Awards Season 2021

[Brian C]

With everything happening this week, the Oscars somehow delivered the most depressing blow of all. Everyone, here are the five nominees for the #OscarsCheerMoment Award, representing the five greatest audience pleasing scenes in film history. Do not click, you will regret reading the five nominees

Academy kinda pwning itself there in multiple ways, not least because none of those movies actually won Best Picture.

[FrauBlucher]

[captveg]

Anyway, like I say, when I was younger, the Oscars seemed just incredibly important to me. I wouldn't have missed them for anything if I could help it. But nowadays? I guess I'll watch them if I'm home. But if something else comes up? I won't hesitate to make plans that will cause me to miss them. If someone asks me why they should bother watching the show, what on earth could I possibly tell them?

Another factor, IMO, is that there's just no real suspense in the acting categories. I can't remember the last time one of the Top 2 expected winners via Oscar watching metrics failed to win one of those four awards. Was it Adrien Brody? That was 20 years ago.

Having the online tracking / odds sites and constant analysis / number crunching leading up to Awards night kinda zaps the awards of their impact.

[soundchaser]

I think Hopkins last year was something of a dark horse, but largely based on the narrative. He was certainly a Top 2.

[Ribs]

The only times in the past ten years the acting prize has went to the person who wasn’t the universal frontrunner have been Anthony Hopkins, Olivia Colman, and Mark Rylance (also Christoph Waltz, I guess, though I don’t really remember who was the frontrunner there anyway). Which are all exactly the same type of respected British actor who doesn’t do much press and events! Which I find interesting in isolation. But I do think it’s somewhat telling that the Olivia Colman win is viewed as one of the best Oscar speeches/moments in recent memory as it was definitely a big exciting upset over an extremely boring narrative that had played out for a movie no one cared about with the Wife. But it is ultimately still possible for that upset to pop up even for what seems like the most locked race as did for Hopkins last year - we ultimately just don’t know until everyone gets to vote, no precursor will ever be perfect, though I agree it probably used to be a little less prescribed so soon as it does now. (Though this year at least for the time being does have one genuine “anyone can win!” category for Best Actress, though with SAG we’ll probably at least finally have a frontrunner established as its shifted between Kidman and Colman).

[therewillbeblus]

Do we have a pulse on how the industry feels about The Power of the Dog three months removed from release? It was the frontrunners for BP and Director from the outset and has stayed locked in place ever since, but I don’t detect a ton of enthusiasm for it. I wonder if another film or filmmaker threatens to slide past it in either category- though my money would be on PTA if anything. I don’t see many shifting their enthusiasm to Branagh or Spielberg this year, while that film continues to reach a lot of people’s warm and fuzzy spots who aren’t huge fans of his to begin with- but who knows

[Ribs]

The industry seems to like the movie, though it’s generally done a bit of an odd mix of over and underperforming at various functions (see it getting three SAG noms (plus an additional fourth performer nominated at the Oscars) but not cast, Campion losing Best Director at… the Australian Academy Awards somehow?). I wouldn’t really say it’s been “the frontrunner” for the entire season - I think it and Belfast have traded places a few times. Which is good - Netflix knows that as with Roma and to a lesser degree Mank having a movie touted as The Big Deal can sometimes run a campaign into the ground by the time the ceremony finally comes up. I think on paper everything being equal it makes sense why it’s the movie that’s in front but for whatever reason many prognosticators seem to think its too artful or there’ll be some disconnect that maybe prevents it from closing the deal in the end. As usual there’s always the possibility the preferential ballot could throw things off as well. I personally think Belfast will still take it, but view both as fundamentally wrong choices in that they are extraordinarily unappealing movies to the general viewing audience at home. (But we’re in a weird world where Licorice Pizza is the third highest grossing nominee and the only movie that’s been at all damaged by the perception no one watched it was one of the two films that’s made more money).

[Brian C]

I'm not an Oscar handicapper by any means, but still, I'd be a little surprised if Belfast won. Usually a movie has to have either very strong critical support or be a strong audience favorite to win, but Belfast doesn't meet either of those criteria. It seems to be considered a favorite mostly on the notion that it seems like the kind of thing that usually wins, but what this book presupposes is ... maybe it isn't?

This is an extremely rough metric, but Belfast would be the first winner since Crash not to have at least either an 80 Metacritic score or an 8.0 IMDb user rating (it's currently sitting at 75/7.3, so not super close on either one). But of course Crash was a cultural phenomenon at the time in the way that Belfast very obviously is not.

Like I say, that's a rough metric, and it's possible that neither Metacritic nor IMDb is identifying the audiences that Belfast is connecting with ... but I dunno. It's just not a successful or seemingly widely-viewed movie, and it doesn't even have a much of a hook for an Academy that likes their awards to tell stories about how self-impressed the Academy is with itself. A bittersweet but feel-good story about The Troubles might have connected thirty years ago, but nowadays it feels a bit passé.

[Dr Amicus]

Belfast has been a big hit in the UK, and certainly feedback emails on the Kermode and Mayo radio show have been almost universally very favourable. Having not seen it or the Campion I can’t say, but it looks like a Best Picture winner in a way the other doesn’t. If it makes Academy voters laugh and cry, I think it will win.

[Black Hat]

With everything happening this week, the Oscars somehow delivered the most depressing blow of all. Everyone, here are the five nominees for the #OscarsCheerMoment Award, representing the five greatest audience pleasing scenes in film history. Do not click, you will regret reading the five nominees

The appropriate hyperbole for my shock, despite bracing myself, upon seeing these choices does not exist. What on earth are they trying to achieve?

[domino harvey]

Chastain won SAG in a big surprise that subsequently makes her the front runner for the Oscar because the Best Actress category this year is wild. She definitely wants it the most, and she’s overall one of our best actresses, so sure why not

[Pavel]

The other acting winners were expected, though the Supporting Actor category is now a battle between Kodi Smit-McPhee and Troy Kotsur

[Never Cursed]

Good for Chastain (and Kotsur/the Squid Game actors), but god, what a lousy movie she's gonna get the statue for

[therewillbeblus]

Drat, now I’m gonna have to actually see the thing

[willoneill]

It's not great, but to her credit she's the best part in it. It's an Oscar showpiece in every sense of the stereotype, so if she wins, I guess the model works?

[Never Cursed]

Well, if you call a ~2.7 million worldwide gross for a film already buried on streaming services a working model

[soundchaser]

I enjoyed the film more than most here, but even with its many faults, Chastain is clearly the best thing about it. I would not be upset to see her win the statue.

[knives]

Personally I enjoyed it a fair deal, but it’s also one of those that improves with distance.

[willoneill]

Well, if you call a ~2.7 million worldwide gross for a film already buried on streaming services a working model

Haha, fuck no, not a financial model - an awards model. Which still matters in Hollywood, whether it should or not.

[John Cope]

It's actually a very good film and she's very good in it (as is Garfield who has been almost completely ignored).

[swo17]

I'll say it's flawed but worth watching, especially for the lead performances

[DarkImbecile]

From this THR piece on the ongoing debate over excluding certain awards from the live telecast:

Another governor of a branch that has lost a category from the live telecast, who wishes to remain nameless, says he was jarred when, over the summer, he received a call from Hudson explaining why significant changes to the format of the Oscars were necessary. This governor says that he was told that ABC had warned the Academy that it would cancel the Oscars telecast, via a clause in the Academy and ABC’s deal for the Oscars’ broadcasting rights, if 12 categories were not removed from the show. “We were told we’d have to sacrifice something or we were going to lose the whole show,” this governor recaps.

In the end, rather than dropping 12 categories altogether from the telecast, the Academy was able to satisfy ABC with the current plan, which will leave the network with more time to restore the sorts of ratings-drivers that were glaringly absent from last year’s telecast, such as a host (or, as will be the case this year, three hosts), clips of the nominated films and performances of the best original song Oscar nominees.

[soundchaser]

The show will improve marginally on last year's ratings, but certainly not for any of the reasons ABC thinks. These "ratings-drivers" aren't marketable, apart from the hosts (which may actually turn some people off).

[Brian C]

ABC threatened to cancel the show? That certainly seems like a bluff worth calling. I know last year left a giant crater in the ratings landscape, but it still seems like a radical step for Disney to just say “screw it.” Until last year, it was still one of the highest-rated broadcasts on TV, even as it’s declined over the years.

[felipe]

The other acting winners were expected, though the Supporting Actor category is now a battle between Kodi Smit-McPhee and Troy Kotsur

Is Will Smith expected to win? I always assumed Cumberbatch was the front runner followed by Garfield.