I recall sitting perched atop my lofted bed in my college dorm room, mouth agape, staring at my computer screen and taking in the initial trailer for Get Out. I was beyond compelled, wondering how Jordan Peele — yeah, that guy from “Key and Peele,” the substitute teacher-skit guys! — conjured up a world of horror and tension. I was in, and barely thirty-seconds of the trailer had passed.
More trailers began to come; one for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri was next on the YouTube autoplay. Dunkirk came out quite early, and I bought that ticket in a heartbeat. Call Me By Your Name won me over instantly, as did Lady Bird, and the Watergate-expo, The Post. Others would come in short order, and I’d spend whatever money was required to nab a ticket. There was profound artistry behind each and every film up for ‘Best Picture’ at the 90th Academy Awards that I had never considered possible. Call it dramatic, I deemed it the truth.
This year, it’s not that the potential nominees are poor in quality. It’s more that those making the list are underwhelming. In a year where Oscars’ news has been headlined by Kevin Hart’s hosting debacle and a new category that won’t even rear its never-before-seen head due to a need for “further study,” you’d at least hope to find films that scream virtuosity. Instead, we have Mary Poppins Returns emerging in the midst of the conversation, not necessarily the rear or even where it likely should be: absent from it all together.
Don’t get me wrong. I adored Mary Poppins. The sequel came at a time where feeling good at the movies was beginning to become a past time. But can I say at all, let alone with confidence, that I’d have it amongst the year’s nine best?
The newest category that the Academy has brought into its ever-evolving picture looks to highlight achievement in popular film. By postponing it, they may have further hurt themselves and raised even more questions. Rather than protecting the show’s reputation for honoring the prestige and most acclaimed films, it moved in a direction which highlighted those normally considered to be afterthoughts. The introduction of this category began a heated conversation on the subject of films like Black Panther. Whether or not it deserved a ‘Best Picture’ nomination or a ‘Great Movie You Really Enjoyed Watching and Made a Ton of Money’ nomination became the theme of the early part of this movie season. The discussion likely should have been where all the typical or real nominees were.
It should be noted, though, that the Academy’s audience has typically flourished and inflated when a more popular box-office stud is present. The Ringer’s Sean Fennessey pointed out back in August, “When the Academy—and its broadcast partner ABC, which urged this change—has an Avatar or The Departed or Argo in contention, the audience tends to rise… In years with lesser-seen films, fewer people tune in. It’s not rocket science. It isn’t even long division.” Think of last year, when The Shape of Water saw more nominations and wins than any other film. It outdid the likes of Get Out, Dunkirk, and The Post, films arguably and knowingly far superior in mainstream popularity and audience size. While these latter films saw superiority in revenue, the former saw critical acclaim and an award-campaign that turned out to be more successful than Ronald Reagan’s. Conversely, the show’s broadcast witnessed a dip; the viewer count fell dropped from 32.9 million to 26.5 million in one year. It is a number unheard of if you’re familiar with show’s standards, as their average viewers have never recorded lower than 32 million.
That could mean booming business for the Oscars moving forward, especially this year. While a few artist-led, Indie films could wiggle their way into the conversation (see If Beale Street Could Talk, The Favourite), there are all-but definite nominees coming in the form of A Star is Born ($388.7 million at the box office), Bohemian Rhapsody (worldwide gross nearing $750 million) and possibly Black Panther, which made an absurd $1.34 billion. Rather than auteur cinema driving the bus, it’s actor-director projects that have dominated. The past wins of films like Moonlight have created, as Fennessey calls it, a “panic,” one that productions like A Star is Born looks to combat. I would more liken this trend to a celebration, one that I thought the Academy had finally learned how to embrace.
The question is not necessarily in regards to the ceremony’s tendencies. I am likely one of the few who truly cares about the more artistic films being honored. Well, maybe not the few. If IndieWire’s David Ehrlich had his way, his favorite film of the year, Paul Shrader’s First Reformed would be taking home the statuette. It’s a difference of opinion, really, between the critic and the channel-wavering eyeball. Critics want Luca Guadagnino and Damien Chazelle. The typical viewer could care less if Jay Baruchel won a ‘Best Actor’ Oscar. For the Academy, it comes down to one thing: does this new category make sense, or does it merely open the door for money-grabbing phenomenons, propelled by overdone animation and all-star casting, to nab an otherwise undeserving nod?
Fennessey’s criticism of the show’s youngest wrinkle spread into more and more pieces, one in which he mentioned, “It undermined not just the entire premise of the Oscars — that the Academy knows better than anyone (including the public) what constitutes greatness in the medium, and it is their duty to historicize with an awards show that airs on television — but it betrayed the sanctity of the process.”
Here, all he has done is hit the nail on the head. There are questions swirling about this award, simply because its premature reveal has now caused everyone to wonder what is a ‘Best Picture’ and what is a ‘Most Successful Picture.’ It has turned nominations into participation trophies, and handed the least successful (at least critically) an honor without any true qualification. The criteria was confused; the award’s true parameters were never honed. When ushering in a disruption to the tradition that is this ceremony’s past, you’d expect care. Instead, the Academy took the hilliest road.
In the past, this popularity contest would have been a flash in the pan. But today, the films in consideration all seem to be experiencing a similar confusion: in the modern Oscars, where do we fall? •
Will Bjarnar 