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This year’s Oscar race is set to begin in earnest just about a month from now when Venice, Toronto, and Telluride showcase the main contenders. We now see how having a long season last year resulted in a surprise winner with CODA, a film that hit Sundance and then mostly skipped the fall festivals, laying low until the final act. That turned out to be a good strategy, given the many weeks where we sat around ruminating on the frontrunners.
Nomadland, the 2020 winner, was first seen in Venice, and the 2018 winner, Parasite, was a much earlier Cannes premiere. There is no doubt the Oscar race has changed over the past few years. If you follow this site, you know I write honestly about what I see happening, which often causes mini whirlwinds on social media. I’m expected to go along with what everyone else is doing, but I’m just not built that way, my dudes.
We know the past two years we’ve had a coordinated effort to ensure equitable contenders, to make sure everything is fair across the board, from the projects chosen, to the casting, to the content of each movie — the message. We’ve had two female directors in a row win Best Director, and we’ve had two films by women winning the top prize.
We’re also living through our eras of long-overdue firsts. First film in a foreign language to win Best Picture, first Best Picture winner by a woman of color, first Best Picture with a predominantly deaf cast… the last thing we seem to be doing is looking for the best and he brightest. They must first meet a set of criteria to even have a shot at consideration. The BAFTA took the option of choosing the acting and directing categories away from their voters entirely, because they could not seem to fix their problem of inclusivity.
We know things changed. We kind of know how we got there. We had built for ourselves a kind of utopia of a fully realized version of the American dream where everyone gets a seat at the table. If you watch any movie made in Hollywood today, they mostly mirror back this ideology — not just with their inclusive casting, but with how the characters deal with problems and talk to each other.
We were so comfortable in that cocoon that our job was simply to continue to tinker with our utopian diorama, our version of what we thought American life should be. It was never perfect enough. We kept trying to get there. When the election of 2016 happened, it was like that utopia had blown a hole in its side and suddenly we were tumbling through space, with a blast of air that sent everything flying off the handle. Who are these people who have just disrupted our otherwise safe haven?
It was bad. It thrust Hollywood into two areas of what some might call necessary reckonings, but others might call moral panic. This has all been made worse by social media and especially Twitter. Humans have never done well when they had access to an arena for public shaming. But that is what we have. We are all used to and accepting of living in a culture that has eliminated due process and the presumption of innocence. Trial-by-Twitter is perfectly fine because if enough people pile on, then sooner or later someone is going to lose their job, or be forced to apologize.
When it comes to the Oscar race, these past six years have been the strangest I’ve experienced in my 22 years on the job. Standing up against racism and rape were the two massive movements that exploded in this country during the Trump years. It isn’t too hard to figure out why that might be — Trump was charged with both and won anyway. It was then a matter of bringing him down, and then a matter of a full blown Cold War online, one we’re still fighting.
Even before Trump, Twitter had, over time, changed from being a place to connect with others to an arena for public shaming. The threat is always there, not because of how people on these apps behave, but because major institutions respond to their ongoing hysteria. If people didn’t lose their jobs, or projects weren’t shelved, or withering apologies didn’t have to be milked out of every person accused of wrong-doing, then it wouldn’t matter. It would just be a dumb app full of dumb people hunched over their algorithm-driven, dopamine delivery system.
The purges and persecutions off of social media have only intensified since Biden was elected, even with Trump banned from Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. In each instance, the person accused is destroyed and that is that. It is a wildfire that hasn’t dimmed even a little bit.
Now, with some films that will be bringing up both of these topics quite profoundly, we’re probably in for another year of equity-based voting. In fact, I’d wager, this is the new normal until we have another massive culture quake like we had in 2016.
There are plenty of films headed for the Oscar race that deal directly with racism, like Till, and other films about strong black women front-and-center, like The Woman King and Shirley. And then there are the films about sexual assault. There are two of them this year: Women Talking and She Said. Both will bring us back to the #MeToo era, and inevitably back to Harvey Weinstein.
The Weinstein saga lives inside the heart of Hollywood and the Oscars. He was a looming figure when I started, in 2000, and he and his highly manipulative team strangely dominated the Oscars for years up until he was “me too’d.” The #MeToo movement and Hollywood is a complicated relationship. While many view it as a positive, much-needed reckoning, there was a dark side to it, a witch hunt side, an unfair side.
The story at the center of the new film, She Said, is what broke the Weinstein crimes wide open and forever changed how accusations by victimized women are treated. This was a profound moment for many women in this country, but it also spurred action in the industry, altering how films are made, how they’re written about, who writes about them, who directs them, whether they have intimacy coordinators or not (they all do now), what the power dynamics are in every film, etc. Once you commit yourself to change, there is an army on Twitter watching every move you make.
Weinstein, it seems, is still shaping the Oscar race even if he’s not involved in it. Why the Weinstein story caused such a frenzy when it did was because, essentially, he was hiding in plain sight. Mass hysteria or panic usually hits a community when many people are connected such that they all react at roughly the same time, and when there is a clear and present threat coming from inside the community itself.
The Weinstein Oscar era started all the way back in 1989 with My Left Foot, when he and his brother Bob owned Miramax. Then, in 1992, he had another Best Picture contender with The Crying Game.
After that, the Miramax run kicked into high gear:
1993 — The Piano
1994 — Pulp Fiction
1995 — Il Postino
1996 — The English Patient (first Best Picture win)
1997 — Good Will Hunting
1998 — Life Is Beautiful, Shakespeare in Love (second BP win)
1999 — The Cider House Rules
2001 — Chocolat, In the Bedroom
2002 — Gangs of New York, The Hours, Chicago (third win)
2003 — N/A
2004 — Finding Neverland, The Aviator
Then the Weinstein/Miramax reign ends and we pick up with The Weinstein Co, which didn’t get a Best Picture nomination until 2008, with The Reader. There was such a shock, because it had replaced The Dark Knight, that the Academy expanded their Best Picture lineup from five to ten the next year.
Then we get:
2009 — Inglourious Basterds
2010 — The King’s Speech (fourth win)
2011 — The Artist (fifth win)
2012 — Silver Linings Playbook, Django Unchained
2013 — Philomena
2014 — The Imitation Game
2016 — Lion
That was when everything changed, as we now know. Long time readers of this site have been along for the bumpy ride and this was and remains the bumpiest. The Oscar race has been completely upended by these two major movements that, I think, are a direct response to the shock of Trump’s win.
The way I figure it, once people can mention Trump’s name and people shrug, when there is no fascination, no complete freak-outs, and when the waves of fear and rage evaporate (if they ever do), we will have moved past this era in our history. But that isn’t likely to happen for some time, which means the Oscars are going to be what they are today for a long time.
We will be revisiting the Weinstein story with She Said, and since it’s about the New York Times, there will be lots of press, lots of interviews and attention on social media. That is going to make it very likely a major player in the Oscar race. The question will be whether this opens Pandora’s Box or whether it offers some closure.
It is just one moment in our recent past that will be brought back to life for this year’s race. There will probably be an inclination to reach for escapism right now, and that might be how it goes. But those of us who cover the race and have through the Weinstein era will be reliving all of those years the film depicts, like they were yesterday.
The Weinstein story and the Oscars themselves are still unfinished business. I think the film will likely do well with audiences because Weinstein is still Public Enemy Number One. In an era of purges and persecutions, that was a big fish whose capture felt like progress.
It will be interesting whether or not Oscar voters have a taste for it, to pick that scab and relive all of those bad memories. Maybe they will. I don’t mind movies doing the heavy lifting. When it comes to real life, however, I long for the ongoing waves of hysteria to finally come to an end. We’re all just about at that point where we’re ready to escape all of it.
“It would just be a dumb app full of dumb people hunched over their algorithm-driven, dopamine delivery system.”
Sasha – this is the best line of read anywhere all year!! Beautifully said
Sasha you said maybe there will be a day when people just shrug at the mention of Trump’s name . Isn’t going to happen ! Not with his Supreme Court trying to drag us back to the nineteenth century and the man himself thinking about finishing the job he began on January 6th ! As for the Weinstein effect you have that list of films for good or ill he helped with his Oscar campaigns. Maybe if people had reported more about the films and filmmakers he brutalized for so many years the things that those two New York Times reporters wrote about would have come out a lot sooner !
Exactly why would we not be expected to feel rage when Trump’s name is mentioned?
That is the exact reaction any sane human should have.
The part with She Said that I’m wondering about is how will the film deal with the actual real life actresses who came forward. Really tricky when you’re doing any real story about still living people, especially when Weinstein’s fall is less than five years old. Spotlight got in a bit of controversy about how it distorted the character of a schoolmaster in ONE SCENE (he sued if I recall correctly). She Said involves many characters in real life, some of who are still part of the litigation against Weinstein. If the film makes a mistake in this respect, I expect the Ben Shapiro types to pounce and pounce hard.
As for women winning director two years in a row, there’s an old saying in sports whenever people try to put an asterisk on a championship team. You can only play who is on the schedule. The Warriors won the NBA title even though two of their opponents’ star players were injured. The trophy is just as shiny. The parade is just as big. Zhao and Campion didn’t have their Oscars grooved for them. Against the films nominated, who was going to beat them? While I believe based on how POTD did on Oscar night, I don’t think Campion won by very much at all, but she wasn’t an undeserving winner. And I’ll never understand the hostility about Zhao. Either way, the trophies are still just as shiny.
I think we’ll see a lot of support for politically charged films this year. I don’t know about She Said. I expect it to have a lot of goodwill on its side, but with same sex marriage potentially being in danger due to the extremist Supreme Court, I can see Rustin really walking away with Best Picture. What bothers me is George C. Wolfe who isn’t really a cinematic director. But if he does a good enough job, this could be a no-brainer.
Between Women Talking and She Said, I’m very interested to see which film gets further in the race–the former has a formidable director, but a story that we are unfamiliar with whereas the latter has a less seasoned director with a story that is all too familiar.
I currently have them both predicted for Best Picture with Sarah Polley slotted in Best Director (I do believe there will be one woman, it could just as easily be Maria Schrader of Chinonye Chukwu, but I’m going with what is familiar for now).
Yes, I definitely think that a female-centered and directed movie will be a major player in the Oscars this year. My gut says it’s She Said, but I could definitely be wrong.
Same. The only thing that gives me pause in going all in on it right now is Frances McDormand appearing in the Women Talking.
I should try to read that novel again.
There already is a female-centered movie in contention, albeit not one directed by a woman. Everything Everywhere All At Once. It’s rolling on a Birdman path, and I’m not sure why people can’t see this.
I don’t know about that level of certainty given that we have seen very little so far this season. Think of the early summer picks that have not gone the distance.
I don’t think ultimately it will win BP/BD but if I use the CODA analogy, Quan is Troy Kotsur. It will need a lot of perceived contenders to stumble still.
Quan will be completely overlooked in the field.
I’m not so sure. The film made nearly 100 million and that’s not nothing.
Last year at this time so many were pulling for the actors in Mass, whom I rightfully singled out for Spirits only. But you are of course free to predict whomever you like. 😉
Not many contenders stumbled last year, and CODA still won. And CODA wasn’t even considered a possibility before February. In December, right before award bodies started announcing, it wasn’t even considered a safe bet for a nomination. Or even likely. It then failed to get any of the usual Oscar stats: Globe nods for directing and screenplay, DGA nod, ACE nod, directing and editing nods. It did not win a single Globe. It even failed to win any awards or mentions from LAFCA, NYFCC, NSFC, and the NBR. It wasn’t some sort of critics’ darling either. It still won. So it’s possible that a lot of films turn out to be Oscar contenders and don’t stumble… And yet, a movie from the summer wins. And as CODA proved, the film doesn’t need an analogy. It needs a narrative. And Everything Everywhere All At Once has the narrative. Even if it fails to be a big contender in picture, I think it’ll get nominated. And Yeoh will be extremely competitive to win the Oscar.
”The Power of the Dog” clearly was the critics’ darling, winning so many prizes. And while the Academy respected it enough to give it a leading 12 Oscar nominations, they didn’t embrace it fully, rewarding it only for direction. I think ”CODA” benefitted from voters who sought an alternative.
I think it’s an early bird pipedream for Best Picture. At the end of the year, screenplay, maybe Yeoh but overall it’s destined for Indie Spirits.
I believe I read somewhere that ”Everything Everywhere All at Once” will not be contending for Indie Spirit Awards. The budget cap for Spirit-eligible movies is $22.5 million, and ”Everything’s” budget was $25 million.
Interesting, so nothing then.
I just have to love how people is simply ignoring the fact, that “She Said” actually sounds like a mix of “Spotlight” and “Bombshell” in tone and themes (all three being based upon actual events, obviously). So it will either do well at the Oscars, or easily be put aside, for being something to close for the AMPAS members… “Bombshell” was the later case, so it underperformed, Oscar-wise, but with “Spotlight”, the distance with the disturbing themes was enough to reward it with Best Picture and little else.
So I don’t count with “She Said” winning Best Picture, but it MAY score 2-3 above the line nominations, but I am in doubt it will win anything.
It will be interesting to see how She Said is handled. I think it is one of those things that can’t be denied a nomination, for the shear fact of the content. It would have to be a train wreck for a snub. It’s obvious comparison will be Spotlight, and a lot of people I feel, voted for it because it felt like justice being served. So how could something with similar premise that literally was about the very system in which Hollywood ran—but kept silent about—not be at least nominated?!
However, that also could be the thing that also pushes it away from people—the wanting to put it in the past and escape from all the bad with what that brings up as well as just current events. I could see it going either way….but I feel it would probably be bad optics for The Academy to not at least show it some love (obviously sight unseen—it could be bad, but I don’t think it will be bad enough that it will be ignored)