The drama of how the race is run

Gabourey Sidibe, nominated for best actress, in “Precious”.

What does it mean to manufacture drama? The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences thought it knew when it announced last year that the number of Oscar nominees for best picture would be doubled, to 10 from 5.
“We will be casting our net wide,” Sidney Ganis, then the Academy's president, said at the time. It was a blatant move to create more buzz around an already artificial buzz machine, an appeal to populism and a gambit to boost ratings.
As it turns out, the Academy needn't have bothered. Last year “Slumdog Millionaire” won enough hearts and had enough box office clout to become the early front-runner and then to win best picture, merrily singing and dancing its way through the economic pallor and any hint of awards suspense. But this year's extended Oscar race was capable of creating drama under its own momentum.
When the statuettes are doled out on Sunday, audience members at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood and at home will have already been privy to a season with as much narrative sweep as a made-for-television mini-series.
The contenders for the golden boy included veterans (Clint Eastwood, with the sports drama biopic “Invictus”), modern heir apparents (Jason Reitman, “Up in the Air”) and upstarts (Lee Daniels, “Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire”). Quentin Tarantino's “Inglourious Basterds” was still just a fantastic summer flick. “Avatar,” James Cameron's behemoth 3-D extravaganza, was withering under the weight of pre-screening bad press. And Kathryn Bigelow's “Hurt Locker” was part of an admirable but unpopular genre, the pulsating Iraq war thriller that only critics seemed to have seen.
Now, of course, “Avatar” and “The Hurt Locker” are the chief rivals for best picture, though they couldn't be further apart in style or profit margin. That Cameron and Bigelow were once married provided a screenplay-worthy twist, though in an uncinematic move they have refused to play the parts of bickering ex-spouses. Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in “Adam's Rib” they're not, but still: drama. And their competition is exactly the kind of David vs. Goliath, art house vs. blockbuster drama that the Oscars are made for.
Anyway, there was plenty of bickering and fighting elsewhere. First, the move to 10 nominees produced its own wave of critics, armchair and industry insider alike, who grumbled that the expansion would dilute the value of being noticed; or that there should have been a companion doubling of best director nominees; or that the Academy couldn't come up with 10 good movies, period. This griping largely stopped when the best picture nominees were revealed, and the Academy did exactly what it was supposed to do, pull in unexpected and popular titles like “The Blind Side,” “District 9” and “Up.”
But more importantly though, people watch the Oscars for stars, and Hollywood's wattage will be out in force, George and Meryl and Sandra, with a few first-name-only newcomers, Mo'Nique and Christoph and Gabby, added to the mix.
Another reason people watch the Oscars is for the spectacle, and the new producers, Bill Mechanic and Adam Shankman, have taken pains to assure would-be viewers that this year's show will be more spectacular than ever. They're aiming for old- and new-school comedy magic in their hosts, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, and pop culture squeals with presenters like the “Twilight” stars Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner. Performers from “So You Think You Can Dance,” the Fox reality show on which Shankman is a judge, will also appear, to the evident delight of his many Twitter followers.
But all is not cheery. (Remember: drama!) In recent weeks Oscar campaigning has taken a dark turn, as allegations and gaffes have dogged front-runners, most notably “The Hurt Locker.” Given the prolonged season and heightened attention on the awards, the charges, which questioned the film's authenticity, probably had more traction than they would have. Yet most also came too late to have much impact on voting.
That, in the end, is all we look for in the Oscars: a little reliability and a little mystery, a dollop of authentic escapism.
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Source: The New York Times