Written by Dr. Charles Bane
With the Academy Awards just one month away, critics are already complaining about why they don’t watch the show. The reasons tend to fall into two camps: that the nominated films are not actually the best films and performances of the year, or that the nominated films are only critical darlings that have not been seen by a wide enough audience. One extreme believes the nominees are too popular, while the other doesn’t believe that they are popular enough. The result is that these groups will ignore the Oscars and probably spend the evening watching a movie they believe should have been nominated.
Not me. I will be watching with my ballot in hand, keeping score of my predictions. Like many critics, I think the Oscars are too long and too self-congratulatory, and I know there are deserving films that won’t win (or weren’t even nominated). I also know that some of this year’s winners will be forgotten down the road and join the ranks of the undeserving (“Crash,” anyone?). But I don’t care. Of all of the awards handed out by the various guilds and critics’ circles, the Academy Awards are the only ones that award the full range of people that it actually takes to make a movie.
They are also the only awards that will force “Barbie” and “Poor Things” – both comedies – to battle it out against “Oppenheimer” and “Killers of the Flower Moon” – both dramas – that will say it’s either Lily Gladstone or Emma Stone (it can’t be both) and that will recognize all of the technical awards alongside the “major” awards. It’s the one night when it’s comedy vs. drama vs. action vs. sci-fi. And, regardless of the speeches heard so far, the thank yous and the tears, it’s the only one that all of the players in Hollywood actually care about. Just ask Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy or Tom Cruise if they’re completely satisfied with their Golden Globe or if they would happily give it up to have an Oscar on their mantles instead.
But more than that, the Oscars introduce us to films we might not have otherwise heard of: “American Fiction,” “The Holdovers” and “Poor Things” all experienced box office bumps once they were announced as nominees. Anticipation is high, and streaming rentals are up for “Anatomy of a Fall,” “Past Lives” and “The Zone of Interest,” three international films that made the Best Picture cut. “The Boy and the Heron”and “Nimona and Robot Dreams” remind us that Disney and Pixar aren’t the only studios making animated films. Best Documentary shows us stories that are sometimes so raw they are not quite ready for the Hollywood treatment, like “20 Days in Mariupol” about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Finally, the shorts categories (Animated, Documentary and Live Action) give us snapshots into other worlds and often introduce up-and-coming filmmakers. This year, “The Barber of Little Rock” tells the story of Arkansan Arlo Washington, an African American barber, whose nonprofit community bank is fighting the racial wealth gap. The film will screen Thursday, Feb. 15, at the Clinton Presidential Library and Sunday, Feb. 18, at the Arkansas Cinema Society.
The Oscars aren’t everything. They sometimes “get it wrong.” But when someone wants to appreciate or study film either professionally, academically or just for fun, the list of past Oscar winners and nominees is often where they have to start.
