Late yesterday, the Oscars announced they would cut 8 categories from the live telecast. Then, all hell broke loose on social media.
The categories affected would be Best Score, Film Editing, Make Up and Hairstyling, Production Design, Animated short, Live Action Short, and Documentary Short Films.
The plan was to have a non-televised first hour during which they’ll give out these 8 awards. Then during the three hour live telecast, they would include snippets of the acceptance speeches from those categories.
Of course, backlash was swift, I can understand some of the other categories, but Editing is one of the crafts that define cinema, and Score is integral to the mood of a film. And so, we’re all going to know who won editing, score, production design etc. before the show even starts. Put those three back in, I can deal with the other categories, like Shorts, Sound and Makeup, not being broadcast.
The idea is to make the show a little shorter and move it along to not hit a ratings snag, but what the Academy doesn’t get it is that they are chasing an audience that is never coming back. The relevance the Oscars once had is gone from the zeitgeist. Just accept that the world has changed and honor cinema.
Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim's "You Can See Everything" has been in theaters for, what, three days? And it's already the highest-rated feature film of all time on Letterboxd.