate The Substance - which is without a doubt one of the goriest films to ever get a nomination in the top category.
All to say that the Academy never gets it 100% right, but that doesn’t mean they’re 100% wrong either.
That said, some omissions this year deserve to be called out.
This isn’t about petulant bellyaching; it’s simply a way of highlighting that just because the following 10 films secured zero nominations, doesn’t mean they’re less deserving of a Golden Baldie.
Here are our picks for the 10 non-Oscar nominated films that could have made the final cut this year – with the nominated films they could have replaced. No shade to the ones that did get selected; we’re just being thorough.
Kneecap
Should’ve been nominated for: Best International Feature (instead of the admittedly wonderful Flow which already got nominated in Best Animated Feature); Best Original Song (instead of Elton John’s ‘Never Too Late’).
What happened here? We were sure that Ireland’s pick for Best International Feature would make the cut. From its trumpeted Sundance debut to sweeping the British Independent Film Awards, Rich Peppiatt’s fun, raucous and heartfelt movie was last year’s little indie that could. It deserved so much more than to get zero nominations.
Kneecap is not only one of the most exciting music biopics in years – we said it understands that “smarts and laughs needn’t be mutually exclusive” in our review - but also became the biggest Irish opening for an Irish-language film ever. The way it embraces humour while delivering a profound meditation on the fragility of language and the preservation of culture is impressive, and we suspect – to quote the band’s song – that Academy voters were ‘Sick in the Head’ to have missed out on championing it.
Read our full review here and check out our interview with director Rich Peppiatt.
All We Imagine As Light
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Picture (instead of Wicked); Best Director (instead of James Mangold for A Complete Unknown); Best Original Screenplay (instead of September 5).
Payal Kapadia’s second feature film was the first Indian film to play in Cannes Competition in 30 years, and it was rewarded with the Grand Prix in 2024. Sadly, India passed on the opportunity to send All We Imagine As Light to the Oscars this year, which was quite the misfire. This immersive and tender drama depicts how the lives of three Hindu women intersect. On the surface, it’s a tale dealing with love and relationships; as the runtime progresses, unexpected surreal elements are injected and break the verité style. Kapadia injects increasing hope throughout, building to a compassionate ode to friendship and female solidarity, which in turn becomes a uniquely haunting meditation on belonging and the dislocations inherent to life. Like Kneecap, Kapadia’s stunning mood piece deserved at least one nomination; and considering how the Academy is trying to show it’s not stuck in time, how wonderful would it have been to see not one but two women nominated in the Best Director category? Kapadia should have joined Coralie Fargeat on the ticket. At least the Golden Globes got it right by shortlisting her for Best Director. How times change...
ADVERTISEMENTAll We Imagine As Light made the Top 5 in our Best Movies of 2024.
The Devil’s Bath
Should’ve been nominated for: Best International Feature (instead of The Girl With The Needle).
Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala’s The Devil’s Bath was a true standout of last year’s Berlin Film Festival. By shining an unsettling light on a previously unexplored chapter of European history, the directing duo not only gave a voice to history’s voiceless but crafted a bleak masterpiece worthy of all the awards. Granted, this disturbing psychological portrait of a dogmatic loophole via suicide-by-proxy, carried throughout by the wonderful Anja Plaschg (aka: musician Soap&Skin), may have been too uncategorizable and heart-wrenchingly gloomy for a mainstream ceremony like the Oscars... But it shouldn’t have been left behind.
Read our full review here and check out our interview with Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala.
ADVERTISEMENTThe Outrun
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Actress (Saoirse Ronan instead of Cynthia Erivo for Wicked).
Don’t get us wrong, we’re fans of Cynthia Erivo and how she pulled together the overpraised Wicked. Plus, the Best Actress category is always one of the most stacked ones, and this year’s nominees all deserve to be there. However, there is one absence we’re still having a hard time getting over... Saoirse Ronan should have been nominated for her towering performance in Nora Fingscheidt’s The Outrun. She plays a young woman recently out of rehab and the way which she portrays the torment of addiction is breathtaking. Yes, Ronan has been nominated before (three times for Best Actress, for Brooklyn, Lady Bird and Little Women; once for Best Supporting Actress for Atonement in 2008) and she will be again. However, this is the first time the Academy has failed to recognize a statuette-deserving performance from the Irish actress.
The Bibi Files
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Documentary (instead of Sugarcane).
There are some great docs selected this year (Porcelain War and No Other Land are our favourites), but we wish Alexis Bloom’s The Bibi Files could have been one of them. This is the film Benjamin Netanyahu didn't want you to see - and he certainly tried his hardest. It’s a scathing and urgent journalistic exposé which features never-before-seen video of Netanyahu being interrogated by police on corruption allegations. It sheds light not only on his character but shows how his unscrupulous nature has directly shaped the current state of the Middle East. Bloom comprehensively – and chillingly - puts the puzzle pieces together and exposes how luxury objects like expensive cigars and champagne have impacted the lives of countless Gazan and Israeli families. It’s a brave film and the fact it managed to see the light of day in the first place is to be celebrated. So why wasn’t it nominated? Did the Academy voters get nervous, as selecting it would anger the Israeli PM? Not enough room for two timely docs about the Middle East, since the Norwegian-Palestinian production No Other Land, about settler violence and the expulsion of Palestinians from their West Bank villages, did get a nod? Who knows... Just do yourself a favour: don’t miss out on this one.
ADVERTISEMENTRead our full review here.
Small Things Like These
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Supporting Actress (Emily Watson instead of Monica Barbaro for A Complete Unknown); Best Adapted Screenplay (instead of A Complete Unknown).
We could have suggested Cillian Murphy be nominated for his quietly devastating turn in Tim Mielants’ adaptation of Claire Keegan’s novella, but he got all the attention last year for Oppenheimer, so it seems only fair that others have a go. Which brings us to Emily Watson and playwright Enda Walsh, who would have been great shouts for both Best Supporting Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay respectively. Walsh sensitively adapted Keegan’s text (which if you’ve read it is no small feat) and uses restraint and intimacy to better tell a dark chapter in Irish history: the Magdalene Laundries. As for Watson, she plays Sister Mary in an uncaricatured and uniquely menacing way. She may not have much screentime, but her performance lingers. Through silence, gestures and carefully emphasized words, Watson manages to convey everything from the Church’s Mafia-like stranglehold on communities to a lesson in how to offer of a cup of tea in the most intimidating manner imaginable.
Read our full review here.
ADVERTISEMENTGrand Tour
Should’ve been nominated for: Best International Feature (instead of The Girl With The Needle).
Portuguese director Miguel Gomes (Tabu, Arabian Nights) left Cannes last year with the Best Director Palme under his arm for his work on this era-spanning, continent-crossing travelogue. And it was deserved. Charting how a British diplomat seems unable to commit to his fiancé, Grand Tour sees the determined lover follow him on his travels - comically armed with unshakable purpose. From the performances to Gomes’ use of comedy and contemporary documentary footage to instil a dreamlike dirge in which past and present blur, this postmodern fable does require patience. But it yields beguiling results. The achingly beautiful inclusion of Bobby Darin’s ‘Beyond The Sea’ during that final scene should have been enough to get Portugal in the Top 5 shortlist for Best International Feature.
Check out our interview with Miguel Gomes.
Bird
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Director (instead of James Mangold for A Complete Unknown); Best Cinematography (Robbie Ryan instead of Ed Lachman for Maria).
ADVERTISEMENTA third woman that could have been in the Best Director category?? Shocking! Hear us out. Andrea Arnold rocks our world. Always has, always will. From Fish Tank to Cow via her work on the show Big Little Lies, the British filmmaker has consistently proven why she’s one of cinema’s most treasured voices. For Bird, she shook things up and delivered a coming-of-age fairy tale which hit the sweet spot between social and magical realism. It was a tricky balancing act to pull off but she never overplayed her hand and showed once more her unparalleled talent for offering empathetic and non-judgemental viewpoints of flawed characters. And for directing unknown young performers. Add Robbie Ryan’s tactile cinematography, which found a unique space where feel-good aspirations and broken dreams coexist in an emotionally generous way, and you’re forced to come to the conclusion that Bird should have been a contender this year.
Read our full review here.
Queer
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Actor (Daniel Craig instead of Timothée Chalamet for A Complete Unknown – forgive us Timmy).
Can you believe that Daniel Craig has never been Oscar nominated? 2025 was supposed to be his year... Usually, the Academy loves a performer who plays against type, but it was not to be. His portrayal of a lovesick drug addict who pines for an elusive younger man in Luca Guadagnino’s surreal William S. Burroughs adaptation went overlooked and it’s a damn shame. Queer didn’t get a single nomination. Maybe the film’s trippy tangents and Orphean retellings were too much for the Oscars to handle? Or was it the very sexually charged scenes? Whatever prevented the British actor from securing his first Oscar nom, Craig showed that Bond was well and truly behind him with Queer, and his awkwardly grandiloquent portrayal of William Lee remains one of his best performances.
ADVERTISEMENTRead our full review here and check out our People of the Year 2024, which features Daniel Craig.
Dahomey
Should’ve been nominated for: Best Documentary (instead of Soundtrack To A Coup D’Etat).
Again, there’s not a bad film amongst the Best Documentary nominees, so there’s very little to get worked up about. However, it is worth mentioning Mati Diop’s Dahomey, which won last year’s Golden Bear. This docu-fiction essay details the return of twenty-six artefacts from France to the Republic of Benin, relics which were among thousands plundered from the Kingdom of Dahomey by French colonialist troops in 1892. It’s a taut exploration of the wreckage wrought by colonialism and a textured point of entry into a knotty conversation around restitution and historical justice. Moreover, what Diop managed to do in the short space of 67 minutes is remarkable – especially when it comes to giving the past a voice. Literally. Sure, not every film can make it onto the Oscars shortlist, and Dahomey has had a fair few nominations and prizes (it also recently won Best Documentary at this year’s Lumière Awards). Still, on the evidence of the stellar five nominees, Diop’s film – much like Alexis Bloom’s The Bibi Files – makes a solid case for making Best Documentary a longer shortlist.
Bonus: The Seed of the Sacred Fig
We’re feeling extra sore about this one - hence breaking the rules a little. Unlike the other films on this list, Mohammad Rasoulof’s radical political thriller did get nominated. Just once - for Best International Feature. We’re guessing that the award will either go to Emilia Pérez or I’m Still Here – both of which are also nominated for Best Picture. We’re thrilled to see crossover between the two categories, but if we had our way, The Seed of the Sacred Fig would have also made it. Not only was it our favourite film of 2024, but the way this Iranian masterpiece represents Germany at the Oscars shows how intercultural exchanges thrive in open society. If deserves more than to go home empty-handed in March.
ADVERTISEMENTRead our full review here and check out our interview with Mohammad Rasoulof.
The winners of the 97th Oscars will be announced on Sunday 2 March in Los Angeles (very early morning on Monday 3 March in Europe). Stay tuned to Euronews Culture for our coverage of this year’s Academy Awards.
