The Oscars: A Form Guide - The Pointy End

It was recently revealed by the Los Angeles Times that the makeup of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (members of which are the peeps who vote on the Oscars) is 94% white (keep in mind that the US is a migrant nation), 77% male and the average age of members is 62. So I will try to think like an old white guy to deduce the winners of Best Picture and Best Director. (Note to the Academy: if you want the Academy Awards to stay relevant, perhaps try getting a membership which is a little more representative of the population. You could start by trying to get your female membership around the 50% mark…)

Best Director

Martin Scorsese was overlooked six times until a few years back when they played catch-up and gave him an Oscar for The Departed (in keeping with the catch-up tradition, it wasn’t one of his best). Turns out they could have just waited for Hugo. Apart from anything else, it demonstrates his versatility as a director (gangster films to children’s fantasies) and that even at this point of his long career he is still trying new things and working with new technologies. Good for you, Marty! However…

Michel Hazanavicius, who directed The Artist would be the main contender – pulling off a silent film is an achievement. As an aside, he’s also nominated for Best Screenplay but that is probably pushing it…

Alexander Payne, who directed The Descendents will have other opportunities for awards in the future (and personally, I thought the Descendents was okay but not great – he’s made better films ie Sideways and Election). Woody Allen has got his seventh directing nomination for Midnight in Paris. He has already won once (for Annie Hall) and they keep inviting him but he never turns up (the only exception was after 9/11; he wasn’t nominated for anything but gave a tribute to New York City). Same goes for Terrence Malick, who has taken over from Stanley Kubrick as the resident reclusive-so-he-must-be-a-genius-director. He makes one film every decade or something so his films are considered Important Events.  There is only one photo of him on file for the media to use. Really, I’m not actually sure if Terrence Malick actually exists. Whatever, but his film The Tree of Life may be a bit too arty or deep (or unfathomable) for the Academy.


Best Picture

At the outset I’ll admit that I have seen only two of the films nominated for Best Picture, The Descendants which left me underwhelmed and Midnight in Paris, which I can only find fault with if I am being really nit-picky. Fortunately, not seeing the films is no impediment and picking the eventual winner can be done based on “the vibe”. It is also how a much nominated film ends up cleaning up almost all its categories, thereby giving journalists an opportunity to use the word “juggernaut” in a sentence.

Usually, the film with the most nominations gets Best Picture so that means this year Hugo will get the gong. Best Picture is the only category that all Academy members vote on (the other categories are voted on by peers eg.  editors vote on editing; costume designers vote on costume design and so on).  Members are not just actors and directors but technical crew as well and Hugo is chockers with stuff for techies to get excited about. And Hollywood seems hellbent on promoting 3-D, too, even if we the audience are shrugging our shoulders about it. Going against it is that it hasn’t done that well at the box office. There is also a “vibe” about The Artist, which is set during the transition from silent movies to talkies in Hollywood in the 1920s and Hollywood loves nothing better than a bit of self-referencing. However, it is a French film and the Oscars can be parochial (to be fair, the Oscars were originally designed to promote the American film industry).

The Help has been gaining momentum and has to be considered a contender. There has been a bit of controversy around it, with some wryly noting that Hollywood hasn’t really progressed beyond casting African American actors as servants. They may have a point. On the other hand, of all the Best Film nominations, it has done the best at the box office so it could surprise everyone and win. It also has a social justice theme which is always popular with voters. Then again old, white blokes may not be that into a movie about African American women and their female employers. It may be dismissed as a high-class chick flick (don’t get me started on the term “chick flick” – okay may be in another post). However, a film dominated by female characters being critically and commercially successful may make the studios heads sit up and take notice of films with female protagonists.  We live in hope...

The rest of the films are making up the numbers really. Haven’t heard much about Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close but did see a trailer at the movies the other day and I can tell you that Sandra Bullock and Tom Hanks are in it and the plot revolves around the events of 9/11. Apparently it is a bit on the treacly side.

Apparently there can’t be too many movies about baseball, which would explain the popularity of Moneyball. What sets this one apart is that it was written by Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing). See previous comments about Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life. I doubt it has been seen by enough people to win.  Also, it is about fathers and sons (refer to demographic breakdown of the Academy). Then there is War Horse which shouldn’t win because film makers shouldn’t be encouraged to make films featuring beautiful, endearing animals in precarious and life-threatening situations. They are too upsetting. But that could just be me.

So that’s the major categories covered anyway.  All that matters now is the frocks…

Yours cinematically