On Tuesday, Jan. 22nd, the highly anticipated award nominees were revealed for the 91st annual Oscars. The excitement continues to rise as we get closer to the date of the most important night for the film industry.

One of the most controversial topics this year is the the host. Kevin Hart was originally set to be this years host, but later dropped out after homophobic tweets surfaced. He states that he does not want to be a distraction on a night that should be celebrated by so many amazing and talented artists and since then, there has been no set host.

Many outstanding motion pictures are included in this years academy award nominations with Roma and The Favourite leading with 10 each.  Both films have been nominated for best picture, as well as Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, A Star Is Born, Vice and Green Book.

One of the most talked about films this year is A Star Is Born. The movie is centered around a singer-songwriter, Jackson, who falls in love with struggling musician, Ally. Jack puts her in the spotlight, but as her career takes off, they face many obstacles in the relationship as Jack is an alcoholic. These roles are portrayed by singer, Lady Gaga as well as Bradley Cooper, who also directs the movie. Gaga received her first ever acting nomination from portraying Ally in the movie. She has also been nominated for Best Original Song, “Shallow”. Gaga is only the second person to ever get nominations in those two categories for the same movie.  Although Cooper is up for best actor, some believe Bradley Cooper got snubbed with the best director and best editing awards, both of which people think should have been easy pickups.

The contenders for this year’s directors are Alfonso Cuarón with Roma, Spike Lee with BlacKkKlansman, Paweł Pawlikowski with Cold War, Yorgos Lanthimos with The Favourite, and Adam McKay with Vice.

Netflix has received 15 nominations this year, 10 of which are for the autobiographical drama, Roma. This film is the first ever Netflix movie to be nominated for best film. The film about director Alfonso Cuarón’s upbringing in Mexico City and is the first ever Netflix movie to be nominated for best film.

Black Panther has also made film history. With seven nominations, the Marvel movie is the first superhero movie to be nominated for best film and is also nominated in many technical categories including Best Original Song, Best Original Score, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing, Best Costume Design and Best Production Design at this year’s Oscars.

The best actress race includes Glenn Close who picked up her 7th Academy Award nomination for best actress in The Wife, who is going up against Lady Gaga, Melissa McCarthy for Can You Ever Forgive Me?, Olivia Colman for The Favourite and Yalitza Aparicio for Roma.

As for the best actors, The nominees are Christian Bale as Dick Cheney in Vice, Bradley Cooper, Willem Dafoe as Vincent Van Gogh in At Eternity’s Gate, and Viggo Mortensen in Green Book. Many critics see a clear frontrunner for this category, which is Rami Malek after his outstanding performance as Queens Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody.

The films up for best Animated Feature are Japanese inspired Isle of Dogs, time travel film Mirai, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, as well as sequel movies, Incredibles 2 and Ralph Breaks the Internet. Predictions for this category are close between Incredibles 2 and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, but Spiderman has a majority of the critics after winning both Golden Globes and Producers Guild award. The movie is based on the Marvel Comics character Miles Morales.

The ceremony date for this years Oscars is February 24th and will air on ABC at 7pm.