What Do Moviegoers Really Think of the 2024 Oscar Nominees?
Margot Robbie was robbed and other findings from The Wall Street Journal’s third annual Oscars poll
We polled 4,404 adults in the U.S. on their thoughts about this year’s award show and its nominees. ILLUSTRATION: NICOLAS ORTEGA, GETTY IMAGES (2)
By John Jurgensen and Kevin McAllister,March 8, 2024 10:00 am ET
Barbenheimer is hitting the Oscars, where both movies in the blockbuster combo are up for best picture. But which one did actual moviegoers like best? Do they really think Margot Robbie’s performance as the iconic doll got snubbed in the nominations? Oh, and where do people stand on the three-hour issue (aka are movies like “Killers of the Flower Moon” too long)?
With official verdicts from the film world about to come down at the 96th Academy Awards on Sunday, we wanted to hear what movie consumers actually thought about the big debates around this year’s award show and its nominees.
In our third annual poll about the Oscar field and the state of moviegoing, The Wall Street Journal and Morning Consult, a data intelligence company, polled 4,404 adults in the U.S. between Feb. 24 and 26. People picked sides between “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” and weighed in on the eight other nominees for best picture. There were smaller contenders they liked (huzzahs for “The Holdovers”), some they liked less (crickets for “Maestro”) and some they hadn’t even heard of (blanking on “The Zone of Interest”).
When it’s atomic bomb vs. blonde bombshell, bomb wins
About one third of the ‘Barbie’ and ‘Oppenheimer’ viewers we surveyed saw both films on the same day. PHOTO: CHRIS PIZZELLO/AP
Remember that rare kumbaya moment for Hollywood, when Barbenheimer yielded two blockbusters linked by a release date and a combined $2.4 billion at the global box office? The double-feature phenomenon was legit: about one third of the “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” viewers we surveyed saw both films on the same day.
Now that they are rivals for Oscar gold, moviegoers had a clear favorite: “Oppenheimer.”
Christopher Nolan’s biopic on the father of the atomic bomb (played by Cillian Murphy) ranked No. 1 in our survey in three categories: its quality level, how much people enjoyed it and whether it deserves to win an Oscar.
Men were particularly smitten with the historical epic, with 90% of male viewers saying they enjoyed the film. Women rallied more to “Barbie”—82% enjoyed the color-saturated road-trip movie, which was in a virtual tie at the top with “Killers of the Flower Moon” (81%), “The Holdovers” (81%) and “Oppenheimer” (79%).
Best-picture nominees ranked
[charts with results from interviewing 4,404 adults not included]
Viewers call ‘Barbie’ Oscar-worthy. High quality? Not so much.
“Barbie” was the box-office superstar of 2023, grossing $1.4 billion in ticket sales worldwide, but people we polled were divided on its quality level. In the survey, the movie came in last place on the question of its quality. Yet it ranked second only to “Oppenheimer” as the nominee most deserving of an Oscar. That suggests there is something about “Barbie,” from its ambitious approach to intellectual property to its female-empowerment message, that people deem award-worthy.
‘Killers’ isn’t counted out, but it was curtains for ‘Maestro’
’Maestro’ came fourth in our tally of the most-seen movies but ranked as the least enjoyable of the nominees. PHOTO: NETFLIX/EVERETT COLLECTION
Martin Scorsese’s saga about a dark chapter in American history, “Killers of the Flower Moon,” ranked third in our survey among the best-picture nominees in almost every category, from how many people had seen it, to how many had enjoyed it.
“Maestro,” the Leonard Bernstein biopic, starring and directed by Bradley Cooper and released on Netflix, came fourth after “Killers” in our tally of the most-seen movies, yet it ranked as the least enjoyable of the nominees.
Oscar recognition doesn’t equal name recognition
Just one in four people surveyed had heard about ‘The Holdovers.’ Among those who saw the film, 85% enjoyed it. PHOTO: FOCUS FEATURES/EVERETT COLLECTION
In the shadow of the high-profile nominees there were some charmers—that is, for people aware that these movies exist.
Just one in four people surveyed had heard at least something about “The Holdovers,” Alexander Payne’s dramedy set at a boarding school during holiday break in the 1970s. But among those who actually saw the film, 85% enjoyed it, putting “The Holdovers” second only to “Oppenheimer” on the likability scale.
“Anatomy of a Fall,” too, was a (deep) sleeper. Seven out of 10 people surveyed had heard nothing about the movie, a French drama starring nominee Sandra Hüller as a woman who shoved her husband out a window (or did she?). The twisty, open-ended thriller worked for those viewers, who pushed “Anatomy of a Fall” into fourth place for enjoyment and quality in our survey.
Other nominees vying for the biggest prize at the Oscars were even more obscure to people we polled. “Past Lives,” about two people’s relationship across time and countries, and “The Zone of Interest,” about a Nazi family’s daily life next to the Auschwitz concentration camp, ranked ninth and 10th, respectively, in viewership.
30-somethings are most cinema savvy
Millennials were more informed about movies, having heard or read about the best picture nominees at a higher rate than other generations, including the relatively obscure “Poor Things” (32%), a woman’s freaky tale of self-actualization, and “Past Lives” (30%).
Gen Z came next in movie awareness, but when asked to pick favorites, these younger viewers mainly had eyes for “Barbie”: 41% said “Barbie” deserved to take home the Oscar hardware. “Oppenheimer” was Gen Z’s No. 2 pick at 21%, but no other best picture candidate mustered more than 5% among young viewers.
Margot Robbie is the best-actress favorite. Too bad she isn’t nominated.
Even though she isn’t nominated, men and women in equal numbers agreed that Margot Robbie most deserved the award for best actress. PHOTO: WARNER BROS. PICTURES
When the “Barbie” star is included alongside the list of actresses who are actually in contention for best actress, Robbie comes out on top with 25% of people saying she deserves the award. What’s more, men and women agree on this point, picking her in roughly equal numbers as most deserving of the win.
These results echo the indignation many “Barbie” fans felt when Robbie didn’t receive an acting nod back in January. As a producer of “Barbie,” however, Robbie is one of the movie’s four nominees for best picture.
Behind Robbie, Lily Gladstone (“Killers of the Flower Moon”) and Emma Stone (“Poor Things”) are neck and neck in our poll, and Oscars experts say this is one of Sunday’s tightest races.
Greta Gerwig seems to represent yet another snub: She wasn’t nominated for directing “Barbie.” And some 17% of our respondents said Gerwig deserved to win best director (had she been nominated), which put her at No. 2 in our survey behind Nolan (22%) and ahead of Scorsese (13%). Gerwig was nominated for best adapted screenplay with her ‘Barbie’ co-writer and husband, Noah Baumbach.
Viewers prefer Leonardo DiCaprio to Paul Giamatti, but Cillian Murphy comes out on top
Some award prognosticators think Paul Giamatti could pull off a best-actor upset for his role as a curmudgeonly teacher in “The Holdovers.”
Regular viewers aren’t having it: Only 6% of people in our survey supported Giamatti’s quest for his first Oscar win; 24% said Cillian Murphy should win for his depiction of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer. The second-place pick (at 15%) was Leonardo DiCaprio, who plays a deadly schemer in “Killers of the Flower Moon.” One problem: Like Robbie, DiCaprio wasn’t nominated.
Three-hour movies are too long, but offer more bang for the buck
Moviegoers in our survey were divided on jumbo run times. PHOTO: PARAMOUNT/EVERETT COLLECTION
Two of the best picture nominees, “Killers of the Flower Moon” and “Oppenheimer,” clocked in at more than three hours, reigniting a long-running debate about the stress that marathon movies put on the attention spans and bladders of viewers.
Moviegoers in our survey were divided on jumbo run times. A slight majority, 52%, say three hours is too long for a movie, while one-third disagree. But nearly half of respondents, 48%, had a different perspective, saying they got more for their money from longer films, compared with 33% who felt otherwise.
Men agreed with that value proposition more than women (53% versus 44%).
Millennials and people in Gen Z showed support for the traditional theatrical experience by being more likely to say that three-hour movies are best experienced in a movie theater compared with Gen Xers and Baby Boomers.
The Oscars are at least three hours. Will people watch that?
Viewership for the Academy Awards was up last year to its highest level since the pandemic, but the existential crisis rolls on for awards shows in general. Boomers were most likely to write off the Oscars completely, with nearly half in our survey (47%) saying they didn’t plan to tune in for anything Oscar-related this year at all.
Millennials were relatively gung ho about the ritual compared with the public at large: One-third said they plan to watch at least some of the Oscars coverage live on Sunday, be that red carpet, the ceremony hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, or both.
By comparison, younger movie consumers also seem interested—up to a point: 16% of Gen Z respondents said they didn’t plan to watch the Oscars live but would keep tabs on happenings in the ceremony via social media.
Write to John Jurgensen at John.Jurgensen@wsj.com and Kevin McAllister at kevin.mcallister@wsj.com
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