If the pundits and Film Twitter critics are to be believed, One Battle After Another is not just the best film of the year but perhaps the best film ever. By all accounts, it is set to sweep the Oscars with the same passionate fervor as Everything Everywhere All At Once. The right movie at exactly the right time for these exact voters. The Scott Kernen theory that it’s Moonlight or The Shape of Water, post-Trump, is also kind of making sense – the right movie/right time/these voters.
Do I think it is a worthy movie to win Best Picture? I guess it depends on how you define that. It doesn’t mean what it used to mean. Back when it was The Godfather, there would be no debate. It was obviously Best Picture of the year. However, the Oscars are no longer what they once were. They are insular and narrow. They speak to a small segment of the population that cares about them. They do express the collective ideology of the voters, but the demographics and the membership have changed so much that it’s hard to define what that even is by now.
Do I think it’s good enough to win? I think the reasons it would win have less to do with how good the movie is and more to do with Paul Thomas Anderson’s legacy in American film and how it’s finally time to award him, along with the film being a weapon of war and a way to show the American people which side Hollywood is on.
The dissenting view is pretty clear and perhaps best summed up by Conservative Andrew Klavan:
But that doesn’t matter because it’s almost as though the more the Right hates on the movie, the more passionate voters will become to WIN THIS ONE BATTLE. I would hope it was more satirical, like Dr. Strangelove or the great political satires from the 1970s, but today’s Left has all of the wealth and all of the culture – they are the ruling class, not the resistance. They need “wokeness” as such to absolve themselves of their sins. Taking out class means it’s about marginalized groups, racism, etc. How many Academy voters or industry even ask these questions? Probably not that many.
This isn’t a movie where you dig into the characters, like The Departed or No Country for Old Men. These characters are archetypes in an imaginary war the Left believes it’s fighting (see Eddington). I would say it would be a disaster for Hollywood to award this film, but at this point, I’m not sure how much worse it could possibly get. The American people are aware of what Hollywood and the Oscars think of them. They know because they can’t watch the movies anymore, and award shows are, for the most part, unbearable.
It always reminds me of that line about the Russian Revolution by Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovitch: “The last spectacular ball in the history of the empire … [but] a new and hostile Russia glared through the large windows of the palace … while we danced, the workers were striking and the clouds in the Far East were hanging dangerously low.”
So let’s assume the pundits are right and this is a juggernaut that can’t be controlled. How many Oscars could it theoretically win?
The first thing to know is that sweeps are mostly a thing of the past. Everything Everywhere and Oppenheimer both won the maximum, 7 Oscars. Movies that have one more than are (per Filmsite.org):
If it wins 8 Oscars, it breaks a record for the preferential, or expanded ballot era. Here is how that lays out:
The last three years have seen near-sweeps, or even four if you count CODA. Nomadland doesn’t quite fit. Parasite does. It shows voters fall in love with a movie and give it their top prize, as opposed to spreading the wealth as they did before the new members were added (beginning in 2016 and ending in 2020).
How many nominations could it get?
Picture
Director
Adapted Screenplay
Cinematography
Casting
Editing
Actor
Supporting Actor
Supporting Actress (X2)
Sound
Score
If they fall in love with One Battle After Another (as a weapon of war or a way to finally honor beloved PTA), it likely wins at least five Oscars:
Picture
Director
Adapted Screenplay
Cinematography
Editing
If it were going to sweep, which other Oscars might it win?
Best Actor
Supporting Actor
Casting
That ties it with Everything Everywhere All At Once
Are there more Oscars it could win?
Original Score
Sound
Supporting Actress
That gives it 10 wins and is highly unlikely. At most, it probably wins 7 or 8, I’d say.
We’re not seeing splits with this new Academy so much, even when we think we could predict them. We might see a split if the Producers Guild and the Directors Guild take different approaches. I would watch out for Hamnet. It might be the movie everyone falls in love with because it exists outside of our modern-day troubles, and then we might see a split.
