by Edward Baillargeon
The Academy Awards have always been known as the culmination of all of the award shows in movies and the entertainment industry giving awards to the best of the year. But after the record low ratings from last year, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have been desperately trying to get more viewers by pandering to the lowest common denominator and doing so many decisions, that they would ultimately undo, to set themselves up for disaster. From the creation and removal of the Best Popular Film category, the hiring and firing possible host Kevin Hart over controversial comments, and cutting and uncutting certain categories that are important to a film, like cinematography and editing, during the commercial breaks. Because of all of these decisions, it could’ve been possible that the Oscars this year were going to be a disaster, but it actually turned out to be okay without a host and letting the presenters do their job. Like always, I will be giving a rundown over who won the awards, any milestones that were made, and occasional thoughts from myself about certain winners.
The film that got the most wins was the Queen “biopic” Bohemian Rhapsody, as it won 4 Oscars for Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing, Best Film Editing, and Best Actor for Rami Malek’s performance as Freddie Mercury. This movie’s wins caused so much controversy in the film fan community for multiple reasons. First, the Film Editing win caused outrage over a scene in the film that had far too many unnecessary jump cuts with one cut per second. Next, some thought Malek didn’t deserve to win Best Actor for lip-syncing to Queen while other nominees like Christian Bale, who endured a makeup transformation as Dick Cheney in Vice, or Bradley Cooper, who took music lessons and learned how to sing for his performance in A Star is Born, were far more deserving. And finally, the big elephant in the room being the fact that no matter how many times the people behind the film try to ignore it, it has been publically well-known that the film’s director Bryan Singer is a disgusting pedophile with many accusations with his name on them and is still getting work. This in result causes a massive step backwards in the #MeToo movement where people like Harvey Weinstein and Kevin Spacey’s careers were obliviated after their allegations came loose, but Bryan Singer is still getting work because Bohemian Rhapsody made over $800 million at the box office.
But back on to the Oscars, each with three wins were Black Panther, Green Book, and Roma. Black Panther, Marvel Studios’ culturally impactful superhero film, won three awards for Best Production Design, Best Costume Design, and Best Original Score giving Marvel Studios their first Oscar wins. Green Book, Peter Farrelly’s buddy comedy drama, won for Best Original Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor for Mahershala Ali’s performance as Don Shirley, and took home the big prize for Best Picture. And Roma, auteur Alfonso Cuarón’s latest drama distributed by Netflix, took home Best Foreign Language Film, Best Cinematography, and Best Director for Alfonso Cuarón.
Other films that got a win include The Favourite for Best Actress for Olivia Colman’s performance as Anne, Queen of Great Britain, If Beale Street Could Talk for Best Supporting Actress for Regina King’s performance as Sharon Rivers, BlacKkKlansman for Best Adapted Screenplay, Free Solo for Best Documentary Feature, A Star is Born for Best Original Song for “Shallow”, Vice for Best Makeup and Hairstyling, First Man for Best Visual Effects, Period. End of Sentence. For Best Documentary Short, Skin for Best Live Action Short, Bao for Best Animated Short, and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse for Best Animated Feature.
This year’s Oscars also had some impressive milestones that were achieved. Black Panther became the first superhero film to be nominated for Best Picture, win three Oscars, and its wins in Production and Costume Design had the first black recipients for Hannah Beachler and Ruth E. Carter respectively. For his performance in Bohemian Rhapsody, Rami Malek became the first Arabian American actor to win Best Actor. For his win for Supporting Actor in Green Book, Mahershala Ali became the first black actor to win in the same category twice as he previously won in 2017 for his performance in Moonlight. Roma became the first Mexican film to win Best Foreign Language Film. For its win for Best Animated Feature, Sony Pictures Animation’s Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse became the first non Disney or Pixar animated film to win that Oscar since Gore Verbinski’s western Rango won in 2012, joining alongside Shrek, Spirited Away, Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, and Happy Feet for this major rarity. The movie was the first nomination and win for its directors, Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman, and previously snubbed producers Phil Lord & Christopher Miller redeeming themselves after their unfair snub for The Lego Movie.
Congratulations to this year’s winners and we’ll see what happens next year if the Oscars will have another solid show next year if they decide to not have a host again.
