Golden Globe noms set tone for Hollywood’s pandemic awards season

The unveiling of the Golden Globes nominations on Feb. 3 will jumpstart a Hollywood awards season like no other, with pandemic-related theater closures and blockbuster delays expected to boost smaller, stay-at-home movies like Netflix's "The Trial of the Chicago 7" and "Mank."

The influential Globes are often a bellwether for any given film's success at the Oscars, but all bets are off in a year that has seen glitzy award campaign events scrapped and ceremonies postponed by COVID-19 restrictions.
Tinseltown's traditional studios held back the release of several big hitters last year in the hope of theaters reopening, so streamers including Netflix, Amazon Prime and Apple should fare better than ever at upcoming prize ceremonies.

Among the lead contenders are Aaron Sorkin's "Chicago 7" - a timely look at the protests, police violence and madcap trial surrounding the 1968 Chicago anti-war riots - and David Fincher's "Mank," which dives into Golden Age Hollywood with the making of "Citizen Kane."

Amazon Prime has "One Night in Miami," a play adaptation about Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Sam Cooke and Jim Brown's friendship at the height of the U.S. civil rights movement, and sleeper hit "Sound of Metal" about a rock drummer who loses his hearing.

Holding the line for Hollywood's old-school studios almost singlehandedly is "Nomadland," which swept the prizes at the Venice and Toronto festivals and is the pick of many experts for overall best picture.

The movie from Disney-owned Searchlight stars Frances McDormand adrift among a community of elderly, nomadic idealists who roam across America in worn-out vans.

"Most of the contenders seem to be more intimate movies, or ones that do play well at home," said Chris Beachum of...