Sunday, March 27 will take place the Oscar ceremony. However, even though moviegoers are making their ultimate bets and predictions, a film that no one was expecting in the front runners has just overtaken the favorites. Indeed, after his recent victories at the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards and the Producers Guild of America (PGA) Awards, everything indicates that CODA(CODA: the heart to the music), friendly remake French success The Aries family signed Sian Heder, will win the Oscar for best film under the beard of “hand-sewn for the Oscars” Belfastby Kenneth Branagh, and especially the magnificently subversive The Power of the Dog (The power of the dog), by Jane Campion.
How do the laurels gleaned from the SAG Awards and the PGA Awards place CODA on your mind ? Simple mathematics: the members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences who vote for the best film are, overwhelmingly, actors and actresses represented by SAG. By going the same way at their own gala, the producers only cemented the chances of this comedy-drama. feel good recounting the tribulations of a young girl who is the only hearing member of her family.
Whatever happens on Sunday, the least we can say is that the race for the Oscars this year will have been full of surprises, big and small (the new audience award, or “Twitter Oscar”, continues to talk). For example, for months, we were ready to crown Kristen Stewart, vibrant as Lady Di in spencer, for best actress. But now, again by virtue of a victory at the SAG Awards, it will undoubtedly be Jessica Chastain, brilliant moreover, as a fallen televangelist in The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Tammy Faye’s eyes), who will leave with the statuette.
In a more confusing episode, we still wonder how the Academy was able to dismiss Denis Villeneuve from the category of best director when his sublime Dunes competes in ten categories, including those for best film (the filmmaker is cited as co-producer) and best screenplay (idem, as co-screenwriter). In this regard, would it be possible that Dunes win the Best Picture Oscar?
Historically, the Academy, if it has granted a handful of nominations to the genre, has always turned its nose up at science fiction (and horror): in its time, 2001: A Space Odyssey (2001 a space odyssey) did not even receive a Best Picture nomination, that is to say.
From one surprise to another
To return to this vintage, the race for the Oscar for best film has slowly got underway – as usual – through the major festivals, which serve as launching pads. At its unveiling at the Venice Film Festival last September, The Power of the Dog, a film co-produced by Quebecer Roger Frappier marking the great return to cinema of New Zealander Jane Campion, received an excellent reception. However, it was too early to speculate on a possible positioning for the Oscars: many expected films had not yet been unveiled.
Gradually, but steadily, The Power of the Dog, about a tyrannical rancher plagued by his repressed homosexuality, has established himself as a frontrunner. That the distressing words of actor Sam Elliott, upset by the gay overtones of what is nevertheless very openly a western queerhad been disseminated, dissected and analyzed online to such an extent, is a good indicator that The Power of the Dogsuddenly labeled a controversial film after months of near-unanimous praise, was the film to beat then.
The other film that, at this point, could have topped it off, was Belfast. The kind of production that the Academy traditionally likes to reward, this autobiographical chronicle with a nostalgic aura inspired by the childhood of Kenneth Branagh won the Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. This, just like nomadland last year and, more significantly, Green Book (Green’s Book), another historical chronicle that later won a surprise Oscar victory over the favorite Rome.
Except that given the unforeseen reconfiguration that has just taken place in the race for the Oscar for best picture, it is probably CODAand no Belfast, which will add to the list of contested winners. Yes, this is very likely to be a year like this, a year like the one where rocky took it instead of Taxi Driver, Network (Hands down on the TV) Where All the President’s Men (The President’s Men); Ordinary People (Ordinary people) instead of raging bull ; Chariots of Fire (chariots of fire) instead of Raiders of the Lost Ark (The Raiders of the Lost Ark) Where Atlantic City ; Gandhi instead ofAND ;Shakespeare in Love (Shakespeare and Juliet) instead of Saving Private Ryan (We have to save the soldier Ryan); Crash instead of Brokeback Mountain (Memories of Brokeback mountainother western queertake) ; Green Book instead of Rome Where The Favorite (The favorite)…
Consensus view
In short, examples abound, because basically, most of the time, the Academy rewards a consensual, classic vision of the seventh art. An Oscar triumph like that of the South Korean film Parasitea scathing social satire that won the Palme d’Or at Cannes, is exceptional.
Moreover, this year’s Palme d’Or, the dazzling Titanium, by Julia Ducournau, about a young mechanophile killer on the run who pretends to be a missing boy, was not selected in the category of best film or best international film. We preferred the superb, but above all softer for the senses Drive My Carabout a bereaved director, the first Japanese film in history nominated in the category of best film (in addition to those of best international film, adapted screenplay and direction).
Here again, it is impossible not to raise the concerns queer all over the place of the failed work, and that, all heterosexual, of the one selected (in multiple categories). Although with ten places now available in the category of the best film, as opposed to five in the others, the Academy does not have any more excuses to name so few international films in what remains a resolutely Hollywood celebration.
As for the probable victory, but not assured since at the Oscars, everything is possible, from CODA Sunday, maybe this reversal in extremis is it due to more psychological than artistic reasons. After two years of pandemic, the specter of a third world war begins to loom… How to blame the members of the Academy of Cinema Arts and Sciences for wanting to turn to “a film that does good”, a film that comforts and reassures? Before being craftsmen and artists, these people are human beings.
The 94th Academy Awards will air Sunday at 8 p.m. on CTV.