Academy Award Contenders to be Announced
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In your own time gentlemen.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Must be company</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have a brother in the second battalion.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, sir.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're walking into a trap.</s>ALLEN: That right there -- the World War One epic "1917". It marched into the number one spot this weekend, at the U.S. box office, and fresh off its win at the Golden Globes. Expectations are that it will also do well at the Oscars. We'll soon find out how many nods it and other movies received with the nomination announcement just hours away. Journalist Sandro Monetti is with us from Los Angeles. He is editor in chief of "Hollywood International Filmmaker" magazine. All right. Sandro -- let's start with the big films this year. What are the favorites and what do you hope to see rack up the most nominations?</s>SANDRO MONETTI, EDITOR IN CHIEF, "HOLLYWOOD INTERNATIONAL FILMMAKER": Well, I think there are three leading contenders for the most nominations. "1917", the World War One drama, is the film with all the momentum going into the nominations. It was the last major release to come out and talk about saving the best for last, to me it is the favorite here. I can see it getting 10 or 11 nominations. I can definitely see Quentin Tarentino's film "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood", potentially leading the pack with 11, maybe 12 nominations. Also very much in the race, the early front runner, never a good place to be as Oscar history has shown us "The Irishman" which is Netflix's hope its first Best Picture Oscar. But that's kind of lost a bit of momentum in recent weeks. Could it be the first film since "Turning Point" and "The Color Purple" to get 11 nominations and zero winds? I can see it getting a lot of nominations, but it is losing track. So it is going to be very interesting to see what tops the field. Could it perhaps be "Joker", which led the pack at BAFTA --</s>MONETTI: -- nominations last week. We will find out early on Monday morning.</s>ALLEN: Well, there are a lot of previous Oscar winners in the mix for acting nominations -- Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks, Charlize Theron, Renee Zellweger. Are you expecting to see a lot of old favorites or some newer names among the nominees?</s>MONETTI: Yes, I'm expecting to see a lot of old favorites especially in the Best Actor category, where there are some real industry heavyweights there. But it will be interesting to see if a couple of industry favorites mainly known for comedy films, are able to break in. Eddie Murphy, for "Dolomite is My Name", Adam Sandler for "Uncut Gems" getting a lot of buzz as well. But DiCaprio and De Niro look like locks. So to does Joaquin Phoenix slight frontrunner for "Joker". And on the actress side it's Renee Zellweger's to lose. At the moment she seems untouchable, but who will the rest of the nominees be? We'll find out. I've got Oscar fever. It's so exciting.</s>ALLEN: Oh, my, goodness we are in the season, aren't we. Britain's BAFTA though nominations were announced last week and they were roundly criticized for nominating all white actors and all male directors. Are we likely to see any more diversity at the Oscars this year?</s>MONETTI: That is a huge disappointment, by the way, especially as BAFTA has been very much a leader in encouraging more diversity in all its programs and film education classes. But it did not translate to the membership. And we have had the Oscar so White controversy, now the academy has moved to address that. They have promised to double the number of minority and female members by 2020. And they have hugely increased the membership and the voting membership to now approximately 9,000. So whether this will be reflected in more people of color getting nominations, let's hope so. There are certainly many deserving candidates in there. The makeup of the academy vote basically used to be old white guys. Now it is 32 percent female, it's 16 percent minority and by changing the numbers will they change the game? It's going to be one of the most fascinating things to watch when the envelopes are open.</s>ALLEN: All right. And I also want to ask you, there was a big controversy last year when the academy proposing quickly dropped an idea for a new popular film category. Are this year's most popular films that might have been nominated in that category like "Avengers Endgame" or "Star Wars" going to get any love in the mainstream categories?</s>MONETTI: Absolutely not. So yes, that's been -- it's a good point, though, because there has been a big disconnect between what audiences are seeing at movie theaters and what, you know, is being awarded by the Oscar voters. You know, there has sometimes been a situation, I can think of examples like "Titanic" and "Lord of the Rings, Return of the King" when that has changed. But more often than not it is the critics and the industry favorites which tend to get rewarded with Oscar votes. And I expect we will look for more of the same in the morning.</s>ALLEN: Blockbusters at the box office does not mean always an Oscar. All right we will talk with you again once they are out. Sandro -- thank you so much. Sandro Monetti.</s>MONETTI: Thank you.</s>ALLEN: I'm signing off. I nominate Rosemary Church to continue our news next.