'Cine'cism

The Oscars are similar to Christmas; people keep talking about them earlier and earlier every year, and it’s starting to get annoying. 

But this is the first time that the early Oscar discussion has actually been intriguing, as the Los Angeles Times reported in early October a plan to move up the ceremony broadcast by a few weeks.

This would mean pushing Oscar night to early February, being careful not to step on the toes of the Super Bowl, and subsequently announcing the nominations sooner. In order to accommodate the more than 6,000 Academy voters, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is suggesting the implementation of digital screenings, which is scaring the people who are afraid of betraying the old-fashioned voting traditions of this historic ceremony.             

It’s also terrifying advertisers, but frankly, who cares?      
       
David Poland of Movie City News wrote a column defending the date shift, but his article was basically from an industry perspective. He pointed out that voters claiming they can’t see the movies is no longer a valid point, and that’s true — for voters.

For the general public, the limited release schedule to build buzz prior to receiving Oscar nominations is a disaster. Art house films are only released in the last week before New Years, critics are putting movies on their best of the year lists and no one has seen the movies outside of New York, Los Angeles or the extreme film festival crowd.               

If you’re anything like me, you’ve been reading about “Winter’s Bone” and “Blue Valentine” since Sundance, “Another Year” and “The Illusionist” since Cannes, “The King’s Speech” since Toronto and “Black Swan” since Mr. Skin of all people started breaking “news” about the film.      
 
And if you’re even more similar to me, you live in Indiana and definitely haven’t seen anything yet and definitely won’t see anything legally until late January shy of driving up to Chicago over Christmas break with the hope of catching a few of said late releases.               

Moving the Oscar ceremony sooner would force distributors to market their award bait in months when people are actually willing and able to see them. I understand how advertisers structure the release schedule around the slew of other awards shows, but Thanksgiving and early Christmas releases seem to make more sense.      
        
And the fact of the matter is, people get burned out by the time the Oscars roll around. It’s the king of the awards shows, and they’re saving the best for last, but no one cares after week after week of “The biggest night in Hollywood.”

When “Slumdog”, Mo’Nique, Christoph Waltz and Jennifer Hudson win every other award in existence months in advance, the suspense has all but dissipated come late February.

There are more than a few industry analysts who claim touching this long-held tradition would damage the Oscars more than it already has been since the reintroduction of 10 nominees and the more “mainstream” selections, but Poland and other industry leaders are more optimistic.

Meryl Streep, for one, said during the last award season that she believes the ceremony should be moved to Jan. 1. That’s is extreme, but her point is the same burned-out expression I’ve been feeling. Poland claims it will even assist the strange voting procedure for documentaries and foreign films.

If moving the awards ceremony up two weeks means more movies in wide release, more movies available before late December and even the potential to see shorts, docs and foreign films period, then I think Christmas has come early this year.