CHICAGO – Stories are released every year about the gap between the Oscars [1] and public opinion. It’s a chasm that seems to be growing with every passing year. For the 81st-annual Academy Awards [2], this legendary group had a chance to close that gap and nominate two films for best picture that were critically acclaimed and commercially successful: “The Dark Knight [3]” and “WALL-E [4]”. But they blew it.
The two films did land a combined fourteen nominations, but were excluded from Best Director and Best Picture, proving that the Academy still has a long way to go when it comes to actually recognizing the best of the year. But they were far from the only mistake revealed on Thursday morning, January 22nd, 2009.
Before we discuss the serious snubs, Best Foreign Language Film is too much of a joke to be considered eligible. The likely winner, Waltz With Bashir [5], is very deserving, but the process is so flawed that it makes the inevitable win for Ari Folman’s excellent film a slightly hollow one. The fact that the Academy still employs a process that makes one of the best foreign films of the year (Let the Right One In [6]) ineligible and ignores one of the most critically acclaimed choices like Gomorrah [7] from even making the short list is mind-boggling to me. It’s not snubbing, it’s utter nonsense.
Picking ten snubs from this year’s list of nominees was shockingly easy. In fact, there wasn’t a single category that didn’t have a worthy contender on the outside looking in. And how do you rank them? What’s more painful - Sally Hawkins [8], Christopher Nolan [9], Darren Aronofsky [10], or Rosemarie DeWitt [11] still being unable to put Oscar nominee next to their name? Instead, we’re picking the biggest snub per category with the big eight and then two notable omissions from the other categories rounding out a top ten (well, top eleven if you’re being picky).
Dear Zachary.
Photo credit: Oscilloscope
10. “Dear Zachary [12]” for Best Documentary
Kurt Kuenne’s amazing dissection of pure evil and immeasurable good didn’t even make the short list for a category that’s almost as messed up as Best Foreign Language Film. Man on Wire [13] will probably and predictably win but there were so many other choices they could have made to join it then the ones they did. Trouble the Water [14] was powerful, so that’s a great nod, but it is mind-boggling to me that Werner Herzog [15] gets snubbed for one of the best nature documentaries of the last few years, Grizzly Man, but nominated for a film that even he would admit wasn’t nearly as good, Encounters at the End of the World. But all of it pales in comparison to the most powerfully emotional experience that I had in 2008 - Dear Zachary. Like Foreign Language Film, this will be a category that I use for a bathroom break.
Winner Bruce Springsteen for Best Original Song in a Motion Picture for “The Wrestler” on stage during the 66th Annual Golden Globe Awards held at the Beverly Hilton Hotel on January 11, 2009
Photo credit: Paul Drinkwater/NBC
9. “The Wrestler [16]” by Bruce Springsteen for Best Song
This is perhaps the most head-scratching snub of the day. It’s clearly not an anti-Boss thing, as they gave him the award for “Streets of Philadelphia”. No, I think there’s a deeper problem here. I think this category is broken. Maybe after giving the trophy to Three Six Mafia (deservedly, I might add), something snapped. How else do you explain the THREE nominations for “Enchanted [17]” in this category last year (snubbing Eddie Vedder’s great work on “Into the Wild” and tunes by John Mayer, Rufus Wainwright, and Bob Dylan) and now this disaster? Don’t get me wrong. The two songs from “Slumdog Millionaire [18]” are both good and it will be ridiculously cool to see M.I.A. perform on the Oscars. And I love the track from “WALL-E” by Peter Gabriel. But did they forget the other two nominees? How about “The Wrestler” and “Dracula’s Lament” from “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”? Come on. It’s not too late. Just pretend there were five all along. We’re gonna need a laugh after all the “Reader” and “Frost/Nixon” clips anyway.
Let the Right One In
Photo credit: Magnolia
8. “Let the Right One In [19]” by John Ajvide Lindqvist for Best Adapted Screenplay
I know it will be a cold day in movie hell when a foreign horror movie gets a nomination this prestigious, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t snubbed. The script for Tomas Alfredson’s stunning study of vampirism and adolescence is easily better than three of the chosen nominees and arguably second only to Simon Beaufoy’s stunning work on “Slumdog Millionaire”. No offense to the talented people chosen for this category, but could it have been any more predictable? Take the award-winning plays, the F. Scott Fitzgerald adaptation, and something called “The Reader” has to be a great adapted screenplay, right? “Let the Right One In” is a challenging, daring examination of childhood isolation through the lens of the vampire mythology. It’s a wonderful screenplay that was probably not even considered. It will stand the test of time far more impressively than “Frost/Nixon” or “The Reader”.
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company
7. “Vicky Cristina Barcelona [20]” by Woody Allen for Best Original Screenplay
“VCB” is Allen’s best script in years, a breezy, easy-going examination of love, sex, and cultural clashes during a summer in Spain. Like the Springsteen snub, this one just doesn’t make sense. The Academy clearly loves Woody Allen. They’ve nominated him fourteen times before. And this work was better than half of those choices. The WGA nominated him, which almost always means an equivalent one here. Did someone mis-count the votes? Honestly, this category ended up the most random. “Happy-Go-Lucky [21]” was excluded from several categories, indicating perhaps the Academy didn’t like the movie, but they nominated it here. And I like “In Bruges [22]” and “Frozen River [23]” but the screenplays are not as good as “The Visitor [24],” “Rachel Getting Married [25],” or “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”. Maybe too many quality choices made this one too difficult for Academy members and they did make some good choices here, just not the right ones.
Director Christopher Nolan on the set
Photo credit: Stephen Vaughan
6. Christopher Nolan [26] for Best Director for “The Dark Knight”
I’m angry that Darren Aronofsky [27] was excluded for his excellent work on “The Wrestler” in favor of dull, boring choices like Ron Howard [28] for “Frost/Nixon” or Stephen Daldry [29] for “The Reader,” but the exclusion of Nolan hurts the most. I would like to talk to the voting body as a whole for a minute. How can a film be worthy of eight nominations, most of them technical, but not Best Director? Do you think editors, cinematographers, etc. act of their own volition? That they’re not guided by the director? Or were you merely prejudiced against what you saw as a superhero movie? Nixon and the Holocaust are more important subjects, so they have to be better directed films, right? It’s just sad.
Rosemarie DeWitt
Photo credit: Sony Pictures Classics
5. Rosemarie DeWitt for Best Supporting Actress for “Rachel Getting Married”
Many, many people are predicting Anne Hathaway [30] to win for “Rachel Getting Married” and you’ll get no argument from me there (especially with Sally Hawkins out of the running…more on that later), but her counterpart in the film, the performance that truly supported the lead and made it great, was snubbed. Hathaway does incredible work but it is largely in part because of how she is balanced by DeWitt’s complex portrayal of the bride-to-be. It’s hard to say who shouldn’t have been nominated in this category - it’s one of the top fives that feels the most correct - but I would probably axe Amy Adams [31] for either DeWitt or Hiam Abbass’ great work in “The Visitor,” and if I had to pick one it would be the former.
James Franco
Photo credit: Dale Robinette
4. James Franco [32] for Best Supporting Actor for “Milk [33]” or “Pineapple Express [34]”
One of the acting stories of 2008 was ignored by the Academy. James Franco is no longer “that guy from Freaks and Geeks and the Spider-Man movies”. He gave two of the best performances of the year in his vastly different roles in “Milk” and “Pineapple Express” and he should have been nominated for one of them. I feel like the Academy decided they could nominate only one performance from “Milk” and they, correctly, went with Josh Brolin and they decided they could only nominate only one comedic performance and they went with Robert Downey Jr. from “Tropic Thunder [35]”. Of course, someone should have told them that they could nominate two performances from “Milk” or two funny characters, but that would have been too easy. Eddie Marsan’s great and truly supporting work in “Happy-Go-Lucky” being shown the door in favor of what should have been a role that competed in lead actor from Philip Seymour Hoffman [36] in “Doubt” was nearly as annoying.
Sally Hawkins
Photo credit: Simon Mein
3. Sally Hawkins [37] for Best Actress for “Happy-Go-Lucky”
This one hurts. Literally, hurts. How the Academy chose to ignore the most vivid, three-dimensional, well-defined performance of the entire year is beyond me. Sally should not only have been nominated, she should have won. She created the most memorable and believable character of the year and she did it from scratch, working on the role improvisationally with Mike Leigh and her cast-mates over a several-month period. This one will go down in history. I also loved Michelle Williams [38] work in “Wendy & Lucy” and Kristin Scott Thomas [39]’ turn in “I’ve Loved You So Long” but I kind of knew they were going to be omitted a long time ago. Hawkins was a shocker.
Benicio Del Toro
Photo credit: Daniel Daza
2. Benicio Del Toro [40] for Best Actor for “Che [41]”
I actually think they got Best Actor more “right” than any category announced on Thursday morning, but if I had to pick an exclusion, it would have been nice to hear a right-field nominee like Del Toro for “Che” or Josh Brolin for “W.”. Having said that, I’m ecstatic that the Academy saw through Clint Eastwood [42]’s routine in “Gran Torino [43]” and chose Richard Jenkins’ far-more-subtle work in “The Visitor”. As for the other nominees, no one can argue against the quality of work done by Frank Langella [44], Sean Penn [45], or Mickey Rourke [46] in 2008 and Brad Pitt [47], while arguably not as good as Del Toro or Brolin, was the driving force behind a movie with 13 nominations. It would have been ridiculous to nominate “Button” for that many trophies and not nominate Pitt.
WALL-E
Photo credit: Walt Disney Pictures
1. “The Dark Knight” and “WALL-E” for Best Picture
These two will go down in history. It’s stunning to think that people that know about the art of moviemaking honestly believe that the “Frost/Nixon” and “The Reader” are better films than these already timeless masterpieces, the two best films of 2008. No, there is clearly a bias that forced these two movies from ever being considered by a large portion of the voting body. I said that once the Best Animated Feature category came into existence that it would be harder or close to impossible for an animated film to get nominated for Best Picture. Guess what? It will NEVER happen. If “WALL-E” couldn’t do it in a year that produced such lackluster alternatives as “Frost/Nixon” and “The Reader” then nothing ever will. And the same goes for superhero movies. “The Dark Knight” tied for the second-most overall nominations with no nod for Best Picture (with “Dreamgirls”). It’s clear that the Academy loved every aspect of the film but hesitated when it came time to pick a superhero movie as one of the top five films of the year. Shame on them.
 [48] | By BRIAN TALLERICO [49] |