It's a new decade of film, if you're one of those decade purists who says that the new decade does not start till next year, then you might as well saddle with the fact, cause in my opinion the 2000-2009 decade is over, and 2010 marks a new decade of film. With the Oscars now a full week behind us, it is now time to start looking forward, but before I decide to try and take a sneak peak at the 2011 Academy Awards, I'd like to spend a week talking about what I want from the Oscars over this next decade.
The Oscars have been around for a staggering 82 years, one of the last symbols of the Golden Age of Hollywood still around today. There is nothing in the industry that has as much clout as an Oscar, except save for mammoth box office. Even still, the Oscars fall, time and time again, to their pretentious ways and refuse to let in outsiders. The Oscars are stodgy, and have received a reputation over the past decade as being out of touch with the times. Partly this is true. The cliche Oscar film being a drama that might not be the biggest box office draw, but is typically a film filled with some stars and a heavyweight director, that received huge critical praise. For the most part, anything that doesn't fall into that category is tossed by the wayside, and that is one of the main things I hope to see change over this next decade.
Every year, there are a great many movies made in a large variety of genres. I mean, just this past year, my favorite film was Star Trek, a big sci-fi blockbuster loaded with action and thrills. While the Academy has gotten better in recent years at least nominating some more populist fare, they still miss the mark a great many times shutting out films that should have been let in. I mean, look at two years ago when The Dark Knight was snubbed by The Reader. Can you actually say that The Reader was a better film than The Dark Knight? Conventional wisdom says no. So why didn't The Dark Knight get a nom? The answer, it was a comic book movie, thus it was not prestigious enough to get included. Come on! A good film is a good film, regardless of genre. While the Academy tried making up for that blunder this past year by widening the Best Picture field from 5 to 10 nominees, can anyone seriously say that District 9 would have made the cut had it only been 5 nominees, and the same could be said for Avatar if it wasn't so heavily campaigned as a "gamechanger" (which I think is a load of crock).
Just an interesting statistic, in the history of the Academy Awards only one fantasy film, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, has ever brought home the top prize, and no sci-fi film ever has (and that includes nominees like Star Wars and E.T. getting passed over). Even comedy is passed over a great deal. A good comedy is hard to come by in my opinion, but a good comedy winning Best Picture is an even scanter reality. In recent years, films like Thank You For Smoking, Being John Malkovich, (500) Days of Summer, and even Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind were all failed to be recognized when they were all smart, savvy, and hilarious comedies that were original, but also had a certain air of class about them that would make them good Academy champions. Now, while I still think the raunchy stuff like The Hangover or The Waterboy should not be let in (I just can't stand that kind of raunchy comedy), I think it's ridiculous to elude certain films the platform that they deserve. Though the Academy also needs to improve in widening the fields of classification.
There are many years, like this past year, where almost half of my 10 favorite films of the year were either Foreign, Animated, or a Documentary. Of course, the 10 Best Picture nominees didn't even come close to mirroring this, with only a small nom for Up. This is most evident in the race for Best Director. Best Director is supposed to honor the five Best Directors of any given year, and while there is no rule that says an animation filmmaker or a documentary filmmaker can't make the cut, they still never get nominated, because of a prejudice against their style of expression. Even foreign filmmakers tend to get ignored on a pretty steadfast basis. I think the Academy needs to be more open-minded and start honoring the other types of filmmakers in their midsts. While a Best Animated Directing category would be nice, it would still be them trying to exclude the talent from the real deal. I mean, if an animated film can get nominated for Best Original Screenplay, why not Best Director? They are still directors, are they not, so why didn't Pete Docter get nominated for Up, or Wes Anderson for Fantastic Mr. Fox? If the Academy really wants to honor the best directing of any given year, they need to stop being so pretentious and share the love, not try to shun it away. Another thing I despise, that I wish would change, is relentless Oscar campaigning.
The mudslinging, the campaigning, it's all just one big political shindig. In the old days, campaigning for your film was considered poor taste, now it's whoever has the biggest PR department with the most money is who will bring home the gold come Oscar night. It's like a Presidential race. Rival studios wait till the last moment to slosh the mud to try and ruin the reputation of rival films, typically trying to take a stab at some sort of behind-the-scenes politics that was covered up about the film that has no real reason to be released to the public. It in many ways ruins the magic of the night for me. I don't care about the politics, I just care about the films. The Oscars are about the films, so let it be about them, stop being selfish and just let the movies and their filmmakers have their night. It's only one night out of the year, so can the studios just pipe it for one night? Perhaps this is just wishful thinking.
I'll end this by saying the main thing I want in this coming decade, to attend the Oscars, preferably as a nominee. Hey, I can dream, can't I?
That does it for this edition of Oscar Watch. Tune in next Tuesday as I take a sneak peak at next year's Oscar race. Till then!
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