Flasz On Film

In one of her Netflix specials, Michelle Wolf made a remark that a blog post is a conversation nobody wanted to have with you… and she’s not wrong. However, I will have that conversation and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.  

Look, it’s now an annual custom to witness the micro-universe of the Film Twitter bubble to burst a collective artery the minute Oscar nominations are announced and it’s not even fun anymore to wonder what the reason might be this year. It’s always the same stuff. The Oscars are always ostensibly too white, too male, too straight, too old, too boomer, too conservative. You pick. And it’s all despite the fact the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, year on year, contort themselves further and further to assuage all this vitriol coming from an army of self-diagnosed do-gooders consumed by righteous fury and suffering mild burns from holding their torches too close to their faces.  

It’s at this point inescapable. We are now in a world where every year, without fail, the run-up to the Oscar ceremony will be taken hostage by the same issue wearing a slightly different outfit. And this year, the outfit is pink because a collective body of however many people – checks notes while elevator music plays… – apparently exactly 587 people in the director branch of the Academy, a quarter of whom are females (that’s according to a cursory Google search courtesy of Yours Truly), had the audacity to “snub” Greta Gerwig and deny her the opportunity to make history and join the esteemed elite of film directors in the running for the Oscar for Best Direction this year.  

Plus, Margot Robbie didn’t get shortlisted for Best Female Performance either, all the while Ryan Gosling did for his role as Ken. Which apparently is a slap on the face. And here I am sitting on the sidelines of what apparently must feel to those invested in the matter like the flipping rapture and I wonder why so many people care this much. I mean, care to the tune of making it almost impossible for Ryan Gosling to sit it out so that he had to come out in support of Gerwig and Robbie, perhaps out of sheer self-preservation because had he not done that, hell hath no fury. Maybe Film Twitter would have imploded and that would have been the end of it. No such luck, though.  

In any case, this entire pile-on, which is customary at this point it seems, is only an indication of just how toxic the discourse surrounding movies has become. Once a year not only do we get to choose sides in what essentially is a competition where the participants, not to mention the supporters, have absolutely no way of influencing the result, but we also get a free pass to cater to our most virulent tribal tendencies as a result of the simple fact some people in Hollywood had the audacity to bestow recognition on some of their peers, while excluding others.

Why do you care? 

I mean, I get the excitement of seeing if some of your favourite films also get some kudos from the industry, but I equally do not compute the anger when something you like does not get that kudos. In fact, moaning and complaining about it will only undermine whatever the cause this year may be, because if the Academy contorts itself further in its effort to accommodate what essentially is a pitchfork mob of perpetually disappointed naysayers with nothing more to contribute than their keyboard vitriol, then the minute Gerwig gets her Oscar – which she will eventually, mark my words – it will instigate a backlash based on an assumption she didn’t deserve it in the first place and she only got it because the Academy caved. You can’t win.  

Equally, had you had your say and the Academy decided to overturn their decision – arrived at somewhat democratically, mind you – which one of the already nominated artists would you boot out of the running? Would it be fair? How would you set it up? Would there be a quota to satisfy all demographics you think deserving of representation? And would ability and achievement even factor into the selection process?  

Look at these nominations holistically and remove your political biases from the equation and you’ll see that the selection of films singled out for the highest industry acclaim is quite formidable. Well, there’s Oppenheimer, which I personally think is overrated, but I am not going to write a strongly worded letter demanding that Christopher Nolan be replaced by Greta Gerwig… even if it really would have made sense to me. I’m happy that Justine Trier got the nod, that Scorsese’s last opus is seen as important or that Yorgos Lanthimos’ provocative fairy tale is getting some prestige stripes. It’s fine. It’s just a game.  

Call me an idiot but I don’t really find moaning and groaning about the shouldas, wouldas and couldas of the Oscar nomination patterns all that interesting. I’m happy to see Past Lives among the ten Best Picture nominees and even though I’m pretty sure it’s not going to get the recognition I think it deserves, I’ll be happy with whatever movie gets the high praise. Truth is, the Academy rarely gets things 100% right, and the historical record proves that. How many of the truly great movies we now consider indispensable to the human experience on this planet received high praise at the time of their release? Casablanca? Vertigo? Apocalypse Now? 2001: A Space Odyssey? And let’s not forget about the little fact that the world doesn’t begin or end with Hollywood and that the best cinema is often found elsewhere. Bergman, Kurosawa, Kiarostami, Fellini… Take your pick.  

Conversely, the Academy rarely gets stuff totally wrong either. Sure, there are some movies I fail to understand how they got the praise they got – The English Patient, Oliver! and The Greatest Show on Earth, I’m looking at you lot – but it’s fine. Life goes on. I’ll happily live my life loving Jerry Maguire and Fargo despite the fact they both lost to a pile of schmaltz I can’t believe I watched all the way through.  

Life is much more than tribal online conflict over perceived social injustices that in the grand scheme of things don’t matter all that much. If Barbie is the juggernaut with a potent cultural footprint I believe it is, it will stand the test of time and will be talked about for decades. Time will tell.  

So, I think it’s best if we all collectively agree not to tattoo our political convictions across our foreheads and refuse to treat movies the way pub-dwelling cavemen treat football clubs. You’re not a part of the game and your ire is not going to get your team to win. It’ll only make the life experience of people who have had the misfortune of finding themselves in your vicinity all that much more miserable.  

Please, stop. 

Kenough is kenough.