The Early Best Picture Shortlist: And why four films with semicolons in the title are front runners for Best Picture

Is anyone up for a Friday night screening of Triangle of Sadness? Perhaps Bones and All, a little meet-cute cannibal love story starring Timothée Chalamet? Tar? Avatar? Anyone?

If Oscar season films haven't captured your interest, you're not alone. It's been a pretty bummer movie at the cinema and with most fall prestige films falling flat, it looks like the Oscar Best Picture nomination list could seriously include sequels to Top Gun, Black Panther, Knives Out and Avatar — I'm not kidding.

Usually, by Thanksgiving weekend I'd have a good list for you to guide you through the films to choose from. It's a little tougher this year, but here's a roundup of the films in discussion for the most unusual prestige-film season that I can recall:

THE WAY-TOO-EARLY BEST PICTURE SHORTLIST

These top five:

The Banshees of Inisherin 

Everything Everywhere All at Once

The Fabelmans

Top Gun: Maverick 

Women Talking 

Plus five of these:
A Man Called Otto

Avatar: The Way of Water

Babylon

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever 

Elvis 
Emancipation

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery 
She Said 

Tár 

Till 

Triangle of Sadness 

The Woman King 

Films about Hollywood
The Fablemans, loosely based on Steven Speilberg's life is a front-runner for Best Picture and multiple nominations. It opens on Thanksgiving weekend. Damien Chazelle's (Whiplash, La La Land) Babylon plants Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie in 1920s Hollywood and opens Christmas weekend. Babylon has mixed early reviews but everyone seems to agree on Robbie's standout performance.

#METOO
Women Talking, directed by Sarah Polley, centers on women in a religious colony and stars Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley, Judith Ivey, Ben Whishaw, and Frances McDormand. Not sure this is timed smartly, but it opens Christmas weekend. She Said, tells a recent story, abuse allegations against powerful Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein and the dawn of the #MeToo movement. She Said opened in theaters this week. In The Woman King, Viola Davis leads a group of all-female warriors to protect the African kingdom of Dahomey.

Musicians
Tár follows the story of fictional composer and conductor Lydia Tár, portrayed by Cate Blanchett. It is available on VOD. And from last summer and playing on HBOMax, Elvis starring Austin Butler is still shaking up the Best Picture race.

The Blockbuster: Sequels
ABC TV Network, home to the Oscars show, is probably the happiest with this news, but with a light turnout of prestige fare, Top Gun: Maverick, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery and Avatar: The Way of Water. That's a lot of semicolons.

Let's Get Serious
Apple's slavery film, Emancipation, starring Will Smith, and Sony's A Man Called Otto remake with Tom Hanks as the grumpy old man will be released in December with potential for nominations. Same for Till, the story of Mamie Till-Mobley's relentless pursuit of justice for her 14-year-old son, Emmett Till, who was brutally lynched. None of them have the unfortunate title of Triangle of Sadness, however. It's in the running for a nomination as well.

The Standouts
Fingers crossed that a documentary, Good Night Oppy, could replace a sequel.

The Banshees of Inisherin, a dark comedy set in Ireland and staring Colin Farrell, and Everything Everywhere All at Once, a sci-fi starring Michelle Yeohwere were standouts in the year and more traditionally what you'd expect to see in a Best Picture list— and are both Ten Buck-worthy.