Author: Matthew Hoover
Editor: Glen Jakober
One of the longest running awards shows, ongoing for over 90 years, the Academy Awards (Oscars) have been affecting filmmakers and audiences for decades. There are a variety of genres of films that are nominated for Oscars. These genres include animated features, short films, documentaries, and more. The nominees are voted for by members of different branches in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. According to the Oscars website (“Academy Membership”), these members include “film artists working in the production of theatrically-released motion pictures”. When voting for nominees, each branch votes for categories relating to their branch in the Academy. When the nominees are announced, all members vote for every category from the nominees.
Many filmmakers strive to be featured in the Academy Awards, and it is a great honor to be a part of. Even so, many people are not even aware of the voting process or anything about the Oscars. I surveyed over two dozen people, most of their ages between 18 and 30, and of those in that age range, only one of them knew who picks the nominees for the Oscars, who also did not know how the winners are picked from those nominees. Being an event this influential, more people should be aware of the Academy Awards, its significance, and how it works.
In 1927, Douglas Fairbanks founded the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in order to benefit the film industry. The first ceremony was held in 1929. It was a banquet for a couple hundred people while awards were given out to filmmakers. For the first ceremony, the recipients of the Oscars were already announced months before the ceremony. For every year after, the results were kept a secret until presenting each category’s award. The first ceremony created so much enthusiasm for the awards that the second ceremony was done on a live radio broadcast. The ceremonies went on for decades, continuing to slowly add more categories over the years. 1966 was the first year that the ceremony was telecast in color. According to the Oscars history on their website, in 2012 “the Academy announced plans for a museum devoted to motion pictures” (“Academy Story”). Today, the awards still go on as usual and the watching the ceremony is a great tradition for those that watch theatrically released motion pictures.
In the survey, I asked if people know details about the Academy Awards, how many they have watched, and if they agree with the winners. Of the people below thirty years old, most have viewed between zero and three ceremonies. As shown in the figures above, most people agree with the winners in each category, but not entirely. Only two people said they agree while most of the rest of the people said they only slightly agree or are neutral. Why does this matter? If the general public does not agree with the Academy members voting for winners, then is the win really deserved?
The Academy Awards take place every year during February, and even if people do not always agree with the results, it is still a prominent ceremony to watch. Getting together with family or friends to watch the ceremony could be a great tradition to start, or it could be turned into a game to see who can guess the most winners in the categories correctly. These activities, however, will not mean anything if people do not agree with the Academy members that vote for the winners. The only way to ensure that the audience agrees with the Academy is to allow them to have a say in the voting. The Academy should have higher priority in the votes, but the audience should be able to participate in this process as well so that they can have representation in one of the biggest awards shows in the country. With some movies being “Oscar bait” films, which are only existent to be nominated for Oscars, this means that some movies are only made for members of the Academy to vote for. This should not be what movies are made for. They should be made to entertain audiences with brilliant film-making so that they are nominated and voted for by those audiences.
Being such a large ceremony with a significant impact on filmmakers and cinephiles alike, the Academy Awards do not have as much meaning as they should. The audience of the ceremonies, sitting on their couches at home, are only there to view a recap of the best films of last year. They should be a part of this event in order to give it more meaning to them. People would care more about the Oscars if they had a say in who wins. This is why shows like America’s Got Talent and The Voice are so popular. People care more about the show when they can vote for the winner themselves. For this reason, the Oscars, as they currently stand, do not matter. If only a few thousand people that are exclusively involved in film-making can vote for these awards, then only those few people view the ceremony as an important experience. Everyone else is there just to find out what movies they should rent on Redbox.
References
“Academy Membership.” Oscars.org | Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, 20 Sept. 2019, http://www.oscars.org/about/join-academy.
“Academy Story.” Oscars.org | Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, http://www.oscars.org/academy-story.
RIPE Magazine | Volume 1 