Martin McDonough’s excellent 2022 The Banshees of Inisherin is many things. The darkest of dark period comedies, it’s a meditation on the value of an artist’s life, a commentary on friendship, and an examination of all sorts of pain — of abuse, of rejection, of solitude. And while McDonough, a supremely talented playwright, could have parlayed these ideas solely through dialogue, make no mistake: Inisherin is a true movie — and a beautiful one at that. Cinematographer Ben Davis captures the beauty and bareness of the titular bucolic locale, making it the film’s fourth character (all four leads, by the way — Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, and Barry Keoghan — were Oscar-nominated, and could have won).

Davis was rightly nominated for Best Cinematography. But he should have won!

This article is part of a special year-long series of anecdotes, reflections and thoughts about the Academy Awards.