How do you solve the problem when having some of the best films of the year are either made for television or a genre that are not what Oscar voters are more comfortable with? You can’t really solve it, actually. You have to accept it. Change comes more slowly in the Oscar race than it does just about anywhere else. Dramas, occasionally comedies, sometimes sci-fi and fantasy pop into the Best Picture race. But when it comes to animated films or documentaries or foreign language films? Forget it.
One of the reasons this is worth thinking about now is the astonishing documentary O.J.: Made in America. Since Hollywood has really forgotten the demographic that actually votes on awards, what Academy voters mostly talk about is what’s on television. The O.J. doc has earned praise far and wide by critics and viewers alike. It will probably emerge as one of the best things made all year. I suspect it will land atop many top ten lists and could earn a Documentary nomination. We know that the doc branch is fickle and prickly when it comes to non-traditional documentary formats. Still, I would expect this five-part series to get some recognition there.
Kate McKinnon has a chance at getting a Best Supporting Actress nod for her performance in Ghostbusters. It was the single most talked about performance not just in this film but maybe all year. Several stories have been written about her part in the film and with Ghostbusters nearing $100 million, it’s a possibility she could get in. Yes, there is genre bias against comedy. But if Adam McKay could get nominated for writing The Big Short (which he deserved) and Melissa McCarthy could get a supporting nod for Bridesmaids, we can see that things are evolving in the actors branch, particularly as work becomes harder and harder to get in roles that don’t require a superhero costume.
The problem for O.J.: Made in America is the same problem for a film like Midnight Special, Jeff Nichols’ sci-fi sleeper about a kid with supernatural powers. If you stepped outside the Oscar bubble you might think: why shouldn’t a documentary get a nomination for Best Picture if it is, in fact, one of the best films of the year by all accounts? The Weinstein Co. tried to sell the idea that CitizenFour could get one. Disney tried to sell the idea that Inside Out could get one. Each time they come up, however, we all know how it will end. No shot. Forget it. No way.
The reason comes down to the way the Academy chooses Best Picture. The entire membership has five spaces to fill on their ballots, not ten. If they had ten, they might put down five that they really loved and then five more than they admired but didn’t love quite as much — maybe a documentary, maybe an animated film, maybe a foreign language film. But if they have only five slots, those are going to be filled with what they loved the most, more than any other thing. The heart often runs counter to critical thinking – thus, emotionally driven films almost always stand a better chance of getting in over films that are black comedies, or mood pieces, or films with darker themes. Remember how Nightcrawler, Foxcatcher and Gone Girl were omitted in 2014? Top five means the heart wants what it wants.
We’ve discussed this at length here at Awards Daily because most people tend to think that because there are more than five nominees that means voters have a wider variety of films to choose from. But the truth is that there isn’t much variety at all in how they choose. They almost always go for the same kind of film year in and year out.
Let’s say you had ten slots this year for Best Picture. And let’s pretend all of the movies coming out we assume will be great ARE great. Then, let’s list them in terms of choosing the ten best of the year.
Birth of a Nation
Loving
Manchester by the Sea
La La Land
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk
Arrival
Silence
Sully
HHhH
20th Century Women
That’s ten right there, before you even get to animated films like Moana or Zootopia. Or even any documentary, whether it’s O.J. or not. If the Oscar race went this way, with these ten movies, how do you skim five off the top? You have to think about which films most people will love, not like, not admire.
There are three ways to do this.
1) Who directed it? This is probably the biggest factor in terms of sussing out how well a film will do come Oscar time. Is the director very well respected? Ang Lee, check. Clint Eastwood, check. Martin Scorsese, double check. Then we get the next tier. Kenneth Lonergan (has a pretty great “Oscar story” with Margaret, which was shelved for year and then lavishly praised when it was finally seen), Jeff Nichols, Denis Villeneuve as promising newcomers, along with Damien Chazelle. Finally, there is the new kid on the block, Nate Parker, causing all sorts of fuss. Actors as directors can be hit and miss. Obviously for every successful one like Ben Affleck or Robert Redford or Kevin Costner there are three times as many who don’t get the kind of praise they would need. There are two prominent actor/directors this year: Denzel Washington for Fences and Ewan McGregor for American Pastoral.
The two directors for 20th Century Women and HHhH are mostly unknowns. But hey, Morten Tyldum of The Imitation Game was one such director not too long ago, and Lenny Abrahamson for Room, and they both managed to get in.
2) The breakout hit, never mind the director. That slot went to Brooklyn last year, and you could say Spotlight and The Big Short as well. All three films moved the needle more for what they were about than their directors. The other films in the lineup last year mostly had big name directors like Iñárritu, Spielberg, and Ridley Scott.
3) The phenomenon, whether it’s a film by the first African American woman, or the film that made a staggering amount of money, or the film that made its mark historically in a way that voters cannot deny.
All ten of those films listen above seem like Oscar films to me. If I then had to winnow it down to just five? That would be harder. Which films get the boot and why? Off the top, I’ll say the big name directors will get first dibs — so that’s:
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk – Ang Lee
Silence – Martin Scorsese
Sully – Clint Eastwood.
I would then add La La Land on a hunch. It’s playing in Venice, along with Villeneuve’s Arrival. Both films might just be exceptional. But it’s hard to say if Arrival might be in the “LOVED IT” category. Seems safe to say La La Land will be. Instead, I would add Nate Parker’s Birth of a Nation – for a variety of reasons but most importantly, it elicits an emotional response, it’s timely, and it will be among the most talked about. I don’t know if Parker gets in for director, but I’m gonna bet it gets in for Picture
LaLa Land – Damien Chazelle
The Birth of a Nation – Nate Parker
After that, we’d have the films that some people loved, and some just liked… and the list would fill up from there. Picking the best films that most will say are in the top five is the trick. This is how you knew Inside Out would not get a Best Picture nomination. Try to think of 100 people who would have put it on top five?
It’s still too early to say how anything will land. We really just do not know at this point. We are more than a month out from getting into serious territory; however, you can’t go too wrong sticking with the bigger named directors when predicting Best Picture.
Current Predictions (just for fun)
Best Picture
Silence (Scorsese)
La La Land (Chazelle)
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk (Lee)
Birth of a Nation (Parker)
Loving (Nichols)
Manchester by the Sea (Lonergan)
Arrival (Villeneuve)
Sully (Eastwood)
HHhH (Jimenez)
Fences (Washington)
Contenders:
20th Century Women (Mills)
The Girl on the Train (Taylor)
Passengers (Tyldum)
Miss Sloane (Madden)
Indignation (Schamus)
War Machine (Michod)
American Pastoral (McGregor)
Director:
Martin Scorsese, Silence
Damien Chazelle, La La Land
Ang Lee, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk
Nate Parker, Birth of a Nation
Jeff Nichols, Loving
Contenders:
Clint Eastwood, Sully
Denzel Washington, Fences
Morten Tyldum, Passengers
Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea
Tate Taylor, The Girl on the Train
John Madden, Miss Sloane
Mike Mills, 20th Century Women
Original Screenplay:
Loving, Jeff Nichols
Manchester by the Sea, Kenneth Lonergan
La La Land, Damien Chazelle
Birth of a Nation, Nate Parker
Passengers, Jon Spaihts
Adapted Screenplay:
Fences, Tony Kushner
Silence, Jay Cocks
Indignation, James Schamus
Billy Lynn, Jean-Christophe Castelli
Arrival, Eric Heisserer
So far, this year, sight unseen (and a lot could change) the auteur is very strong, with quite a few writer/director efforts landing in Best Original Screenplay. That’s somewhat unusual. Keep cool, Oscar watchers. We’re getting ready to start this show.
If you think I’m forgetting something glaringly obvious, please point it out.