People outraged as film 'where no actors wear costumes' gets nominated for costume design Oscar

Movie fans have been left confused after a film where 'where no actors wear costumes' has been nominated for Best Costume Design at the Oscars.

The highly-anticipated nominations list was revealed today (22 January), letting the public know which of their favourite movies, actors and directors could be winning big - and the reactions are pouring in.

Sinners, Ryan Coogler’s hit starring Michael B Jordan as twins, scored a record 16 nominations, beating the record of 14 nominations shared by All About Eve, Titanic and La La Land.

British-Nigerian star Wunmi Mosaku is nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her performance in the movie, while Jordan is nominated in the leading actor category.

Battling it out for Best Picture will be Bugonia, Frankenstein, F1, Hamnet, Marty Supreme, One Battle After Another, The Secret Agent, Sentimental Value, Sinners, and Train Dreams.

Meanwhile, Wicked fans have been left speechless that Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo have both been 'snubbed'.

However, one category that's caused quite a bit of confusion is Best Costume Design.

The nominees are Avatar: Fire and Ash, Frankenstein, Hamnet, Marty Supreme and Sinners - and it's the former that's left people baffled.

Fans of the Avatar movies will know they are largely made with hyper-detailed CGI simulations and motion capture, which raises questions about the costumes and whether they're real.

One Twitter user penned: "What costume does Avatar has lmao???"

While a second asked: "How can a cgi film be nominated for costume design ….and then Sinners…over Wicked for good…I can’t…"

A third wrote: "Are we serious? how many real life costumes are even in fire and ash? it’s like entirely mocap."

While a fourth agreed: "Avatar making best costume instead of wicked for good is such a joke cuz they’re basically naked??"

And someone else chimed in with: "Still perplexed by this nom. So the Avatar: Fire and Ash costumes were physically crafted and then scanned to appear on their bodies in post, based on this video.

"Is this the first-ever Best Costume Design nominee where the actors never actually wore the costumes? lol."

Meanwhile, others came to the film's defence, with one fan writing: "Avatar fire and ash has to win this."

To clear up any confusion, Avatar's costume designer, Deborah L. Scott, who's nominated for the gong, previously explained exactly how the costume process works.

She clarified that the costumes are absolutely real but the actors don't wear them.

Speaking to the Art of Costume, Scott explained: "The costumes are absolutely 100% real. They are created like how you would in any live-action movie; they are then sent through the process so that the costumes look real! The goal is that as an audience member, especially if you go to the theater and see it in a big format, you’re sitting in your seat, and you can feel like you can almost reach out and touch them because they look so real. Because they are."

She added: "We start with the design on paper, and if the design’s approved, we make the garments. They’re made to a human scale so that you can see the actors standing in costume.

"They only wear the performance capture suit when we’re capturing their performances, but they need to understand the relationship that their clothes have with their body.

"Then comes the process of sending the garments, all the illustrations, and every piece of the puzzle that you have to the digital artist so they can start to recreate it on the computer."

The costume designer continued: "Then we follow that process through what I always call virtual fittings. They start a 3D model of the character in a particular garment. We go back and forth, tailoring the costume to fit this nine-foot-tall blue person. It’s a long process of not only virtual fitting but then understanding how the garments move and what they’re made out of.

"That’s where a lot of extensive testing of the garments comes into play so that we can inform the animators and the simulators."

2026 Oscar nominations

Best Picture

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• F1
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• The Secret Agent
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners
• Train Dreams

Best Actor

• Timothée Chalamet - Marty Supreme
• Leonardo DiCaprio - One Battle After Another
• Ethan Hawke - Blue Moon
• Michael B Jordan - Sinners
• Wagner Moura - The Secret Agent

Best Actress

• Jessie Buckley - Hamnet
• Rose Byrne - If I Had Legs I'd Kick You
• Kate Hudson - Song Sung Blue
• Renate Reinsve - Sentimental Value
• Emma Stone - Bugonia

Best Supporting Actress

• Elle Fanning - Sentimental Value
• Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas - Sentimental Value
• Amy Madigan - Weapons
• Wunmi Mosaku - Sinners
• Teyana Taylor - One Battle After Another

Best Supporting Actor

• Benicio del Toro - One Battle After Another
• Jacob Elordi - Frankenstein
• Delroy Lindo - Sinners
• Sean Penn - One Battle After Another
• Stellan Skarsgård - Sentimental Value

Best Director

• Paul Thomas Anderson - One Battle After Another
• Ryan Coogler - Sinners
• Josh Safdie - Marty Supreme
• Joachim Trier - Sentimental Value
• Chloé Zhao - Hamnet

Best Adapted Screenplay

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• One Battle After Another
• Train Dreams

Best Original Screenplay

• Blue Moon
• It Was Just an Accident
• Marty Supreme
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners

Best Original Song

• 'Dear Me' - Diane Warren: Relentless
• 'Golden' - KPop Demon Hunters
• 'I Lied to You' - Sinners
• 'Sweet Dreams of Joy' - Viva Verdi!
• 'Train Dreams' - Train Dreams

Best Original Score

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners

Best International Feature

• It Was Just an Accident
• Sentimental Value
• Sirât
• The Secret Agent
• The Voice of Hind Rajab

Best Animated Feature

• Arco
• Elio
• KPop Demon Hunters
• Little Amélie or the Character of Rain
• Zootopia 2

Best Documentary Feature

• Come See Me in the Good Light
• Cutting Through the Rocks
• Mr. Nobody Against Putin
• The Alabama Solution
• The Perfect Neighbor

Best Costume Design

• Avatar: Fire and Ash
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• Sinners

Best Make-up and Hairstyling

• Frankenstein
• Kokuho
• Sinners
• The Smashing Machine
• The Ugly Stepsister

Best Production Design

• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners

Best Sound

• Frankenstein
• F1
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• Sirât

Best Film Editing

• F1
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners

Best Cinematography

• Frankenstein
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• Train Dreams

Best Visual Effects

• Avatar: Fire and Ash
• F1
• Jurassic World Rebirth
• Sinners
• The Lost Bus

Best Live Action Short

• A Friend of Dorothy
• Butcher's Stain
• Jane Austen's Period Drama
• The Singers
• Two People Exchanging Saliva

Best Animated Short

• Butterfly
• Forevergreen
• Retirement Plan
• The Girl Who Cried Pearls
• The Three Sisters

Best Documentary Short

• All the Empty Rooms
• Armed Only with a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud
• Children No More: Were and Are Gone
• The Devil Is Busy
• Perfectly a Strangeness

Best Casting

• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• The Secret Agent