The 89th Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, is one of entertainment’s most prestige honor for all of Hollywood’s key players.

Every year, the Oscar nominees are announced in standard fashion– an announcement ceremony in front of a live audience. However, this year’s nominees were announced in a way completely new to the Academy Awards. This year’s award contenders were named via a global livestream.

Current Oscar winners and nominees alike such as Jennifer Hudson, Jason Reitman, and Brie Larson were some of the stars used to announce the films being honored at this year’s Academy Awards.

Check out the full list below and be sure to watch the 89th Academy Awards hosted by Jimmy Kimmel on Feb. 26.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

• Mahershala Ali, Moonlight
• Jeff Bridges, Hell or High Water
• Lucas Hedges, Manchester by the Sea
• Dev Patel, Lion
• Michael Shannon, Nocturnal Animals

Best Cinematography

• Arrival
• La La Land
• Lion
• Moonlight
• Silence

Best Documentary Feature

• Fire at Sea
• I Am Not Your Negro
• Life, Animated
• O.J.: Made in America
• 13th

Best Documentary Short Subject

• Extremis
• 4.1 Miles
• Joe’s Violin
• Watani: My Homeland
• The White Helmets

Best Foreign Language Film

• Land of Mine, Denmark
• A Man Called Ove, Sweden
• The Salesman, Iran
• Tanna, Australia
• Toni Erdmann, Germany

Best Live Action Short

• Ennemis Intérieurs
• La Femme et le TGV
• Silent Nights
• Sing
• Timecode

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

• Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea
• Andrew Garfield, Hacksaw Ridge
• Ryan Gosling, La La Land
• Viggo Mortensen, Captain Fantastic
• Denzel Washington, Fences

Best Sound Editing

• Arrival
• Deepwater Horizon
• Hacksaw Ridge
• La La Land
• Sully

Best Sound Mixing

• Arrival 
• Hacksaw Ridge
• La La Land
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
• 13 Hours: Secret Soldiers of Benghazi

Best Production Design

• Arrival
• Fantastic Beasts
• Hail, Caesar!
• La La Land
• Passengers

Best Visual Effects

• Deepwater Horizon
• Doctor Strange
• The Jungle Book
• Kubo and the Two Strings
• Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Best Costume Design

• Allied
• Fantastic Beasts
• Florence Foster Jenkins
• Jackie
• La La Land

Best Makeup & Hairstyling

• A Man Called Ove
• Star Trek Beyond
• Suicide Squad

Best Original Score

• Jackie
• La La Land
• Lion
• Moonlight
• Passengers 

Best Original Song

• “Audition,” La La Land
• “Can’t Stop the Feeling,” Trolls
• “City of Stars,” La La Land
• “The Empty Chair,” Jim: The James Foley Story
• “How Far I’ll Go,” Moana

Best Original Screenplay

• Hell or High Water
• La La Land
• The Lobster
• Manchester by the Sea
• 20th Century Women

Best Adapted Screenplay

• Arrival
• Fences
• Hidden Figures
• Lion
• Moonlight

Best Animated Feature

• Kubo and the Two Strings
• Moana
• My Life as a Zucchini
• The Red Turtle
• Zootopia

Best Animated Short Film

• Blind Vaysha
• Borrowed Time
• Pear Cider and Cigarettes
• Pearl
• Piper

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

• Viola Davis, Fences
• Naomie Harris, Moonlight
• Nicole Kidman, Lion
• Octavia Spencer, Hidden Figures
• Michelle Williams, Manchester by the Sea

Best Film Editing

• Arrival
• Hacksaw Ridge
• Hell or High Water
• La La Land
• Moonlight

Best Actress in a Leading Role

• Isabelle Huppert, Elle
• Ruth Negga, Loving
• Natalie Portman, Jackie
• Emma Stone, La La Land
• Meryl Streep, Florence Foster Jenkins

Best Directing

• Denis Villeneuve, Arrival
• Mel Gibson, Hacksaw Ridge
• Damien Chazelle, La La Land
• Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea
• Barry Jenkins, Moonlight

Best Picture

• Arrival
• Hacksaw Ridge
• Hidden Figures
• Lion
• Moonlight
• Fences
• Hell or High Water
• La La Land
• Manchester by the Sea

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The post Award Season Is In Full Effect With Oscars Noms Already Announced appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Looks like Nick Cannon is the next star up to speak out against the race relations in Hollywood, and he used quite an approach to do so. The entertainer/mogul took his Facebook platform to share a spoken word video Sunday addressing the Oscars controversy. In the two-minute, black-and-white clip, Cannon sits on a staircase and spits conscious lyrics regarding Black suffering in America, media corruption and ultimately respecting ourselves.

He uses his previous Chi-raq experience and effortlessly and precisely delivers a gritty performance that’ll make you sit back and — well think. Many stars have slammed the Academy for lack of diversity amongst their nominees for the second year in row, including Will and Jada Pinkett-Smith, Reese Witherspoon and Spike Lee, by reviving the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite.

Read along and watch the video below.

Oscar

Damn! Look what they did to Oscar.
Nah, not another trophy rant.
I’m talking Oscar Grant, Sandra Bland, Mike Brown, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray.
Why we trust what the news say anyway?
It’s blasphemous, don’t get distracted by these lottery tickets and statues.
It’s just fake gold and plastic.
We come from Pharaohs with no masters.
What happened? We went from golden tombs to closed caskets.
The Black Plague, they want us to catch it.
Just ask Magic, Malcolm, Martin, Muhammad Ali, Bill Cosby.
It’s tragic.
How the enemy can tear down our community and rewrite the history by highlighting our flaws.
But let he who cast the first stone, who constitutes the new laws.
Nah, I ain’t never seen Empire but I serve my own throne.
What I look like begging them to let royalty into they home.
As for me and my house, we’ll serve the Lord!
We crying for votes but how many of us is on the board.
Better yet, when’s the last time you showed up and supported the NAACP Awards?
I want what’s mine, not yours.
Fuck getting my foot in.
I’m building my own doors.
Hollywood mainstream don’t validate me, yo.
Like Hov say, Save the accolades, just the doe.
You in this show for the business, or this business for the show?
Talent and brilliance? Hands down, man we got that shit.
That’s why I told Chris, man go ‘head and rock that shit.
You got the Juice now.
Fight the Power.
Hell yeah, I’m gonna watch that ceremony where they gonna let a black man be the Master for at least two hours.
So don’t waste your voice, don’t waste your prayers.
Save’em for the thousands killed in Nigeria, Kenya, The Philippines, Syria or right here in our urban areas.
Low America.
Nah, now no one cares.
What about my mother raising a son while working three jobs and still equating to less than minimum wage?
What about me being placed on medication before my system could age?
What about that prison industrial system turning Brothers into new slaves?
Where’s the outrage? Where the complaints at?
Overcoming obstacles, definition of Black.
Hashtag ‪#‎facts‬.
But I guess they don’t make no awards for that.
Real talk.
Real Kings don’t need no pats on the back.
#Dontbedistracted

The post WATCH: Nick Canon Shares Spoken Word Poem About #OscarsSoWhite appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

As the 88th Academy Awards were announced on Thursday morning, Twitter couldn’t help but get more than just the #Oscars2016 hashtag trending. After the excitement of seeing Straight Outta Compton, the N.W.A. biopic, actually nominated for an Oscar, reality set in: It was only one Oscar. The Straight Outta Compton writers are white, by the way. Let’s be real. Even one nomination is something to celebrate. The thing is, should we actually celebrate it?

While Straight Outta Compton received a Best Original Screenplay nomination, it, along with other “black movie” favorites, failed to be nominated in any of the top categories.  Use of the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag, thus so, came as a response. Actors of color, along with movies featuring a diverse cast, have officially been absent from the top Oscar categories for the second year in a row.

“It’s only two years. That’s not much.”

So is it just a coincidence?

Well, maybe. If you choose to overlook the facts.

The Academy of Motion Arts and Pictures presented the first Academy Awards in 1929. The first black producer to win an Oscar didn’t come till 2013 (Steve McQueen, 12 Years a Slave). The second win from an African American in the Best Adapted Screenplay category didn’t come till 2013 (John Ridley, 12 Years a Slave) after the first one had only been awarded in 2009 (Geoffrey Fletcher , Precious). T.J. Martin, an African American film maker, didn’t become the first African American to win in the Best Documentary category until 2012 (Undefeated).  In 2002, Denzel Washington became the only African American to have two Oscars win. After 87 years, only 15 African American actors have won an Oscar.

So should the opinion of a group of about 6,000 individuals matter to you? Should the fact that, on average, about 80% of its members are white be relevant?

If you’re in the film industry, yes.  If you’re not in the film industry, yes.

How are we supposed to get children of color interested in the arts when history shows that their success in it isn’t promising? It’s not a smart decision to encourage children (or yourself, quite frankly) to go into the film industry if they’re African American.

If you’re convinced that its not an issue of race, let me rephrase it for you: African American actors and film industry members have ‘coincidently’ struggled in the Hollywood Film Industry when compared to other races.

According to the Motion Picture of Association of America, about 150 million African American individuals went to the movies in 2012.  The number rose for the first time since 2009 in 2013 when more African American movies were appearing in our cinemas (Fruitvale Station, 12 Years of Slave).

So from a business standpoint, Hollywood makes more money when it offers a bit of diversity. If you’re African American, numbers show that you tend to spend more money at the box office when people who look like you are on the screen.

If 2015 proves anything it is that Hollywood took that into consideration. Apart from Straight Outta Compton, films like Creed, Dope, and Beasts of No Nation, which highlighted African American actors and film makers, were all Oscar favorites but received limited nominations. Well, only one other nomination for Sylvester Stallone’s portrayal of Rocky in the Best Supporting Actor category for his work against an African American lead (Michael B. Jordan), and an African American writer and director (Ryan Coogler).

But then again, it probably was just another coincidence that the only African American film recognition in the 88th Academy Awards was only awarded to the white involvement in them, right?

An award is a great recognition to receive. So fans of N.W.A and Straight Outta Compton should celebrate their Oscar nomination, but not, by any reason, be content.

The Oscars are a small but prevalent example of how, even if indirectly, discrimination  still exists.

The post Why “Straight Outta Compton” and the Oscars Matter appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.

Continuing his stellar victory lap celebrating an astonishingly successful 2013, Pharrell will be performing his Oscar-nominated song “Happy” at the award show on March 2nd. You would be hard-pressed to find anyone currently immersed in more musical success than Pharrell–be it singing, songwriting, producing, or wearing comically giant hats–so the fact that he will be showcasing his talents at the film industry’s biggest night isn’t entirely too surprising. Still, after a fantastic performance with Daft Punk and the legendary Stevie Wonder at the Grammys and a buzzy new track with Major Lazer which finds Skateboard P rapping–a rarity on its own–this is some great news. Here’s to hoping Pharrell takes home the big award for his catchy Despicable Me 2 anthem and takes one step closer to the precious EGOT.

The post News: Pharrell to Perform at Oscars appeared first on RESPECT. | The Photo Journal of Hip-Hop Culture.