With nine nominations, British-Irish filmmaker Martin McDonagh’s “The Banshees of Inisherin” is a top 2023 Oscar contender. Wins have been elusive for many Emerald Isle-connected films over the past few decades, but like four-leaf clovers, they do exist.
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“In America” (2003) and “Brooklyn” (2015), lovely little films about Irish immigrants in New York, each came up doughnuts from three nominations.
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“Gangs of New York” (2002) and “The Irishman” (2019), brutal Martin Scorsese films about Irish-American criminals, win zip from 10 nominations apiece. Scorsese …
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… Took a breather between shutouts (but not from Irish-American gangsters) with 2006’s winning “The Departed.”
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British-born, Irish-citizen legend Peter O’Toole, sentimental-favorite lead actor nominee for “Venus” after seven nominations without a win, missed out again. (O’Toole received an honorary Oscar in 2003.)
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The music-infused Irish movie “Once” won an original song Oscar from the film’s only nomination, in 2008.
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“Belfast” won a single — yet meaningful — Oscar last year from seven nominations, for Kenneth Branagh’s autobiographical screenplay.
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If superstition or momentum have any say, director, screenplay and best picture nominee McDonagh should win something March 12. Now on his seventh lifetime nomination, he previously won in 2006 for the live-action short “Six Shooter,” and directed …
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… Frances McDormand and Sam Rockwell to acting Oscars in 2017’s “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” which was far less beloved than “Banshees.”
