The Oscars are finally here…
Truth be told, this whole #Oscarssowhite controversy over the last month has really, as the British are fond of saying, done my head in. It’s been frustrating me and bumming me out.
Having watched the show religiously and aspired to the Oscars since I was a little kid, they have always been a big deal in my world. And I have had to defend them on many occasions, against being old-fashioned, stagnant, too commercial, too political, a mere popularity contest instead of a real measure of artistic talent, etc, etc. You know all these arguments by heart. They have been in the ether for as long as I can remember. There has always been controversy in some form. There have always been “undeserving winners” and “outrageous snubs” to complain about. Sometimes emotions get the better of the voters and sometimes they play a little catch-up and give somebody an award more for their entire body of work than the current nomination.
It’s a very human process, with all the fickleness that entails.
Sometimes the choices are indefensible, absurd in retrospect…
Exhibit A:
In 1974, The Towering Inferno was actually nominated for Best Picture! I’m not kidding. That actually happened. And this was when there were only FIVE nominees, for chrissake. The other nominees? Maybe you’ve heard of them: Chinatown, The Conversation, The Godfather Part 2, and Lenny. Yeah. And The Fucking Towering Fucking Inferno!! A disaster movie! In both senses of the word! A movie so bad that even after fanatically anticipating it for months in advance, my 11-year-old brain could still tell what a giant burning turd it was!
One could argue it was being rewarded for mere spectacle – although it fails even on that count – but my guess would be that its inclusion has more to do with the influence of the TWO studios, 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros, that made it in a rare joint venture. This was an expensive film for its time and Hollywood was still a small industry town. If the race wasn’t fixed, then at the very least a lot of people voted with their livelihoods and work relationships in mind.
Thank god it didn’t win.
Some people feel that Crash stands out as the “least-deserving” winner in modern memory. I would give that honor to American Beauty, hands down.
To this day, I still hear people ask in disbelief (smug snobbery?) how Ordinary People could possibly have beaten Raging Bull? Well, although the latter is amazing and a technical masterpiece, the former actually makes people cry. They voted with their hearts. Mystery solved.
See where I’m going with this?
The Oscars are just opinions, counted up on little pieces of paper. That’s all. They are influenced by so many different factors that it’s impossible to reduce it to something mathematical, logical.
And as any Oscar buff knows, political issues have always intruded on the process. I just finished a book called “The Big Show” by Steve Pond, a collection of Behind-The-Oscars articles on the backstage goings-on over fifteen years, and it reminded me of not just Sacheen Littlefeather and Vanessa Redgrave and Michael Moore, but also earlier protests by Black leaders.
Do I think race comes into play?
It’s a bit of a trick question, isn’t it? Yes and no. We’re all of us racist to some degree, whether we admit it or not. But just because we see someone as ‘the other’ when we shouldn’t, doesn’t mean we don’t want to reward them for an incredible performance. Sometimes being ‘the other’ makes your fine work and talent stand out even more. As many have recently said, it’s much more about lazy thinking on the production end than anything else. It’s harder to get movies made with minority leads – not just Black, but also Asian, Latino, Middle-Eastern, or for that matter, any actor from a foreign country. Hell, it’s harder to get movies made with a FEMALE LEAD. So if you’re saying that a richer tapestry of people of all colors/ethnicities is needed and a much wider variety of stories – who can really dispute that? And I do believe everyone benefits, the art form benefits, from working towards that goal. So I hope all this talk will give us a boost in that direction…
Historically, there have been times where I felt actors of color were definitely unfairly overlooked. The entire cast of The Color Purple leaps to mind. I love that film. 11 nominations and not one win! At the time I felt it was more a snub of Spielberg and his “sentimental” style than blunt racism…but yeah, it certainly felt suspicious. (Out Of Africa won instead, not helping – a stilted white romance in the heart of the dark continent)
I also felt strongly that Wesley Snipes should have been nominated for his heartbreaking turn in The Waterdance, and that Samuel L. Jackson should have won for Jackie Brown.
I’m sure there are plenty of others…
But in the last 20 years, we’ve seen the following winners; Denzel Washington (for the second time), Halle Berry, Cuba Gooding Jr., Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Hudson, Monique, Forrest Whitaker, Morgan Freeman, Octavia Spencer, and Lupita Nyongo.
Does that automatically level the playing field? Of course not… But it is a helluva’ group of talented people. Including a few of our very finest actors: Freeman, Washington, Whitaker.
Two years ago, 12 Years A Slave won Best Picture.
So I guess I resent the implication that there’s been no progress at all, just because the last couple years have been dry. I don’t really believe the Academy – more often attacked by Right Wingers as a hotbed of Commies and Limo Liberals – is racist in its heart. I think most of the voters would revel in the opportunity to reward artists of color. But the industry has to supply them with the work to choose from. This year Creed, Straight Outta Compton, and Beasts Of No Nation are being cited as overlooked. One is a popcorn film with a novelty supporting turn (or return to form) for a veteran action star of ill repute – the second is a biography of a rap group, that no matter how well-made was never going to be the Academy’s cup of tea – and the third is a dark, depressing movie about children soldiers in Africa released by an online streaming company, Netflix. In each case, a good argument can be made that there were other complicating factors at play.
Spike Lee is boycotting the show despite the inconvenient fact that a few weeks ago he was given a Lifetime Achievement award from the Academy. Despite the fact that the Academy President is African-American, and so are the producer and host of this year’s show.
If the Academy is racist, then they are really really bad at it!
And some of the reactions to the whole thing have just defied logic. Will Smith and Jada Pinkett are exactly the wrong people to be protesting – especially since it looks like sour grapes on Smith’s part for not being nominated for Concussion. And the idea that the Academy needs to suddenly recruit a bunch of minority members is insulting to everyone involved because it implies people will only vote down their color line. That’s ridiculous, that’s not the answer.
Again, put the pressure on the studios to hire minority talent – that is the change we want.
This article says it much better than I possibly can.
But you are never going to get anywhere “shaming” the Academy into giving Oscars to as many black actors as possible. And who would want to win the award with that kind of shadow hanging over it? Who wants that asterisk next to their name? You can’t legislate award shows. By doing so, you negate the whole purpose. You take all the joy out of the wins, which are, by their very nature, gifts. It will only lead to more bitterness and more division.
In any case, the whole debacle has really kind of taken the fun out of the Oscars this year. I guess some would say that’s as it should be. But I still find it depressing. I look forward to when this conversation becomes passe…
Chris Rock is a smart, funny man, but if anything, he likes to throw gasoline on every fire, so I’m cringing a little at what might go down. It will be interesting to see how far he goes.
We may all feel like Jude Law by the end!
In any case, bring on the show…
–RR