Emilia Perez and The Brutalist lead Golden Globe film nominations

Musical thriller Emilia Perez and post-World War Two epic The Brutalist topped the roster of films nominated on Monday for the 2025 Golden Globes, the Hollywood honours that kick off the awards season leading to the Oscars.

Emilia Perez, a Spanish-language movie released by Netflix, scored 10 nods and independent distributor A24’s The Brutalist earned seven.

Both movies will compete for the top Globes honour — best film drama — with the papal selection story Conclave, Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, sci-fi epic Dune: Part Two, historical drama Nickel Boys and September 5, the story of sports journalists who covered a hostage crisis at the Olympics.

Box office smash Wicked, adapted from a long-running Broadway play about the witches in The Wizard of Oz, landed four nominations. It faces the dark romantic comedy Anora and others in the best movie musical or comedy category.

The Globe nominations can help movies in the race to the Academy Awards in March. Last year’s Hollywood strikes scrambled this year’s release schedule, and awards pundits say there is no clear frontrunner for Best Picture at the Oscars.

Winners of the Globes will be chosen by 334 entertainment journalists from 85 countries, compared with roughly 9,000 voters who select the Academy Awards.

The Globes voting body was expanded in recent years and organisers instituted reforms after criticisms of ethical lapses and a lack of diversity.

Comedian Nikki Glaser will host the January 5 Globes ceremony for the first time. The show, in the past a booze-fuelled and more free-wheeling occasion than the Oscars, will be broadcast live on CBS and streamed on Paramount+.

Emilia Perez stars Zoe Saldana as a lawyer who helps a drug cartel leader (Spanish actor Karla Sofía Gascón) fake his death and transition from a man to a woman. Selena Gomez co-stars as the cartel leader’s wife. All three were nominated by Globes voters for acting honours.

Streaming service Netflix, which gives movies only a limited run in theatres and has never won the prestigious Best Picture Oscar, overpowered traditional studios to grab a total of 13 film nominations from Globe voters.

The company also outpaced rivals in Globe TV nods with 23. “It is a reminder of just how dominant that streaming platform is,” said Michael Schneider, TV editor at the Hollywood publication Variety.

Movie nominee The Brutalist features Adrien Brody, also a Globe acting nominee, in an epic tale of a Hungarian immigrant who flees the horrors of World War Two to rebuild his life in the United States.

Wicked stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande also received acting nominations, as did Angelina Jolie for her portrayal of opera singer Maria Callas in Maria and Zendaya for the sports romance Challengers.

Timothee Chalamet received a nod for his portrayal of music legend Dylan in A Complete Unknown, as did co-star Edward Norton, who plays folk singer Pete Seeger.

Sebastian Stan was nominated for his role as President-elect Donald Trump in The Apprentice, along with Jeremy Strong who played Trump attorney Roy Cohn. Trump has called the film “a politically disgusting hatchet job.”

In TV categories, the restaurant tale The Bear received five nominations. Mystery comedy Only Murders in the Building and historical epic Shogun earned four each.