Bite-sized Reviews

'Mank', 'My Octopus Teacher': Six Oscar contenders you can stream now

21 March 2021 - 00:01
By tymon smith AND Tymon Smith
Viola Davis in 'Ma Rainey's Black Bottom', one of several Oscar-nominated films you can stream on Netflix.
Image: Netflix Viola Davis in 'Ma Rainey's Black Bottom', one of several Oscar-nominated films you can stream on Netflix.

With 2021's Oscar nominations announced, it's time to catch up with the films that will battle it out for Hollywood's highest accolade on April 25.

Plus, this year's nomination list features movies you can watch right now from the comfort of your home:

MANK

Leading the race with 10 nominations, David Fincher's labour of love about the making of Orson Welles's legendary Citizen Kane is told through the story of his alcoholic collaborator Herman Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman, in his third Oscar-nominated performance). It's an evocative love letter to the golden age of Hollywood and one of its unsung mavericks.

Read our full review of this film here.

Where to stream it: Netflix

MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM

Chadwick Boseman's final performance earned him a posthumous Best Actor nomination, and Viola Davis earned her fourth Oscar nomination, putting her in line to become the first woman of colour to win two Oscars.

Read our review of the film here.

Where to stream it: Netflix

SOUND OF METAL 

Riz Ahmed gives a Best Actor-nominated performance in this moving and technically innovative story of a heavy metal drummer who loses his hearing. It is also nominated in the Best Picture category.

Where to stream it: Amazon Prime Video

THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7

Aaron Sorkin's tale of the absurdities of the Nixon government's attempts to silence those who took their protest against the Vietnam War to the streets of Chicago in 1968 earned the Oscar-winning screenwriter a fourth nomination and his first for Best Original Screenplay, as well as a Best Supporting Actor nod for Sacha Baron Cohen, a Best Picture nomination and three other nominations.

Read our full review of this film here.

Where to stream it: Netflix

HILLBILLY ELEGY

Ron Howard's sentimental adaptation of the bestselling book by JD Vance was widely slated, but it has earned an eighth nomination for Glenn Close. Whether or not the academy will give it to her for the best part of a mediocre film remains to be seen.

Where to stream it: Netflix

MY OCTOPUS TEACHER

Love it or hate it, everyone was talking about South African filmmaker Craig Foster's documentary chronicle of his love affair with a cephalopod he befriended in the kelp forest off the coast of his Cape Town home. It moved the academy enough to earn it a place in the final running for this year's Best Documentary feature.

Where to stream it: Netflix