Who is hosting?
This year’s host, Nikki Glaser, is a stand-up comedian and actor best known for Trainwreck, I Feel Pretty and Nikki Glaser: Someday You’ll Die, for which she is nominated for an award at the Globes for the first time.
Glaser has hosted reality TV shows such as F Boy Island and Not Safe with Nikki Glaser, and starred in her own reality show called Welcome Home Nikki Glaser?.
Her predecessor, US comedian Jo Koy, was roundly panned for his approach last year.
Who are the nominees?
Jacques Audiard’s film Emilia Pérez leads the nominations with a record-breaking 10 nods this year (one more than Barbie last year), including for best musical or comedy, best foreign language film, best screenplay, best actress in a musical or comedy, best director and two nominations for best supporting actress.
Three films nominated for best drama are also up for multiple nominations, including Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, starring Timothee Chalamet, with three nominations.
Conclave, which follows a cardinal who unravels scandals about papal candidates, is up for six awards, and The Brutalist, which follows a fictional Hungarian architect (Adrien Brody) as he escapes the Holocaust and rebuilds his life in America, has seven, including best supporting actor for Guy Pearce.
The Bear, starring Jeremy Allen White, once again leads in the television race with five nominations after the highly anticipated third season aired this year on Disney+. Co-star Ayo Edebiri is nominated for best performance by an actress in a television series for the musical or comedy genre.
Australians Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Naomi Watts are all nominated, as is Adam Elliot’s Memoir of a Snail, for best animated movie.
Kidman is up for best performance by an actress in a motion picture and drama for Babygirl, in which she plays a chief executive who becomes entangled in an affair with a young intern (Harris Dickinson). In the same category, Pamela Anderson has landed her first Golden Globe nomination, for The Last Showgirl.
Clockwise from top left: Guy Pearce in The Brutalist; Naomi Watts in Feud: Capote vs. The Swans; Cate Blanchett in Disclaimer; and Nicole Kidman in Babygirl.Credit: Artwork by Aresna Villaneuva
Blanchett is nominated for best performance by a female actor in a limited series for the psychological thriller Disclaimer. She is up against Watts for her role as American socialite Babe Paley in the critically acclaimed Feud: Capote vs. The Swans.
There are 26 first-time nominees, including Ariana Grande for Wicked, Dakota Fanning for Ripley, Seth Meyers for Seth Meyers: Dad Man Walking, and Zoe Saldaña for Emilia Pérez.
Why were the Golden Globes controversial?
In 2021, the Los Angeles Times published an exposé on the awards accusing its voting body, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, of – among other things – having a diversity problem. Not a single member was black.
In 2023, the association sold its assets to Eldridge Industries, owned by billionaire investor Todd Boehly, and Dick Clark Productions, part of Penske Media. The 334-member Golden Globes voting body now comprises entertainment journalists representing 85 countries.
What have our critics said about the nominees?
Anora: ★★★★
“American writer-director Sean Baker is an expert in creating semi-programmed mayhem – a talent that has made him a great hit on the festival circuit. His latest film, Anora, is typical of his style,” writes Sandra Hall.
“The winner of this year’s Palme d’Or at Cannes, it shines with inspired bits of improvisation delivered by a cast so spirited that anything seems possible.”
Dune: Part Two: ★★★
“In Dune: Part Two, based on the second half of Frank Herbert’s cult science-fiction novel, writer-director Denis Villeneuve dives straight in, trusting his audience will recall where he left off in 2021.” – Read Jake Wilson’s full review here.
Challengers: ★★
“Challengers is supposed to be about tennis. Cast as players on the pro circuit, its three leads speak of the sport with a fervour bordering on the religious.” – Read Sandra Hall’s full review here.
A Real Pain: ★★★½
“Jesse Eisenberg was not a good choice to play Superman villain Lex Luthor, nor has he had much luck since with extending his acting range.
“Now entering his forties, he’s still most at home playing anxious adolescent types, inwardly focused yet hyper-sensitive to slights.” – Read Jake Wilson’s full review here.
The Substance: ★★★½
“‘Death to subtlety’ appears to be the motto of Coralie Fargeat, the French writer-director of The Substance, an audaciously morbid satire on Hollywood, the beauty industry, and the dream of eternal youth. There are drawbacks to this approach, but it does ensure the images stick in your mind: a chrome orange corridor out of a Hanna-Barbera version of The Shining, or Dennis Quaid as a good ol’ boy TV executive leering into the camera, misogyny oozing from his pores.” – Read Jake Wilson’s full review here.
Wicked: ★★★★
“Working from a screenplay co-written by Winnie Holzman, one of the musical’s creators, [Jon M. Chu] has taken a successfully radical approach to the show, smoothing out the kinks in the narrative by spreading it across two films (part two will be with us in November).” – Read Sandra Hall’s full review here.
Several of the nominated films have yet to be released in Australia. The Bob Dylan biopic starring Timothee Chalamet, A Complete Unknown, comes out on January 23.
The Brutalist, the first film in decades to be entirely shot in VistaVision – the format of classics such as Vertigo – will be released on January 23; Conclave is due out on January 9; September 5 will be released on February 6; and Emilia Pérez comes out on January 16. A release date for Nickel Boy is to be determined.
Find out the next TV, streaming series and movies to add to your must-sees. Get The Watchlist delivered every Thursday.
