Oscar season has begun and the race to the top awards is starting to line up. Current favorites in the Best Picture category include Steven Spielberg’s “The Fablemans,” Sarah Polley’s “Women Talking,” Todd Field’s “Tár,” Martin McDonagh’s “The Banshees of Inisherin,” Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale.” and Rian Johnson’s “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Story.”
However, unlike in previous years at this point in the awards calendar, none of these films are available for Oscar voters to view on the Academy Screening Room, a members-only portal that helps voters view the films in competition. And the big contenders that have already hit theaters aren’t available either: no “Top Gun: Maverick,” no “Elvis,” no “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”
In fact, as of the last week of September, there are only 12 films in the Academy Screening Room. Four of them, “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song,” “Navalny,” “Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams” and “Turn Every Page,” are documentaries; another, “The Bad Guys”, is animated.
Rounding out the dozen titles available are the spy thriller “All the Old Knives,” the drama “Emergency,” the Adam Sandler vehicle “Hustle,” the romance between Jennifer Lopez and Owen Wilson “Marry Me,” the horror drama ” Master, Ron Howard’s Thai cave rescue film “Thirteen Lives,” and the Sundance hit “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande” (The latest Emma Thompson, starring in the screening room film that probably has the best chance of getting a nomination in some category).
The number of films is about half what it was last year, when the Academy Screening Room contained 23 films at a similar point in the Oscar schedule. The Academy, however, does not control which films go to the screening room or when they go, because studios or production companies must pay $20,000 to be included there. The academy’s guidelines say there will be a delay of “at least 10 business days” from the time the fee is paid and the materials are submitted to the time the film is posted on the platform.
The $20,000 charge is a significant increase from the $12,500 the Academy charged in 2020 and 2021, with forensic watermarking available for an additional $5,000.
(It’s perhaps worth noting that after the Oscar nominations are announced on January 24, all recognized films will be available in the screening room free of charge for your studios.)
The Academy also houses additional screening rooms dedicated to the documentary, international, animation, short film, and song branches, and qualifying films are placed in those screening rooms free of charge.
At this time, members have not yet been invited to join the voting committees in the international and animation categories, so those screening rooms have yet to open. In the screening room dedicated to the Best Documentary Feature category, the 28 films currently available are more than the 17 that were available this time last year, though far less than the 86 available in 2020. The number is expected to end of eligible documentaries. close to 200.
The first 15 documentaries were placed in the screening room on August 19 and include “The Automat,” “Hallelujah,” “Jazz Fest: A New Orleans Story,” and “Navalny,” along with seven short documentaries. A further 13 features were added on September 16, including “Cow”, “Fiddler’s Journey to the Big Screen”, “My Old School”, “Salvatore” and “Turn Every Page”. Four shorts were added at the same time.
Los Angeles-based members will also be able to attend screenings at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theatre, with October bookings including “Don’t Worry Darling”, “Amsterdam”, “Tár”, “The Good House” , “Decision to Leave,” “Armageddon Time,” and the documentary “Sidney.” In-person screenings in September included “Three Thousand Years of Longing,” “The Woman King,” and “Blonde.”
AMPAS screenings in New York and London included “Blonde”, “Moonage Daydream”, “The Woman King” and “Don’t Worry Darling”, and will include “Bros”, “Amsterdam” and “The Banshees of Inisherin”.
Here are the films in the main and documentary screenings starting September 27.
PROJECTION ROOM OF THE ACADEMY
“All the old knives”
“The Bad Boys” (Animated)
“Emergency”
“Good luck to you, Big Leo”
“Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song” (documentary)
“Hustle”
“Marry me”
“Teacher”
“Navalny”
Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams
“Thirteen Lives”
“Turn Every Page: The Adventures of Robert Caro and Robert Gottlieb” (documentary)
DOCUMENTARIES
“Anonymous Club”
“The Automaton”
“bad axe”
“The Balcony Movie”
“Bitter Brush”
“Doctor Morris’s Chamber”
“Children of the Mist”
“Civil”
“Clay dream”
“Cow”
“Deep in the Heart: A Texas Wildlife Story”
“Dream Walls: Inside the Chelsea Hotel”
“Fanny: The Right to Rock”
“The violinist’s journey to the big screen”
Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song
“Stop the fire”
“A house made of splinters”
“I am Wanita”
“Jazz Festival: A New Orleans Story”
“Keep taking steps”
“my old school”
“Navalny”
“Only in theaters”
Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams
“mermaids”
“History will not die”
“Surviving Sex Trafficking”
“Turn Every Page: The Adventures of Robert Caro and Robert Gottlieb”
ACADEMY PROJECTIONS
The Angels:
Saturday October 1: “Don’t worry, honey”
Sunday, October 2: “Sidney” (documentary)
Sunday October 2: “Amsterdam”
Friday, October 7: “Tár”
Sunday, October 16: “The good house”
Sunday, October 16: “Decision to leave”
Sunday October 30: “Time of Armageddon”
New York:
Thursday, September 29: “Bros”
London:
Tuesday, October 4: “Amsterdam”
Tuesday, October 11: “The Woman King”
Tuesday, October 18: “The Banshees of Inisherin”
Tuesday. October 25: “My Police”