Part Two’ Star Josh Brolin Addresses His Threat To Quit Acting Following Oscars Snub

Dune star Josh Brolin has reacted to the Academy Award nominations for the 2025 ceremony, which were announced yesterday. The reason why this deserves attention is that last year, the actor made a threat that if the Academy didn’t nominate director Denis Villeneuve for his work on Dune: Part Two, then he would quit acting. And guess what just happened? The Academy deciding to snub Villeneuve wasn’t exactly a surprise. The early release of the movie was a probable cause for this, but Villeneuve being snubbed in previous years also means that Academy members don’t exactly love the guy (he has a single nomination for Arrival). However, someone that does love him is Brolin, aka Gurney Halleck in the Dune saga, who appeared on Instagram to address the snub. Brolin had this to say:

“Just want to say congratulations on the Dune best picture nomination, to Greig Fraser on cinematography, for best visual effects, for Patrice [Vermett] on production design and for sound. Apparently, I am going to quit acting because Denis Villeneuve didn’t get nominated. This is just how this thing works. It makes no sense to me. That’s okay. [Editor] Joe Walker and Denis, you deserve it. It’s an amazing film. It was even better than the first one. The people who have gotten accolades surely deserve it. Happy to be a part of it. Congrats everyone.”

Will Brolin really quit acting? It’s still to be confirmed, but he certainly sounds vexed about Villeneuve and others not being recognized by the Academy for their efforts on Dune 2. And, if he does indeed go through with the “quitting” threat, Villeneuve will have to find a way to bring him back and reprise the role of Gurney for Dune: Messiah. In any case, it was a preposterous move by the Academy, whose members historically seem to have an issue with genre films such as Dune.

‘Dune 2’ Was Just One of Several Egregious Oscar Snubs This Year

Yesterday, when the Oscar nominations were announced, as is often the case, the internet was quickly shaken by some of the choices. Some of the favorites made it onto the ballots, but just as Denis Villeneuve’s absence was awkwardly loud, there were others surprisingly left out of the race. Really, you think we’d be used to snubs by now. But here we are. Challengers was completely snubbed, with Luca Guadagnino’s film not even mentioned in the category that most people had bet on: Best Original Score. Academy Award winners Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross truly did something remarkable with the soundscape of the romantic sports drama, but the Academy clearly felt they didn’t do enough.

Denis Villeneuve’s Best Director Oscar Snub Hurts Me More Than I Can Fathom

Modern sci-fi’s Lisan al Gaib, Denis Villeneuve, has been snubbed from the upcoming Oscars for ‘Dune 2.’ Sigh.

Marianne Jean-Baptiste was also snubbed in the Best Actress category, as was Daniel Craig for his role in Queer, in another peculiar, and sure to be controversial misstep by the Academy. Other snubs include Pamela Anderson being left out of the Best Actress race for her role in The Last Showgirl and Jon M. Chu for his directorial effort in Wicked, which landed a whole heap of other nominations.

But perhaps 2025 wasn’t the year of the snubs. Maybe it’s the year of surprises. Netlfix’s controversial musical thriller, Emilia Pérez, the French production about a Mexican drug lord who transitions into a woman, got a whopping 13 nominations (one more than classic films like Gladiator and Schindler’s List), and this has since become the main point of contention on social media. We’re not saying it doesn’t deserve as many nods, but it feels… lazy. It’s a potential sign that maybe good FYC (For Your Consideration) campaigns don’t translate into Academy members seeing all the movies, thus making their choices questionable. And that, right there, constitutes cinematic sin.