Academy Awards adding a "Best Popular Film" category. Good or bad idea? Academy walks it back, won't be presented this year

[DAR]

You know if they started this last year, Last Jedi would have been nominated

[grim22]

Disney and ABC pushed for this apparently

 

 

[Barnack]

1 hour ago, TalismanRing said:

This is silly conspiracy stuff.  Disney bought ABC over two decades ago. 

Even variety is suggesting that it is probably coming from Disney

 

https://variety.com/2018/film/news/oscars-popular-film-category-what-it-means-1202899599/

 

Does that mean more Disney-pandering skits like last year’s stale “Wrinkle in Time” bit (Disney-owned ABC airs the Oscars)? Probably, particularly given that it’s clear ABC had a hand in these moves. Is the ceremony going to morph into a borderline sketch/variety show that feels like a painful stretch for content? One assumes they’re still figuring all that out, but step one ought to be hiring a strong television producer to get something like that off the ground, rather than another round of film personnel. You’re making a television show. Lean on television talent.

 

But, again, it’s a condescending move and it may have just undercut efforts to push Coogler’s film into competition with all worthy contenders, not just the ones that busted blocks. (And what an irony that would be if indeed Disney/ABC pushed for these changes.)

 

They are paying what around 1 billion for the show until 2028 that must give them some open year's to their request, it is not silly to suggest that they could want a popular movie category (that their own movie would dominate not being a negative here, but for the ads revenues of the show itself also). 

 

And there:

https://variety.com/2018/tv/news/abc-oscar-changes-ratings-popular-film-1202899515/

Edited August 8, 2018 by Barnack

[DMan7]

This new category feels like a participation award.

[Marathon]

Selling the technical categories short is abhorrent for a multitude of reasons. For the Oscars themselves, it won't boost ratings, but it will piss off the people who would've watched your show anyway. Seems like a classic case of undermining your core identity to pander to people who have no interest in your product anyway.

 

Everything about these changes reeks of massive, massive desperation. Instead of trimming some fat (the amount of time the hosts have for filler talk, various skits, montages, musical numbers, etc.), they decide to twist themselves into a pretzel in hopes of impressing, but this is just too transparent. Granted, the change in movie-going habits (heavy skew towards event movies) is presenting some difficulties to the industry's award shows, but surely this kind of naked ratings bait will only end in tears?

[SLAM!]

19 minutes ago, grim22 said:

Disney and ABC pushed for this apparently

 

 

 

More unnecessary political 'commentary' it is, then.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Slambros

[Rebeccas]

4 minutes ago, Marathon said:

Selling the technical categories short is abhorrent for a multitude of reasons. For the Oscars themselves, it won't boost ratings, but it will piss off the people who would've watched your show anyway. Seems like a classic case of undermining your core identity to pander to people who have no interest in your product anyway.

 

Everything about these changes reeks of massive, massive desperation. Instead of trimming some fat (the amount of time the hosts have for filler talk, various skits, montages, musical numbers, etc.), they decide to twist themselves into a pretzel in hopes of impressing, but this is just too transparent. Granted, the change in movie-going habits (heavy skew towards event movies) is presenting some difficulties to the industry's award shows, but surely this kind of naked ratings bait will only end in tears?

Is this the Academy's version of white working class voters. 

[TwoMisfits]

10 minutes ago, Marathon said:

Selling the technical categories short is abhorrent for a multitude of reasons. For the Oscars themselves, it won't boost ratings, but it will piss off the people who would've watched your show anyway. Seems like a classic case of undermining your core identity to pander to people who have no interest in your product anyway.

 

Everything about these changes reeks of massive, massive desperation. Instead of trimming some fat (the amount of time the hosts have for filler talk, various skits, montages, musical numbers, etc.), they decide to twist themselves into a pretzel in hopes of impressing, but this is just too transparent. Granted, the change in movie-going habits (heavy skew towards event movies) is presenting some difficulties to the industry's award shows, but surely this kind of naked ratings bait will only end in tears?

To be fair, Joe Six-pack doesn't know anyone in these tech categories, nor probably does he want to hear speeches from people he doesn't know.  So, there needs to be some way that the Oscars gets from supporting actor/actress to the "big awards" (actor/actress/director/movie) in less than 2.5 hours...

 

You could eliminate speeches from all categories - crazily, that actually might be the change that could bring back the most viewers - instead, you could montage some of the things people talked about (have the actor/actress talk in pre-recorded snippets as they accept the award about what it took the perform the role, tech talks about what it took to make things happen, directors talk about the vision they had, etc)...I know I don't watch the Oscars til 11pm b/c I could care less about thank yous to 745 people and their dogs...I know it matters to the winner, but it doesn't matter to the watcher...and if ABC really cares about the watcher, that's how you make a fast-paced, must watch 2 hour telecast...

 

EDIT: And before you say "then everyone would know who's winning", you have every nominee record the snippets and then just use the winners...and don't hire Ernst and Young to manage what gets shown...

Edited August 8, 2018 by TwoMisfits

[Ryan Reynolds]

36 minutes ago, DAR said:

What if you're not certain Black Panther was actually worthy of Best Picture?

Its not worthy if Coogler other films never made it, BP is his worst film

[Webslinger]

The "no one cares about the craft categories" argument is a depressing self-fulfilling prophecy: average viewers don't care about the categories because they don't know the nuances of each one (hell, how many people here could explain the differences between the two sound categories?), and the showrunners make little to no effort before or during the show to show the audience the tricks of each trade outside of having an actor read a canned statement off the teleprompter (i.e. "Sound... it's all around you in dialogue, music, and effects. Without it, movies wouldn't be the same. The nominees for Achievement in Sound Mixing are...").

Edited August 8, 2018 by Webslinger

[Barnack]

47 minutes ago, TwoMisfits said:

You could eliminate speeches from all categories - crazily, that actually might be the change that could bring back the most viewers - instead, you could montage some of the things people talked about (have the actor/actress talk in pre-recorded snippets as they accept the award about what it took the perform the role, tech talks about what it took to make things happen, directors talk about the vision they had, etc)...I know I don't watch the Oscars til 11pm b/c I could care less about thank yous to 745 people and their dogs...I know it matters to the winner, but it doesn't matter to the watcher...and if ABC really cares about the watcher, that's how you make a fast-paced, must watch 2 hour telecast...

I think that a false impression, if you watch the ceremony you almost certainly do it for the winner speech, to live a part of their moment of winning by empathy.

 

You can easily follow who win what via twitter and what not, if you watch it is not to know who is winning, it is for the jokes, the bits, the songs and the speech.

 

You are right for when the person making the speech is unknown to the audience and that why it is a really good idea that they have to give more time to the stars/big category to speech than the others.

 

41 minutes ago, Webslinger said:

don't care about the categories because they don't know the nuances of each one

The year that they did explain them and isolate the work of the technical category in the presentation montage of the nominee was a very good idea.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Barnack

[rukaio101]

55 minutes ago, DAR said:

What if you're not certain Black Panther was actually worthy of Best Picture?

I'd ask if you'd ever actually seen an Oscar BP line-up? 'Worthy' has nothing to do with it.

 

Honestly, as someone who personally enjoys the Oscars as an amusing curiosity (albeit one that I think is only very rarely (if ever) actually representative of the best films of the year) I'd probably be fine with this category being introduced if it was being introduced in almost any other year. But as it is, it just feels like they're trying to avoid letting Black Panther get a BP nom. Which is just kinda shitty, tbh.

Edited August 8, 2018 by rukaio101

[Marathon]

Also, does this mean that from hereon out every genre film will be "banished" into the popular film category? Or only those genre films which make big bucks at the box office? A loosely enforceable artistic quasi-segregation policy of sorts?

[MrGlass2]

49 minutes ago, Barnack said:

Even variety is suggesting that it is probably coming from Disney

 

https://variety.com/2018/film/news/oscars-popular-film-category-what-it-means-1202899599/

Just rename the category "Best Disney Film".

[IronJimbo]

51 minutes ago, grim22 said:

Disney and ABC pushed for this apparently

 

 

Disney are shameless...

they need a category for franchise sequels and remakes

[Rebeccas]

2 minutes ago, Marathon said:

Also, does this mean that from hereon out every genre film will be "banished" into the popular film category? Or only those genre films which make big bucks at the box office? A loosely enforceable artistic quasi-segregation policy of sorts?

Basically this is why even fanboys hate this idea. Especially in a year when Black Panther had a good chance at a real BP nomination. lol

[IronJimbo]

3 minutes ago, rukaio101 said:

I'd ask if you'd ever actually seen an Oscar BP line-up? 'Worthy' has nothing to do with it.

 

Honestly, as someone who personally enjoys the Oscars as an amusing curiosity (albeit one that I think is only very rarely (if ever) actually representative of the best films of the year) I'd probably be fine with this category being introduced if it was being introduced in almost any other year. But as it is, it just feels like they're trying to avoid letting Black Panther get a BP nom. Which is just kinda shitty, tbh.

You've got it backwards.

 

They know it won't get nominated, so they want to avoid the backlash.

[CoolioD1]

 

[The Futurist]

Populists are ruining the West.

Fight The Power.

[TwoMisfits]

28 minutes ago, Barnack said:

I think that a false impression, if you watch the ceremony you almost certainly do it for the winner speech, to live a part of their moment of winning by empathy.

 

You can easily follow you win what via twitter and what not, if you watch it is not to know who is winning, it is for the jokes, the bits, the songs and the speech.

 

You are right for when the person making the speech is unknown to the audience and that why it is a really good idea that they have to give more time to the stars/big category to speech than the others.

 

The year that they did explain them and isolate the work of the technical category in the presentation montage of the nominee was a very good idea.

Yes, which can be shown split-screen with the pre-recorded snippets - what people love to see is the winner's joy, really...they aren't in it for the rattling off of random names in speeches...and my way, you'd still see "the walk" and the "acceptance of the trophy" without the need for wasting time on the 23rd recitation of thank yous over 3 hours...

 

There's only so many ways you can break them up...and really, you can't, especially now that we're gonna get yet another one...so, just stop doing them...I mean, these folks do enough thank yous all over the award circuit...really, Joe Sixpack doesn't have to hear them, too:)...

 

I mean, I follow movies, and I can't bear to get through more than 4-5 anymore (see my 11pm viewing)...

 

PS - And I'd much rather have 5 minutes added to the In Memorium for my 2 hour telecast - that's the one Oscar honor that I think is both popular and necessary...and as the industry is aging some of its early- mid-period stars, there just won't be enough time to show all those who have earned a place in that piece...

 

 

Edited August 8, 2018 by TwoMisfits