Oscar manifestos

We summarize the political results of the main film award of the world

In Los Angeles, the Oscars was awarded this year. The victory of the Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan was not a surprise: the film received as many as seven figurines from 13 nominations, including the most prestigious awards - for the “Best Film” and “Best Director”. But the main result of the award this year is probably that it reacted not only to internal, but also to world policy. Film critic Oleg Tundra tells how the main film award in the world is politically arranged, what trends reflect this year’s awards and how leading representatives of the film industry spoke about current events.

Who and why receive an Oscar

There are many myths and harmful stereotypes around the main world film award, which are most often distributed by people far from the industry - that the bonus has nothing to do with the audience sympathies, the results are known in advance, the voices are bought, and the reference and awarding prizes are impenetrable. In fact, as we would like or did not like the distributed awards, the presentation of Oscar really reflects the preferences of members of the American Film Academy, which now has more than 10 thousand people.

The first stage is the nomination itself: professionals from specific areas put forward for each of them colleagues. That is, winning artists vote for winning artists, actors-for actors, and installation directors-for installation directors. Thus, each nomination expresses a collective opinion of one or another professional workshop. But the second stage - the final vote, the results of which we observe at the ceremony - passes through the collective way: all members of the film academy vote in all nominations, and the winners are announced by the number of votes. The most difficult nomination in the voting procedure is “Best Film”. It is awarded according to the so-called rating vote , that is, preferences from the best film to the least worse of eight to ten nominated. Voting occurs online and secretly, frauds are impossible, and even the presenters who declare them do not know the names of the winners until the last moment. Thus,

The Oscar, despite the annual murmur of the masses, remains a democratic prize, really formed by the film industry.

Why Oscar still matters

Any festival or a bonus is a booster for the international industry, high expenses and at the same time investment in the future. The Oscar in this regard defeates the British Bafta and the French Cesar, the Golden Globe and the prizes of the Guild of Film Critics, as well as the prizes at class A (Cannes, Venice, Berlinale, Toronto). After the announcement of the results, the fees of nominees and laureates can increase several times, figurines affect the international rental of films and the following transactions of participants, as well as the value of demonstration rights. Oscar is of great importance for little -known actors who debuted in Hollywood cinema: for example, Christoph Waltz before the nomination for the role of Tarantino was recognized in Europe, but not all over the world as an actor. The same turn of fate is waiting for Sandra Huller, a German actress, both films with the participation of which (“Anatomy of the Fall” and “The Foreign Zone”) are nominated for an American film academy this year. In addition, there is an additional growth of symbolic capital, which accompanies the promotions of nominant films. Special slots are organized for industrial impressions and prime minister, publications are planned, and the prize itself is a media car that is processed in the media for several months: from the long-list to the short-list and, finally, to the winners.

Unable to directly affect the nomination of films, production companies make great efforts to show the film the maximum number of movie academics

And to warm their interest even before handing-an “Oscar”-campaigns can cost from 3 to 15 million dollars. But even the abundance of marketing is not always good for films: in particular, the rattling of the whole 2023 Barbie (the most boxing Hollywood film last year) did not get into most nominations and eventually received a prize for only one song - and then not for the one that will sing after Gosling for several more years.

Red carpet policy

The general dress code as a sign of solidarity is not news for such events: so, at the presentation of the Golden Globe and BAFTA in 2018, celebrities at the opening ceremony were dressed in black, protesting against sexual harassment and discrimination in the industry. The military conflict of Israel and Palestine last year greatly shared Hollywood: on the one hand, an establishment that has strong ties with Israel and the Jewish diaspora, on the other, public Muslims and people of Arabic origin. So the way to express compassion for the victims of the war in the Middle East was chosen more delicate: the stars basically attached small badges on clothes. Red icons-for the end of the military conflict in the Middle East as part of the “Artists for Crossing Fire”-attached to Billy Ailish and the stars of the “poor-nasal” Rami Yussef and Mark Ruffalo. The yellow ribbons put on Hamas sympathetic hostages, and the badges with the flag of Palestine are sympathetic to the inhabitants of the Gaza sector. Other representatives of the industry outlined the support of transfers and fighting for equal wages. Meanwhile, in Hollywood itself, streetprotests against Israel’s attack on the Gaza sector threatened to detain or even tear off the ceremony, but this time everything worked out.

Manifesto from the stage

Taking awards, the winners did not subject themselves to self -censorship. The director of the painting “20 days in Mariupol” Mstislav Chernov, who received a prize for the best documentary, told the audience that he would like his cinema to be never shot, and Russia would not attack Ukraine. Drama of the drama about the Holocaust “Zone of interests” (category “Best Foreign Film”) Jonathan Glazer, who did not hold back his sympathy Palestine and during the BAFTA prize, repeated his words on the presentation of “Oscars”: “This is the film that we shot to reflect and push us with the present, and not say what they did then” ... our film shows, to which they showed, to which they showed, to which they showed, to which they show. Curses division in the most terrible outcome. It determined our past and present ... Victims on October 7 in Israel or an ongoing attack in Gaza, all the victims of this detachment, how will we resist? ” A separate quote on the screen during the ceremony honored the death of the Russian political prisoner Alexei Navalny: "Everything that is needed for the triumph of evil is the inaction of good people."

Political agenda and awards

Important political awards of the year was the presentation of the Oscar to the star of Irish origin of Killian Murphy for the role of Oppenheimer in Bayopic Christopher Nolan, as well as Dawin Joy Randolf, who played the “abandoned” mother of the African American soldier who died in Vietnam. The Feminist Epistle of Barbie was ignored even in the nominations, but Emma Stone received a prize for performing Bella Bacter -one of the most crazy and internally free heroines in the latest history of the cinema. Honored attention also got the adapted scenario of the American Read about the primitive exploitation of the African American heritage in mass culture. The author of the script Cord Jefferson said in his award speech: “In society there is interest and taste in something else ... Stories with black heroes do not have to happen on plantations and in sleeping areas, among drug dealers and bandits ... They can be as deep and versatile as any other stories on the screen.”

The only acute political film, unfortunately, completely ignored by film academics, is Martin Scorsese killers , which is still not reflected in the states of the genocide of indigenous Americans. The massive choice of academicians in favor of the well -known history of the creator of the atomic bomb indicates that the workshop of Scorsese to recreate the fragile lost world of the Assaeus tribe did not accept their hearts, did not realize and did not feel the problems of African Americans, women or victims of conflicts in the Middle East. Perhaps because of the statute of limitations and small numbers of the survivors, capable of telling it on their part. I would like to believe that the picture of Scorsese will withstand the test of time and take a worthy place in the history of political cinema, which she certainly is.