The Academy Awards 2026

The Academy Awards ceremony has come and gone. We watch it very year, not slavishly, but with mild anticipation and curiosity, hoping the clips will be long and the production numbers short.

This year was a good one, right from the beginning, on the red carpet, where the breathy interviewers asked intelligent questions, mostly ignoring who made the gowns, and the stars mostly responded in kind.

Conan O’Brien handled his responsibilities well as MC, in the best Johnny Carson tradition, reaching neither the highs of Bob Hope and Billy Crystal nor descending to the lows of David Letterman and Kid Rock.

The tributes to Rob Reiner and Robert Redford were sincere and touching. The comedy skit about repetitive dialogue aimed at distracted viewers was hilarious. And to top it all off, the run of nominated films was good. Well, I only saw half of them, but I liked what I saw.

If someone asked me to rank them, I’d put them like this:

One Battle After Another. An adventure comedy with numerous twists and turns and an exquisite visual flow, marred only by the absurd overacting of Sean Penn as a deranged military man.

Marty Supreme. A good old-fashioned bildungsroman with lots of energy and color and an annoying protagonist. (Well, Citizen Kane was also annoying and abrasive. And when was Jack Nicholson not annoying?)  

Sentimental Value. A wandering family drama with three acting nominees including an Oscar-worthy performance by Stellan Skarsgård. (The question in my mind remains: by the end of the film, had Dad really changed?)

Hamnet. A “small” film with a single theme, but emotionally affecting.

Sinners. Many parts of it looked like a filmed theatrical performance, which isn’t good. It reminded me of the Saturday matinees I used to go to at the Avalon Theater in White Bear Lake when I was twelve. In short, hokey and over-the-top, yet fun.

After decades of movie-going, one thing I’m convinced of is this: However you imagine a film, based on reviews, clips, or word-of-mouth, it’s likely to be different … and richer, than you expected. Even if it’s bad, it’s likely to be bad in ways you never imagined.

What’s next on the list? It Was Just an Accident? or The Secret Agent?