Image via Complex Original
With the 88th Academy Awards drawing near, the race to watch as many of the nominated films as possible is already in motion. While many are still making the rounds in theaters—some haven’t even gotten distribution yet—a handful are currently available to watch. We picked the 10 best films up for Oscars that you can now watch from the comfort of your own home, before the show on Feb. 28.
Spotlight
Director: Tom McCarthy
Release Date: Nov. 6, 2015
This dramatized retelling of the true-life effort to expose the Roman Catholic Church for covering up years of child molestation is a riveting look into the complicated world of investigative journalism. Spotlight follows a special unit at the Boston Globe named Spotlight. It consists of a crack team of reporters and editors (played by Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, and more), who slowly untangle a decades-long history of abuse, tearing apart the Massachusetts capital’s tightknit community.
Inside Out
Director: Pete Docter, Ronnie del Carmen
Release Date: June 19, 2015
Pixar’s latest animated feat comes in the form of Inside Out, which follows a young girl grappling with the hardship of moving with her family to San Francisco from Minnesota. Though she’s the film’s true protagonist, it centers on five characters, each of whom represent a different emotional response within the mind. They control the girl’s core memories and supply her with the appropriate reaction to developing circumstances around her. Stellar voice acting from Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, and Mindy Kaling is a selling point, but it’s the story’s heart-wrenching moral conclusion that a personality depends on balance that makes it a must-watch for all ages.
Mad Max: Fury Road
Director: George Miller
Release Date: May 15, 2015
A visual masterpiece, Mad Max: Fury Road serves as the fourth installment in the post-apocalyptic series, this time bringing it to dazzling new heights. Tom Hardy stars as the steel-faced title role. After escaping from his perch as a blood-donor slave, he joins forces with the reluctant Imperior Furiosa (Charlize Theron) as they attempt to transport a tyrant’s five wives to safety. The compelling story is breathless and gallantly paced, while Miller’s mind-warping action sequences in the beige desert are simply divine.
Amy
Director: Asif Kapadia
Release Date: July 10, 2015
One of the most unique voices of her generation, Amy Winehouse burned brightly in the spotlight with her jazz-inflected debut Frank and its career-defining follow-up Back to Black. Winehouse grappled with her personal demons both publically and privately as her profile continued to rise until her untimely death in 2011. Asif Kapadia’s intensely personal documentary Amy spans the short life of the late British songstress, tracing her trajectory with never-before-seen footage, interviews with those closest to her, and an expectedly voluptuous soundtrack, making for one of the most affecting films of the year.
Ex Machina
Director: Alex Garland
Release Date: April 10, 2015
One of the most imaginative sci-fi thrillers of the year, Ex Machina is squared on the life of a software mogul (Oscar Isaac) who succeeds in creating an artificial intelligence that’s so human it thinks for itself. One of his programmers, played by Domhnall Gleeson, goes to his secluded home to determine the extent of her humanity, only to establish a relationship with the being and attempt to free her from imprisonment. It’s a wildly thought-provoking movie, one that blurs the moral distinction between the value of man’s life and that of a robot.
The Martian
Director: Ridley Scott
Release Date: Oct. 2, 2015
With The Martian, Ridley Scott pairs glorious cinematography that craftily imagines the landscape of Mars with the horrifying scenario of being left behind there during a space mission. Matt Damon plays astronaut Mark Watney, who is swept away in a storm that forces his crew to blast off and head back for Earth, assuming he died in the process. But he wisely uses his scientific knowledge to connect with NASA and build his own crops on the red planet, leading to an anxious rescue mission to bring him home.
Straight Outta Compton
Director: F. Gary Gray
Release Date: Aug. 11, 2015
As one of the pioneering groups of rap music, N.W.A. gets the biopic treatment in F. Gary Gray’s succinct, explicit telling of the West Coast collective’s career, from its 1986 inception to its inevitable disbandment years later. Straight Outta Compton does a striking job of capturing several milestone moments in the group’s history—a police raid on their Detroit concert in 1989, Ice Cube and Dr. Dre’s solo ventures, its corrupt management issues—and cements their status as leaders in changing the discourse of hip-hop during the early ’90s.
Bridge of Spies
Director: Steven Spielberg
Release Date: Oct. 16, 2015
Steven Spielberg’s historical drama zooms in on the tense relations between the Soviets and Americans during the Cold War. Bridge of Spies focuses on the trade of suspected spies between countries and the negotiations to bring each captive back to home terrain. Tom Hanks turns in a predictably spot-on performance, serving as a lawyer who trusts his instincts in the battle to fight for what he believes is the fair exchange between the two countries.
Sicario
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Release Date: Sept. 18, 2015
The harrowing Sicario is a stern depiction of the FBI’s attempt to take down the leader of a Mexican drug cartel. While it’s a story that has previously been tackled in several action-thrillers, the film succeeds in its multi-pronged examination of the agents and their respective motives and perspectives, showing the various ways that a diverse group of professionals react to life-threatening situations. Emily Blunt’s nuanced performance lends the pic a deeper side, countering the sinister, elusive Benicio del Toro, who steals the film with his rigid remove.
Shaun the Sheep Movie
Director: Mark Burton, Richard Starzak
Release Date: Aug. 5, 2015
A spinoff of Wallace and Gromat, Shaun the Sheep established its presence in the United Kingdom as a stop-animation television series that’s already four seasons deep. For the big screen adaptation, the sheep accidentally send their rural farm owner into the big city, where he gets amnesia and forgets about his life back home. Intent on restoring his memory, the flock heads out in search of him, dodging a pesky animal-control specialist along the way. The film’s charm and British wit earned it numerous nominations and awards, including Best Animated Film by the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards and Best Movie: UK at the 2015 Golden Tomato Awards.