Every January, the Academy Award nominations are announced, and every year a vast majority of the movie-going public, film critics and Hollywood insiders (whatever that means) read the list while scratching their heads and saying, “Really?”
Sometimes the voters get it right, but sometimes they are so far off it’s not even funny. The nominations and winners from last year were pretty much spot on8212;Daniel Day-Lewis, Javier Bardem and “No Country For Old Men” took home the top honors8212;those I could get behind. This year, though, there are so many categories that miss the mark completely that it just leaves you wondering who votes for these things in the first place. With the Oscars, it’s like an annual repeat of the 2004 presidential election8212;everyone knew George W. Bush would screw everything up, but people voted for him anyway.
Living in Utah only adds to this frustration because half of the movies that were nominated just barely arrived in Salt Lake City (“Revolutionary Road”) or won’t for at least another week (“The Wrestler”). That makes it harder to get behind a nomination for a movie that only people in New York and Los Angeles have seen.
The biggest disappointments this year are that “The Dark Knight” didn’t get a Best Picture nod, and Christopher Nolan didn’t get nominated for Best Director. “Gran Torino” was shut out altogether and Wall-E, one of the best movies of the year, still couldn’t convince voters that it was more than just a cartoon, despite an aggressive campaign otherwise.
Clint Eastwood has been dropping hints that “Gran Torino” would be his last acting role and gave a great performance, but got absolutely no praise from voters. The Academy probably feels it’s honored him enough over the past few years, but that still doesn’t make it OK to leave him out. That’s like not inviting LeBron to the All-Star game because he went last year. If you’re constantly one of the best in the game, you deserve to be there every year. There is a bright side to that snub, however8212;it’s between Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke now. Penn is on a hot streak, but Rourke’s performance is one for the ages.
The Best Actress category is a mess too, but not because of a snub. Kate Winslet is nominated for her performance in “The Reader,” but she’s already won a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild Award for that same performance, though it was listed as a supporting role in those victories. That kind of clears the way for Meryl Streep to swoop in and take it for “Doubt,” but Winslet is nominated almost every year and is one of the best actors working today. She’s never won an Oscar though, and this confusion isn’t going to help.
Bruce Springsteen’s original song for “The Wrestler” wasn’t even acknowledged, and it’s one of the best songs The Boss has ever written. I’ve sat through the end credits of that movie on multiple occasions just to hear it again.
“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” was a good movie, but it plays like a backward version of “Forrest Gump.” Going over the list of movies I’ve seen this year, I don’t think I’d even put it in my top five. “Wall-E” was a cartoon, sure, but it also had more heart, humor and meaning than anything else this year. And that’s with close to no dialogue for the first 45 minutes. It’s just a stunning picture to look at, but apparently it can’t compete with Brad Pitt in old man make-up.
The Original Screenplay category has a chance to redeem itself this year, after giving Diablo Cody the award for “Juno” last year. Not to take anything away from that film, but there were much better scripts written. This year, Dustin Lance Black is among the frontrunners, with his script for “Milk,” but “In Bruges” is much better from a writing standpoint. “Milk” feels like Biopic 101, and if not for the great performances of Penn, Brolin, etc., it wouldn’t even be there. “In Bruges,” on the other hand, could hold up as a lazy afternoon read, and that’s the real trick of writing a good script.
Now, for every mistake the Academy Award voters make, there’s always a couple that they get absolutely right, and Best Supporting Actor is one of those categories. Heath Ledger’s portrayal of the Joker has been cleaning house on the awards circuit this year, and rightly so. It’s his race to lose right now, but he’s up against some solid competition such as Josh Brolin, Michael Shannon, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Robert Downey Jr.’s character from Tropic Thunder.
Those one or two categories don’t excuse Academy voters for dropping the ball so many other times. These awards used to mean something to Hollywood8212;and I’m sure they still do, if only because the studios can print the win on the DVD covers8212;but the meaning has been diminished by one lousy win after another.
Just like when the people who rose up changed this country with the last election, maybe it’s time for that to happen in Hollywood. And it just might, because there’s already an aggressive write-in campaign going for “The Dark Knight” as the Best Picture.
If that fails though, as it probably will, maybe we can petition to a higher power8212;someone with the authority to pull it off. Perhaps President Barack Obama can add that to his list of things to do8212;right behind the college football playoff proposal.
