Heavy metal is going to the Academy Awards, sort of. Riz Ahmed, who excellently portrayed a metal drummer named Ruben in the Amazon Prime film The Sound of Metal has been nominated in the best leading actor category of this year's Academy Awards.
The British Pakistaini actor will be the first person of Muslim decent nominated in the lead actor category. Previous Muslim actors nominated at the Oscars were Mahershala Ali for 2016’s Moonlight and 2018’s Green Book (Ali won both awards) and Omar Sharif for 1962’s Lawrence of Arabia.
In the movie, the character of Ruben suddenly loses his hearing in the middle of a gig. He is in a midly successful two-piece noise band and eventually has to re-learn how to live life as a deaf person, while also not falling into the trappings of being a recovering drug addict. The movie was truly one of the scariest movies I've ever seen, and does a great job of conveying emotion. I highly recommend the viewing.
The category also features Steven Yuen nominated for Minari, becoming the first Asian-American actor and East Asian to be nominated in the category.
The event will take place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California on Sunday, April 25th, 2021.
