They Give Oscars for this Stuff?

I hate to pile on; in these blog posts I like to take iconoclastic positions that defy the Convention Wisdom (tm John Kenneth Galbraith).  But sometimes something happens that is so stupid, so idiotic, so completely meshugenah that I can’t help myself.

The Academy of Motion picture Arts & Sciences has announced that in the future there will be a category called "Best Popular Film."

God help us.

Here is the problem they are trying to address: several years ago (2008) a couple of really popular films that had some artistic merit, The Dark Knight and Wall-E, failed to get a best picture nomination.  Ratings for the Oscar ceremony were sagging, and the theory was that there was a direct link between TV ratings for the Oscar broadcast and the popularity of the nominees.  The academy then increased the number of nominees to a maximum of ten, expecting the additional five nominees to be what the press would call “popcorn movies.”

Alas, the Oscar voters, in their infinite wisdom, responded by nominating even more artsy-fartsy art house movies.  Don’t get me wrong, I love the Coen Brothers, but A Serious Man (2009) getting a Best picture nomination is just silly. 

Things didn’t improve, and big budget films of reasonably high quality kept missing a Best Picture nomination while artsy stuff like Moonlight and The Shape of Water kept winning.  So, if you can’t make the Academy voters nominate an action film for Best Picture, you create a new category that will force them to.

I recall reading somewhere that once J.D. Power and Associates did a survey expecting a certain make of car to win, and when it didn’t it created a category like “Best new American 4-door SUV with 8 cup holders” that was so narrowly defined that the car they wanted to honor was the only entrant.

Why is this a stupid idea?  First of all, there already is an award for Best Popular Film: it’s called M-O-N-E-Y.  I was amused when, in 2009, people predicted Avatar (a rare money-maker that did get a Best Picture nomination) would win Best Picture over The Hurt Locker because it made more money.  I predicted The Hurt Locker would win BECAUSE it made less money.  Except for Titanic (which is an outlier of epic dimensions), the biggest money-making film of the year rarely wins Best Picture.  It’s like the attitude in Hollywood is, “You made all that money, AND you want awards too?”

Secondly, what is a “popular” film?  Do you base it on total domestic gross?  Then what about films released late in the year that have only a few weeks before the nominations close?  Do you HAVE to nominate the five biggest blockbusters even if one is an Adam Sandler animated film that made $300 million despite being drek?  Does the artistic merit of the film still matter, or are we only comparing box office?  Is there a threshold below which films aren’t considered “popular”?  $100 million box office used to be the sign of a hit; Solo made that its opening weekend and was considered a bust.

Thirdly, what is the aesthetic criterion for judging “Best Popular Picture”?  Does the Oscar automatically go to the biggest money-maker?  If not, isn’t that subverting the point of the category?  Generally speaking, most of a year’s top box office champs are sequels, especially for children’s movies (Star Wars, Marvel, Hotel Transylvania 3, etc.).  What happens if a money-making sequel to a good film is not as good; does it still get consideration just because it made money?

Won’t this hurt the chances of a well-made blockbuster wining Best picture if it is considered a shoo-in for “Best Popular Film”?  Isn’t this creating a “ghetto” for money-making films that will mean they won’t be considered seriously in the “real” Oscar categories, including Best Actor or Actress as well as Best picture?

It’s times like this I recall the words of H.L. Mencken, who once said that “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”  If you think lower ratings of the Oscar telecast is a problem which is understandably ABC's position, and you think obscure (“unpopular”) films being nominated and winning Best Picture is a contributing factor, then come up with a more subtle way of fiddling with the voting then just giving “popular” films their own category. 

You people in the Academy are supposed to be creative; come up with something more imaginative!