The 91st Academy Awards are a month away, but this is still barely enough time to plan the perfect viewing party. Only 30 days to buy a sheet of poster board and create a betting bracket for categories, like longest political acceptance speech. A mere 720 hours to buy snack food and label each with a movie pun. A scant 43,200 minutes to buy mini Oscars to hand out as party favors. With all that planning, who has time to actually watch the movies nominated? AMC Theatres is providing a binge-able solution with their AMC Best Picture Showcase.
Now in its 13th year, the AMC Best Picture Showcase will bring back and show seven of the eight films nominated for Best Picture. For this year’s showcase, the films will be screened over two Saturdays, Feb. 16 and Feb. 23, beginning at 11 a.m the first week and a 24-hour marathon event Saturday, Feb. 23 beginning at 10 a.m.
The breakdown looks like this:
Feb. 16
The Favourite
BlacKkKlansman
Bohemian Rhapsody
Feb. 23
Vice
Black Panther
A Star Is Born
Green Book
Feb. 23, 24-hour event
The Favourite
BlacKkKlansman
Bohemian Rhapsody
Vice
Black Panther
A Star Is Born
Green Book
Stephen Colanero, chief marketing officer at AMC, says the Best Picture Showcase is not only a chance to watch movies, but it’s also an opportunity to make close friends you see once a year.
“There’s a true sense of community, as so many of these guests come back every year, often bringing friends and family members who are experiencing the event for the first time,” he said in a press release. “At many locations, guests who often only know each other through this event come back to catch up with each other, and watch the best films of the year.”
There is one Best Picture nominee missing from the selection available in the AMC showcases. Roma, the first Netflix film to be nominated in the category, will not play at any AMC location.
"For more than a decade, movie-lovers have enjoyed the AMC Best Picture Showcase to catch up on the nominated films that played at AMC throughout the prior year," AMC told The Hollywood Reporter. "This year, Academy members nominated a film that was never licensed to AMC to play in our theaters. As such, it is not included in the AMC Best Picture Showcase."
Roma will of course still be available on Netflix, where you can watch it just like the Academy voters do — at a private screening in your home while you play games on your phone.
Tickets are on sale now, with pricing and event availability varying by location. Click here for a full list of prices and participating theaters.
