Historic firsts: Minari Oscar nod just made the Best Picture race a nail biter

This year’s Oscars was supposed to be a tidy affair, with the same frontrunners, Nomadland, Mank and The Trial of Chicago 7 contending for Best Picture, with Chloé Zhao’s Nomadland sure to beat out the competition just like it has everywhere else. Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari was predicted to neatly fall into the International Featured Film category as the determined leader.

This is how it went down at the 2021 Golden Globes, where the film — with mostly Korean dialogue — took home the Best Foreign Language Film award. The autobiographical drama about Chung’s own childhood roots growing up on a rural Arkansas farm, Minari won both the top audience prize as well as the U.S. Dramatic grand jury award at the 2020’s Sundance Film Festival. Many consider it the best film to come out of 2020.

The refreshing choice to include Minari — starring The Walking Dead’s Steven Yeun, as well as Yeri Han, Alan Kim, Noel Kate Cho, Will Patton and Yuh-Jung Youn, has made the Best Picture competition a heated race. Minari may steal Nomadland’s assured status as everyone’s favorite pick, and may end up the surprise winner on Oscar night. Both films exemplify exceptionally poignant storytelling and I, myself, am torn between the two. Although, my heart also leans towards The Father, my favorite film from last year.

It’s a welcome surprise that Minari is included in the coveted main category. As one of the best films of the year — if not the best — it is in the category it deserves.

More historic firsts for Minari

Minari continued to make history with its Oscars nominations beyond Best Picture. Steven Yeun also became the first Asian-American to be nominated for Best Actor for his portrayal of Korean father, Jacob, in a heartfelt tale that illustrates the “American dream” in rural 1980s Arkansas.

Yeun will have stiff competition between Chadwick Boseman (Ma Rainy’s Black Bottom) and Anthony Hopkins (The Father). Boseman is likely to win — he’s cleaned up at the other awards ceremonies with the posthumous win — but this in no way takes away from Yeun giving the performance of his career, a much more nuanced portrayal than he was ever allowed to display on The Walking Dead.

Joining Yeun in historic achievement is his co-star Yuh-Jung Youn, the first South Korean actress to be nominated for Best Supporting Actress.

History for female directors

For the first time in Oscars history, more than one woman was nominated in the Best Director category: Nomadland’s Chloé Zhao and Promising Young Woman’s Emerald Fennell (who we also love as a young Camilla Parker-Bowles on The Crown).

The Golden Globes had nominated a third in this section, Regina King (One Night in Miami), and we were also hoping she would make the Academy Awards list for her engaging film. However, the Oscars fell one short from that historic achievement.

Still, we’re celebrating the overwhelmingly deserved nods for Zhao and Fennell. And if it’s any consolation to King, The Trail of Chicago 7’s Alan Sorkin was another surprising omission. Minari’s Lee Isaac Chung also made the list here, and could cause a possible upset, although my money is still on Zhao continuing her sweep of director nods all the way to the end of awards season.

The surprising leader of nominations is Netflix’s Mank (with 11), a black and white stylistic film based on the screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz’s experience writing the screenplay for Citizen Kane. Although it has the most Oscar nods, I would be very surprised that this translates into major wins, except for perhaps cinematography (which was stunning). Not to say it wasn’t a captivating drama or that Gary Oldman doesn’t turn in another excellent performance: He does. But Minari and Nomadland tell stories of such intimate, beautiful truth that speaks to our shared humanity, it will be difficult to watch any other movie walk away with the statue.

The 93rd Academy Awards will air live on Sunday, April 25, starting at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.

Who surprised you the most among the nominees? Who do you feel was left out? What are your Oscars predictions? Share your thoughts and drop me a line.