Oscar on the Oscars: The 96th Academy Awards Bring a Great Year For Cinema to a Largely Satisfying Conclusion
"Oppenheimer" and "Poor Things" dominated in a ceremony that confirmed that the movies are alive and well
Welcome back to the fifth installment of Oscar on the Oscars, the annual column where I comment on the awards show with which I share a name!
In the years and decades that come, the 96th Academy Awards, which took place on Sunday, March 10, might come to be known as the Oppenheimer Oscars. Director Christopher Nolan’s biographical drama about the creation of the atom bomb came into the show with the most nominations at 13, and took home seven of those trophies, including Best Director for Nolan, Best Actor for star Cillian Murphy, and the crown jewel of the night, Best Picture.
Ever since its release last July, which saw it open to both glowing reviews and a massive box office haul that would have once been unthinkable for a movie of its type, Oppenheimer has been the presumptive frontrunner in this year’s awards season. This was not one of those years where multiple contenders duke it out and we enter Oscars night with any semblance of suspense. When Al Pacino gave his extremely anticlimactic pronouncement, it confirmed what nearly everyone watching had expected for the past eight months.
But the sheer fact of the success of Oppenheimer, that a talky, three-hour long historical drama about nuclear physics and bureaucratic politics was widely beloved not only by critics but by general audiences, to the point of nearly grossing a billion dollars, is massively heartening for the state of cinema. In the past few years, there’s been a fear among the film world that in the near future, there would only be room for huge franchises at the box office. But Oppenheimer made more than any of the superhero movies released last year. No longer can anyone accuse the Oscars of promoting obscure movies no one’s seen.
Except, maybe, Jimmy Kimmel. Hosting for the fourth time, Kimmel, though a perfectly cromulent master of ceremonies, was often a drag on an otherwise pleasant evening. His digs at Oppenheimer and fellow Best Picture nominee Killers of the Flower Moon over their runtime were old, hacky material that raised to mind the question of if Kimmel even likes movies if he seems to find sitting through them so taxing.
If Kimmel decides to spare us from another year about hearing how the nominated films were just soooooo long, John Mulaney would be an excellent replacement. After proving he could pull off topical, film-related comedy with a hilarious speech at the Governors Awards in January, Mulaney presented the category for Best Sound with a show-stealing tangent into the plot of Field of Dreams.
The winner in that category was The Zone of Interest. Directed by Jonathan Glazer, the film is an unconventional Holocaust drama, largely focusing on the mundane home life of the Nazis who lived next door to Auschwitz. The horrors happening just beyond the frame are almost wholly expressed through the film’s innovative sound design; we lay in a picturesque garden while hearing screams and gunshots in the distance. It was a particularly well-deserved win for one of the year’s most deliberately disquieting watches.
Another personal highlight of the ceremony was Cord Jefferson’s acceptance speech for Best Adapted Screenplay. Jefferson won the award for his work on American Fiction, an adaptation of the novel Erasure by Percival Everett. Though I wasn’t the biggest fan of American Fiction (I found it enjoyable, but somewhat disjointed in tone and message), I found Jefferson’s words on the state of the film industry valuable.
“Instead of making one $200 million movie, try making 20 $10 million movies,” Jefferson said. “Or 50 $4 million movies.”
In an era where big-budget blockbusters like The Flash and The Marvels are increasingly crashing and burning at the box office, we can only hope that studios heed Jefferson’s advice and put their money towards a more diverse range of cinematic ventures.
One more bittersweet moment from the night was a montage honoring stunt performers. It was an engaging presentation of some of the most exciting scenes from film history, but also a sobering reminder that the Academy still does not deem the people who put their lives on the line to create these iconic moments worthy of an awards category. They’ve already announced that the 98th Academy Awards will introduce a Best Casting category, it’s not too late for them to also add Best Stunts.
Perhaps the most contentious category of the night came one of the only categories that had any sense of suspense around. Many of the major fields had winners most saw coming a mile away: Cillian Murphy for Best Actor, Robert Downey Jr. for Best Supporting Actor, Christopher Nolan for Best Director. Best Actress, meanwhile, felt very much like a close race between two contenders: Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon and Emma Stone for Poor Things. Both actresses had won many precursor trophies this awards season. At the Golden Globes, Gladstone took home the trophy for Actress in a Drama, while Stone took the one for Actress in a Musical or Comedy. On Oscars night, the only thing one could be certain about was that the winner would have a name ending in “stone.”
Judging acting, as for all art, is an extremely subjective exercise. The task of comparing these two leading ladies is made all the more complicated by the fact that their performances could not be more different in tone or style.
Gladstone’s character, Mollie Burkhart, is a pensive, soulful Osage woman married to a white man who’s behind a conspiracy to kill her and destroy her people in the name of self-enrichment. Her performance is an extremely naturalistic and understated one in a grim, contemplative historical drama. Stone’s character, Bella Baxter, is a Frankenstein-esque creation of a mad scientist, the rapidly maturing brain of an infant in the body of an adult woman who contorts herself through all of the awkwardness and fantastical self-dicovery of maturation all in two hours. Her performance is highly expressive and heightened, matching the fantastical, stylized film she exists in. Both performances have their fans, as well as their detractors. You could accuse Gladstone of being monotonous, or Stone of being over-the-top. For the record, I think both are fine pieces of acting that superbly carry the characters and their respective films.
At the end of the day, Stone won. Those who preferred Gladstone, both because of her performance and the representational milestone that she would have been as the first Native American actress to be awarded, were understandably disappointed. But Stone’s win was a well-deserved one for a bold, transformational peice of acting in one of the year’s best, most original films. A win for Gladstone would also have been well deserved, and with any hope, she has a bright career with more standout roles ahead.
The highlight of the night, though, came from Ryan Gosling’s performance of “I’m Just Ken” from Barbie. Gosling didn’t win Best Supporting Actor for his role as Ken. “I’m Just Ken” didn’t win Best Original Song, with the trophy instead going to Billie Eilish and Finneas for “What Was I Made For?,” another Barbie track. But when Gosling took to the stage in a sparkling hot-pink suit, performing the tongue-in-cheek power ballad backed by his fellow Ken actors, dozens of backup dancers, Mark Ronson, and Slash, he and the song felt like undeniable winners nonetheless. With everyone in the Dolby Theater on their feet singing and laughing along, it was the kind of glorious show business extravaganza that awards shows were made for.
The 96th Academy Awards were not without their flubs. The In Memoriam montage, as always, had some rough subs, and was presented in a hard-to-see format. The presentation of some awards by multiple presenters was well-intentioned, but clunky in execution. But all in all, it was a joyful celebration of great movies, a particularly refreshing sight especially considering some of the more awkward ceremonies we’ve had in recent years. Tighten up the show and get John Mulaney to host, and the 97th Oscars could be close to perfect.