Lisa Marie’s Way Too Early Oscar Predictions For June

Posted on June 30, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Click here for my April and May predictions!

Best Picture

Avatar: Fire and Ash

Deliver Me From Nowhere

Hamnet

It Was Just An Accident

The Secret Agent

Sentimental Value

Sinners

The Smashing Machine

Wicked For Good

Best Director

Jon M. Chu for Wicked For Good

Ryan Coogler for Sinners

Joseph Kosinski for F1

Jafar Panahi for It Was Just An Accident

Joachim Trier for Sentimental Value

Best Actor

Timothee Chalamet in Marty Supreme

Dwayne Johnson in The Smashing Machine

Michael B. Jordan in Sinners

Wagner Moura in The Secret Agent

Jeremy Allen White in Deliver Me From Nowhere

Best Actress

Cynthia Erivo in Wicked For Good

Lucy Liu in Rosemead

Renate Reinsve in Sentimental Valure

Amanda Seyfried in Ann Lee

June Squibb in Eleanor The Great

Best Supporting Actor

Miles Caton in Sinners

Colman Domingo in Michael

Paul Mescal in Hamnet

Stellan Skarsgard in Sentimental Value

Christoph Waltz in Frankenstein

Best Supporting Actress

Elle Fanning in Sentimental Value

Ariana Grande in Wicked For Good

Gabby Hofman in Deliver Me From Nowhere

Kate Hudson in Song Song Blue

Nia Long in Michael

Lisa Marie’s Way Too Early Oscar Predictions For May

Posted on May 31, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

We’re taking just a short break from our Eastwood-a-thon so that I can share my Oscar predictions for May.

As I say every month, don’t read too much into anything this early in the year. I do think Sinners has a decent chance of getting nominated, despite being released early in the year. And since Cannes has now emerged as a semi-reliable precursor, you’ll find a lot of this year’s winners mentioned below. That said, in all probability, the actual Oscar nominations will look completely different from what’s below. That’s part of the fun of doing monthly predictions!

I should note that Clint Eastwood is apparently working on another film. Given how quickly he directs, he might be directing this year’s next sudden contender.

Click here for my April predictions!

Best Picture

Avatar: Fire and Ash

Deliver Me From Nowhere

Hamnet

It Was Just An Accident

The Secret Agent

Sentimental Value

Sinners

The Smashing Machine

Wicked For Good

Best Director

Jon M. Chu for Wicked For Good

Ryan Coogler for Sinners

Joseph Kosinski for F1

Jafar Panahi for It Was Just An Accident

Joachim Trier for Sentimental Value

Best Actor

Timothee Chalamet in Marty Supreme

Dwayne Johnson in The Smashing Machine

Michael B. Jordan in Sinners

Wagner Moura in The Secret Agent

Jeremy Allen White in Deliver Me From Nowhere

Best Actress

Cynthia Erivo in Wicked For Good

Lucy Liu in Rosemead

Renate Reinsve in Sentimental Valure

Amanda Seyfried in Ann Lee

June Squibb in Eleanor The Great

Best Supporting Actor

Miles Caton in Sinners

Colman Domingo in Michael

Paul Mescal in Hamnet

Stellan Skarsgard in Sentimental Value

Christoph Waltz in Frankenstein

Best Supporting Actress

Elle Fanning in Sentimental Value

Ariana Grande in Wicked For Good

Gabby Hofman in Deliver Me From Nowhere

Kate Hudson in Song Song Blue

Nia Long in Michael

Here Are The 2024 Nominations for the Black Reel Awards

Posted on December 25, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 2024 nominations for the Black Reel Awards were announced on December 19th. The winners will be announced on February 10th.

OUTSTANDING FILM
“Challengers” | Luca Guadagnino, Rachel O’Connor, Amy Pascal & Zendaya, producers
“Exhibiting Forgiveness” | Stephanie Allain, Derek Cianfrance, Sean Cotton, Titus Kaphar & Jamie Patricof, producers
“Nickel Boys” | Joslyn Barnes, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner & David Levin, producers
“The Piano Lesson” | Todd Black & Denzel Washington, producers
“Sing Sing” | Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar & Monique Walton, producers

OUTSTANDING DOCUMENTARY (awarded to the director)
“Dahomey” | Mati Diop, director
“Daughters” | Angela Patton & Natalie Rae, directors
“Luther: Never Too Much” | Dawn Porter, director
“Piece by Piece” | Morgan Neville, director
“Seeking Mavis Beacon” | Jazmin Renée Jones, director

OUTSTANDING ENSEMBLE (awarded to the casting director)
“Exhibiting Forgiveness” | Kim Coleman, casting director
“Hard Truths” | Nina Gold, casting director
“Nickel Boys” | Victoria Thomas, casting director
“The Piano Lesson” | Lindsay Graham & Mary Vernieu, casting directors
“Sing Sing” | Greg Kwedar, casting director

OUTSTANDING INDEPENDENT FILM (awarded to the director)
“Albany Road” | Christine Swanson, director
“Blink Twice” | Zoë Kravitz, director
“Hard Truths” | Mike Leigh, director
“I Saw the TV Glow” | Jane Schoenbrun, director
“We Grown Now” | Minhal Baig, director

OUTSTANDING SHORT FILM (awarded to the director)
“Chocolate With Sprinkles” | Huriyyah Muhammad, director
“Mosiah” | Jirard, director
“On a Sunday at Eleven” | Alicia K. Harris, director
“Self” | Searit Kahsay Huluf, director
“Will I See You Again?” | Michael Perez-Lindsey, director

OUTSTANDING ORIGINAL SONG (awarded to the performers & writers)
“Bricks” from “Exhibiting Forgiveness” | Andra Day, performer; Andra Day & Jherek Bischoff, writers
“El Mal” from “Emilia Pérez” | Zoe Saldaña, Karla Sofía Gascón & Camille, performers; Clément Ducol, Camille & Jacques Audiard, writers
“The Journey” from “The Six Triple Eight” | H.E.R., performer; Dianne Warren, writer
“Like a Bird” from “Sing Sing” | Adrian Quesada & Abraham Alexander, performers; Adrian Quesada, Abraham Alexander & Brandon Marcel, writers
“Piece by Piece” from “Piece by Piece” | Pharrell Williams and Princess Anne High School Fabulous Marching Cavaliers, performers; Pharrell Williams, writer

OUTSTANDING SOUNDTRACK
“Bob Marley: One Love” – Tuff Gong / Island
“Mufasa: The Lion King” – Walt Disney Records
“Piece by Piece” – Columbia / I AM Other
“Wicked” – Republic / Verve
“The Wild Robot” – Black Lot Music

OUTSTANDING FIRST SCREENPLAY (awarded for the debut screenplay by a first-time writer)
“Blink Twice” | Zoë Kravitz
“Exhibiting Forgiveness” | Titus Kaphar
“Nickel Boys” | RaMell Moss
“Parallel” | Aldis & Edwin Hodge
“The Piano Lesson” | Malcolm Washington

OUTSTANDING CINEMATOGRAPHY
“Ernest Cole: Lost and Found” | Wolfgang Held & Moses Tau, cinematographers
“Luther: Never Too Much” | Bryan Gentry, cinematographer
“Nickel Boys” | Jomo Fray, cinematographer
“Rez Ball” | Kira Kelly, cinematographer
“Suncoast” | Bruce Francis Cole, cinematographer

OUTSTANDING COSTUME DESIGN
“The Book of Clarence” | Antoinette Messam, costume designer
“The Piano Lesson” | Francine Jamison-Tanchuck, costume designer
“Shirley” | Megan Coates, costume designer
“We Grown Now” | Courtney Wheeler, costume designer
“Wicked” | Paul Tazewell, costume designer

OUTSTANDING EDITING
“Daughters” | Adelina Bichis & Troy Lewis, editors
“Hard Truths” | Tania Reddin, editor
“Seeking Mavis Beacon” | Yeelen Nelson Cohen, Jon Fine & Jazmin Renée Jones, editors
“Twisters” | Terilyn A. Shropshire, editor
“We Grown Now” | Stephanie Filo, editor

OUTSTANDING HAIRSTYLING & MAKEUP
“Bob Marley: One Love” | Nadia Stacy & Carla Farmer
“The Book of Clarence” | Allison Lacour, Wayne Jolla Jr. & Yolanda Mercadel
“Nickel Boys” | Iganica Soto-Aguilar & Shandrea Williams
“The Piano Lesson” | Andrea ‘Mona’ Bowman & Para Shardé Malden
“Shirley” | Nakoya Yancey & Debi Young

OUTSTANDING PRODUCTION DESIGN
“Nickel Boys” | Nora Mendis (production designer), Elizabeth Herberg (art director) & Monique Champagne (set decorator)
“Nine” | Gilbert Ekow Ampah (production designer) & Edmund Johnson (set decorator)
“The Piano Lesson” | David J. Bomba (production designer), Chardae Adams (art director) & Patrick Cassidy (set decorator)

Set sail with the Moana 2 trailer!

Posted on May 31, 2024 by Leonard Wilson

(New York and the other TSL branches are covering for the Texas Division until power is restored. We wish the the best and hope for a speedy recovery. Coincidentally, my little brother’s just West of Dallas Ft. Worth, and I haven’t heard from him yet. Stay strong out there!)

It looks like Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) and Maui (Dwayne Johnson) are back for another adventure. While we aren’t given too many details as to what this entails, one major change will be the lack of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s involvement, musically. Fear not, as both Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear (known as Barlow & Bear, of course) have taken on musical duties. We’ll see where this takes us.

Moana 2 is due in theatres this November.

Monday Live Tweet Alert: Join Us For Fortune Dane and Skyscraper!

Posted on February 5, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in hosting a few weekly live tweets on twitter and occasion ally Mastodon. I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday, I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday, and I am one of the five hosts of Mastodon’s #MondayActionMovie ! Every week, we get together. We watch a movie. We snark our way through it.

Tonight, for #MondayActionMovie, the film will be Fortune Dane (1986), starring the great Carl Weathers!

Then, on twitter, #MondayMuggers will be showing 2018’s Skyscraper, starring Dwayne Johnson! The film is on Prime and it starts at 10 pm et!

It should make for a night of fun viewing and I invite all of you to join in. If you want to join the live tweets, just hop onto Mastodon, pull up Fortune Dane on YouTube, start the movie at 8 pm et, and use the #MondayActionMovie hashtag! Then switch over to twitter, pull Skyscraper up on Prime, and use the #MondayMuggers hashtag!

Enjoy!

Comic-Con 2022: Here’s The Teaser For Black Adam

Posted on July 23, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Along with the trailer for the new Shazam movie, a teaser for the upcoming Dwayne Johnson-starring Black Adam has been dropped at Comic-Con. And here it is!

Here’s The Trailer for Red Notice

Posted on October 21, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Earlier today, Leonard shared the trailer for Uncharted. At the same time that the Unchartered trailer was dropping, the trailer for Red Notice was being released as well. To be honest, I kind of suspect that they’re both the exact same film. Maybe Red Notice is the European edit….

No, actually, they’re both separate films. But judging from the trailer, they both appear to take place in the same cinematic universe. Anyway, Red Notice stars Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot as rival things who end up woring for an FBI profiler who is, of course, played by Dwayne Johnson. It’s always interesting to me that whenever you real life FBI agents, they’re always these kind of nebbish accountant types but whenever they show up in a movie, they’re always played Dwayne Johnson. Dwayne Johnson’s never had to keep track of his money because, if he ever did run out of cash, the people of the world would come together to send him as much extra money as they could. Everyone understands that the world would be a much worse place without Dwayne Johnson.

I guess Red Notice is a wacky comedy time and Netflix has a pretty uneven history when it comes to wacky comedy but I do like all three of the stars so who knows?

Here’s the trailer!

Black Adam is teased on the DCFanDome!

Posted on October 16, 2021 by Leonard Wilson

The DC Fandome is currently underway! DC and Warner Bros. are showcasing the lineup for some of their new movies, shows and video games. One of the first offerings was a peek into Black Adam, starring Dwayne Johnson. Black Adam was a long term project, as Johnson is an executive producer for Shazam!

With Black Adam playing as an adversary to Shazam!, that should make for an interesting battle. We’ll see when the movie releases next year.

The trailer comes by way of both the DC FanDome and IGN

Here’s The Trailer for Black Adam!

Posted on August 23, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I have no idea who Black Adam is or what to make of this trailer but here it is!

I guess the main theme of this trailer is “Dwayne Johnnson’s back and DC’s got him.”

Faster (2010, directed by George Tilllman, Jr.)

Posted on June 29, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

A man known as the Driver (played by Dwayne Johnson) is released from prison, having served time for taking part in a bank robbery. As soon as he gets his freedom, the Driver is jumping in a fast car, driving across Nevada and California, and killing everyone who he believes set him up and murdered his half-brother. The Driver has even made out list of the people on whom he needs to get revenge. Among those on the Driver’s list are a nightclub bouncer, a snuff film producer, an traveling evangelist, and one name that the Driver has not bothered to write down.

As the Driver conducts his killing spree, he is pursued by two other men who each have their own reason for wanting to find him. The Cop (Billy Bob Thornton) is close to retirement and has a heroin addiction. The Killer (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) is a hit man who views murder as a personal challenge and who plans to marry his girlfriend (Maggie Grace) as soon as he takes care of the Driver.

Today, we take Dwayne Johnson’s superstardom for granted so it’s interesting to go back and watch a movie like Faster, which was made when Johnson was still best known as a wrestler and there were still doubts about whether or not he had the screen presence to carry an entire film on his own. Though Johnson’s character is the main character and it’s his single-minded quest for revenge that propels the plot, the film spends as much time with the Cop and the Killer as it does with the Driver. The Driver doesn’t get much dialogue. Instead, the majority of the Driver’s scenes emphasize Johnson’s physical presence, casting him as the unstoppable hand of fate. Johnson doesn’t really get to show what he can do as an actor until nearly halfway through the film, when the Driver has an emotional meeting with his mother. Johnson acquits himself well in the scene but it’s still obvious that the film was made before people realized that Dwayne Johnson really could act.

Seen today, Faster is a relentless and exciting B-movie. It’s fast-paced and, even if it doesn’t give Johnson a chance to say much, it’s smart enough to surround him with memorable character actors like Billy Bob Thornton, Tom Berenger, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Carla Gugino. Even without a lot of dialogue, Dwayne Johnson is such an imposing figure and has so much screen presence that he dominates the film in a way that it’s hard to believe that there were ever any doubts about whether or not he could be a film star. Faster holds up well, as both an action movie and star-making vehicle for Dwayne Johnson.