The Oscar noms - lost in space

I see that the Oscar nominations are out. Which means that I can’t assess the veracity of the nominations since I haven’t seen most of the films. But I’ll still comment anyway. Dune by Quebec director Denis Villeneuve, came away with 10 minimations. I haven’t seen the movie - mainly because I have no interest in the kind of sci-fi that takes place on other planets  - and tried to read the book in college but never got through the first one or two pages. Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog  got 12 nods. I had a chance to see this at Montreal’s Festival du nouveau cinema in October but deliberately passed - I’ve always found Campion’s works plodding and, like sci-fi, I’m really not that into the Wild West. Ditto for Will Smith’s King Richard. I love tennis but not keen on sports films and I hear that Denzel’s character, Serena’s dad, really wasn’t that nice a guy. Ditto most of the other films. Like Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast. I lived through that period (well, actually not in Belfast) and it was a hateful time. And I’m not keen on biopics and ones that don’t ring true, like the film’s Everlasting Love identifying soundtrack. Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story also got seven  nominations. Why, oh why, I wondered whenever I saw reference to this film, did Spielberg have to do a remake? I kind of want to see Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth even though, truth be told, Shakespearean speech seems, dare I say, a bit incomprehensible (I know I open myself to charges of Philistinism here) . But I heard the film is so great it transcends typical Shakes and I admire the Coens greatly. So we’ll see. Netflix had 27 film nominations for its stable but I cut the Netflix cord some time ago. And why would I want to watch Being the Ricardos (Aaron Sorkin.)  when the original I Love Lucy series was so great? I had no interest in seeing the House of Gucci (Ridley Scott), starring of all people Lady Gaga. I mean, really, who’d want to see a movie about nasty Italian fashion glitterati? Don’t even mention Adam Mckay’s climate change diatribe Don’t Look Up, a supposed comedy which is really a humourless look at what the director thinks will be world catastrophe in 15 years - or less - while star Dicaprio parties on his giant yacht in the Mediterranean. I did actually see - yay! - Nightmare Alley. It had its moments I suppose (see Dec. 22 review). But I'd just watched the 1947 version (Edmund Goulding) and found that truer without Guillermo del Toro’s over the top noirish veneer. I love Aretha Franklin but again I really don’t care for biopics so skipped Queen of Soul (Liesel Tommy). As or the others, ditto meh.