Gross Behaviour - by Leonard Klady

Oscar … Where Is Thy Sting?

As the nominations were being read for the 76th edition of the Academy Awards, I glanced down at one of the Hollywood trade papers and saw a graph detailing the steady decline of Oscar viewership contrasted against the equally steady growth for the televised Golden Globes. In the past four years Oscar eyeballs have diminished by some 29% while the Globe's orb has grown 21% in the course of five most recent airings. In 2000, the Academy Awards had double the audience to its competitor but last year's broadcast corralled 33 million viewers compared with last weekend's record Globe turnout of 26.7 million.

It's fair to say that if NASA were controlling the show, the message from backstage would be: Hollywood, we've got a problem. The Golden Globes are simply part - albeit a significant one - of what dogs the ailing big kahuna of movie awards. The organization's confidence in its own supremacy has allowed dozens of wannabees to poach on its territory and while it's told the world that it was only a scratch, the most recent medical checkup confirmed the patient was anemic and had to be immediately wheeled off for a massive transfusion.

There's no quick fix to the situation for the Academy. The first pangs of recognition that something had to be done resulted in moving the event back a day from a Monday berth that had existed for decades. Monday had been deemed ideal within the industry because, barring holidays, it remains the slowest movie going day of the week. However, the production chieftans and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences board members identified a number of potential benefits in repositioning to Sunday. Logistically, traffic control and access would be simplified by a move from a work day rush hour to the Sabbath. The event could also begin earlier and eliminate telecasts that seeped into the next day on the East coast.

Theater owners weren't happy about losing part of their Sunday box office but swallowed the bitter pill. The move went into effect and audience interest continued to decline. The AMPAS spin was that terrible as the situation was, it would be far worse had it held fast to a Monday broadcast.

Other band-aid solutions were pursued. The executive director, in consort with the president, set in motion the elimination of the short subject categories. Their rationale was sound: the theatrical vitality of the short subject that existed when the categories were introduced had become moribund. Also, its membership has only a vestigial involvement in that area of filmmaking. What was perceived as a no-brainer rapidly turned into a firestorm with passionate advocates for documentary and live-action short subjects furious that the Academy would take such a cynical step and deprive up and comers with an invaluable financial and career boost. Also shot down in flames were efforts to move several technical awards (on a rotating basis) from the broadcast to inclusion as part of the organization's separate Sci-Tech awards. Again, those likely to feel the impact dug in their heels and called the move discriminatory.

So, following all the sturm und drang, the small inroad made was to annually cap the number of Special and discretionary awards (including the Thalberg) it doles out annually. Considerable time and effort had been expended on trimming the show by perhaps 15 minutes and that diverted attention from the more salient reasons the show was losing ground.

There's no question that AMPAS and Oscar carry the authority and weight of the film industry. It's a billion dollar imprimatur that caught fire on February 19, 1953 when it was aired on television for the first time with Bob Hope presiding over the ceremony. It ruled! But fifty years on, a lot of outfits have realized there's money and attention to be gained from being part of the process. The trickle of alternative movie awards has in the past three decades grown from a trickle to a torrent that precedes the Academy Awards. And in recent years, when the envelope was opened and the winner announced, it generally felt like a lot of déjà vu.

The most recent response is now in evidence with the move to advance the awards a month beginning this year with a February 29 broadcast. Objectively, it seems logical and long overdue. The abbreviated award season ought to manifest itself in a fresher quality to the nominees and winners. There was also a tacit understanding that 30 fewer days to Oscar would create a Darwinian environment in which flyweight clones would be deprived of oxygen and expire. However, there's little of evidence of that yet and whether that's a natural process that will occur in the next five years remains theoretical. It may also be too long and damaging a gestation period for the Academy to weather.

One can also hypothesize that a shortened season merely sardines the schedule and the intrinsic problem at the Academy is reversing an evolution that has gone from "the word" to "the last word." It cannot afford the process to progress to the point where Oscar is simply "a word."

When my parents finally allowed me to stay up for the Oscar ceremonies (it was a school night), they seemed magical and glamorous even in black and white. In memory it felt as if their were more movie stars back then - John Wayne, Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Gary Cooper and virtually everyone that seemed untouchable appeared to be present. There was something inexplicably deft about how Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas could wade through a spoofy song and dance routine titled "Not Nominated" and appear more like real folks without tarnishing their luster.

Today, their equivalents are apt to appear as guest stars on Friends or be the source of an elaborate goof on some reality show. The distance between stars and the audience has contracted to a point where magic is no longer an option. However, the Oscar ceremonies and virtually all the other award presentations are operating with a playbook unchanged for a half century. There's a predictability about it all that makes it easy to channel surf during commercial breaks without fear that some precious moment will be missed if one strays too long. I don't know what steps need to be taken to get things back in sync but it isn't cosmetic touch ups, it's radical surgery.

And the Fluvvie Goes to …

An inveterate Oscar basher I know called shortly after the announcement of nominees Tuesday and confessed that he thought the 76th annual roster was its most palatable in years. He then proceeded to pick it apart category-by-category, citing omissions, dubious inclusions and making pronouncements about eventual winners.

Charitably speaking I thought it a respectable, if uninspired, selection and harks back the myriad awards already meted out by sundry critical organizations. Johnny Depp's inclusion among acting nominees at the expense of Russell Crowe, Paul Giamatti or Peter Dinklage was presaged by other award giving groups and generated a faint "oh," rather than mute shock. Conversely, the failure of Cold Mountain to secure nominations for best picture - the first time since 1991 that Miramax has been absent in the category - screenplay or direction could be explained away by its generally poor showing in guild and critic's honors. It would have been a shock if Master and Commander was shut out of Oscar consideration but no one anticipated the film would garner 10 mentions.

Of course, the release slate of any given year and industry and public response have the single greatest impact on the annual ballot. What's more difficult to ascertain this year is how advertising, reviewers, other awards and nominations and a combination of all those elements influenced Academy member voting. My gut sense is that the quicker rush to judgment translated into generally more pedestrian choices. The opportunity for more eccentric work to reach voters was likely reduced.

It also appears that the films and individuals whose work has attained a high level of critical consensus whether it was The Return of the King, Mystic River or Lost in Translation; performances by Bill Murray, Charlize Theron or Tim Robbins or the technical prowess of Girl with a Pearl Earring, all made the cut. There wasn't a single group or organization that had undue influence or provided that last push for the all important fifth slot. And it's my guess that in a little more than four weeks, regardless of the ferocity of campaigning, few minds will be changed about one's Oscar's preferences. The Return of the King will dominate the tech side and receive direction and picture nominations, Sean Penn will finally receive an Oscar and pose with Theron, Robbins and Renee Zellweger.

That said, it wasn't a particular great year for some idiosyncratic indies despite their arrival as screeners. Neither Sundance nor Cannes-prized The Station Agent and Elephant received a single nomination while Dirty Pretty Things, Thirteen and American Splendor had to accept sloppy seconds with each securing a single mention.

The slate provides few genuine surprises. Rather, some were better at getting the message across than others. Lions Gate's mailing of The Cooler, Shattered Glass and Girl with the Pearl Earring when the MPAA and the courts were still debating the screener issue was beneficial in securing four slots. It also was likely instrumental in splitting Scarlet Johansson's votes for Lost in Translation and paving the way for Samantha Morton's spot on the ballot. One also has to suspect that Disney's decision to send out the DVD of Pirates of the Caribbean cemented its five nominations and that people watched Miramax's screener of the Brazilian City of God for its surprisingly strong showing of four nominations including best direction.

Personally, I'm disappointed that Bono's song from In America wasn't nominated, that the documentary and foreign-language slate displayed not a wit of audacity and that there wasn't space for things that really made me laugh - Bill Nighy in Love Actually, both Billy Bob Thornton and Tony Cox from Bad Santa and School of Rock's irrepressible Jack Black. However, am I surprised? Not at all.