When Oscar got it wrong

Summary

Consider This from NPR: “When Oscar Got It Wrong”

Release Date: January 23, 2025

In the “When Oscar Got It Wrong” episode of NPR’s Consider This, host Scott Detrow delves into the perennial debate surrounding the Academy Awards' nominations and selections. Featuring insights from NPR film critic Bob Mondello and producer Mark Rivers, the episode examines historical Oscar misses, the impact of these oversights on the film industry, and the broader cultural implications.

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Introduction: The Oscar Snub Phenomenon

Scott Detrow opens the discussion by highlighting the recurring frustration among audiences regarding Oscar nominations. While acknowledging commendable nominations like Colman Domingo and Demi Moore, Detrow emphasizes that debates over snubs have become an intrinsic part of the Oscars experience.

• Detrow (00:14): “But complaining about who got snubbed is an essential part of the Oscars experience.”

He references last year’s controversies, such as Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie being overlooked despite their significant contributions to films like Barbie.

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Historical Oscar Misses

The conversation shifts to some of the most notable Oscar blunders in history, underscoring how even critically acclaimed films can be overlooked.

Classic Films That Didn’t Win Best Picture

Detrow mentions timeless classics that never secured the Best Picture award, despite their lasting legacy.

• Detrow (02:18): “Working backward from Gene Kelly, that’s Singing in the Rain. Dr. Strangelove, Sunset Boulevard, Apocalypse Now, and Citizen Kane, all on many lists of the best films ever. But not one of them took home the Oscar for Best Picture.”

Bob Mondello (03:09) adds perspective on iconic misses, prompting Mark Rivers to recall significant examples:

• Rivers (03:16): Reflects on the 1968 Oscars where Oliver! won Best Picture, overshadowing contemporaneous masterpieces like 2001: A Space Odyssey.

• Rivers (05:46): Discusses Singin’ in the Rain not being nominated, attributing it to the Academy's reluctance to honor another Gene Kelly musical following An American in Paris. Similarly, Apocalypse Now lost to Kramer vs. Kramer, a decision Mondello criticizes as undermining a film of profound depth.

Brokeback Mountain vs. Crash

Mondello highlights the controversial 2006 Oscars where Brokeback Mountain lost to Crash, a decision that sparked significant debate.

• Mondello (04:22): “I still think about Brokeback Mountain losing to Crash, which was like this cartoonish algorithm of a dumb movie plot that was heavy-handed.”

Rivers criticizes the Academy’s inconsistent logic:

• Rivers (04:51): “There's a dumb reason that makes no sense. But that makes sense to the Academy somehow.”

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Cultural and Representation Issues

The hosts delve into how representation and societal trends influence Oscar nominations and selections.

Representation and Diversity

Detrow points out the lack of diversity in historical nominations, notably the 2015 Oscars where all nominated actors were white.

• Detrow (00:46): “Sometimes these critiques are a matter of movie taste and sometimes they are broader matters of representation raising questions about who the movie industry chooses to celebrate or ignore.”

This ties into broader discussions about which stories the Academy chooses to honor, often reflecting or neglecting societal shifts.

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The Dark Knight’s Snub

A prominent discussion focuses on Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight and its absence from nominations, despite its cultural and cinematic impact.

• Mondello (06:36): “The Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies of all time... but I feel like it came.”

• Rivers (07:25): “The Dark Knight being snubbed is an example of just what voters are comfortable with.”

They argue that the Academy often favors traditional genres and narratives over groundbreaking films that redefine cinema.

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Oscar Mix-Ups: Moonlight vs. La La Land

The infamous 2017 Oscar mix-up serves as a pivotal example of the Oscars’ unpredictability and occasional alignment with cultural moments.

• Rivers (10:02): Recalls the Moonlight and La La Land envelope confusion, ultimately celebrating Moonlight as a deserving Best Picture winner.

• Moonlight’s Significance (10:20): Detrow and Rivers discuss Moonlight not only as the best film of its year but also as a landmark in representing marginalized voices within the industry.

• Rivers (10:48): “Moonlight represented an expansion of the kind of black stories we could tell... It sends a message to other directors and filmmakers.”

This moment is portrayed as a rare instance where the Oscars echoed a significant cultural and artistic shift, validating diverse narratives.

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When Oscars Get It Right

Despite many criticisms, Mondello and Rivers acknowledge that there are moments when the Academy accurately reflects the cinematic zeitgeist.

• Mondello (09:47): “Are there years that jump out to you in that the Oscars got it right?...”

While Rivers is initially skeptical, he concedes that moments like the Moonlight win demonstrate the Oscars’ potential to recognize and elevate meaningful cinema.

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Conclusion: The Oscars’ Influence on Cinema

The episode concludes with reflections on the Oscars' role in shaping the film industry. While the Academy often misses the mark, significant wins like Moonlight highlight its capacity to influence and acknowledge groundbreaking work.

• Rivers (11:31): “It’s really. It’s great. It shakes things up for sure.”

• Mondello (11:36): “Sin Pierre’s Bob Mondello and Mark Rivers. Thanks to both of you.”

Scott Detrow wraps up by underscoring the importance of these discussions in understanding the evolving landscape of cinema and cultural representation.

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Notable Quotes

• Scott Detrow (00:42): “Honestly, we just got tired of googling.”

• Mark Rivers (05:46): “Was this some kind of joke? It’s a nice movie. Perfectly nice movie. It’s arguably a terrific movie.”

• Bob Mondello (04:22): “I still think about Brokeback Mountain losing to Crash...”

• Mark Rivers (07:25): “The Dark Knight being snubbed is an example of just what voters are comfortable with.”

• Unnamed Speaker (10:02): “There's a mistake. Moonlight, you guys won Best Picture.”

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Final Thoughts

“When Oscar Got It Wrong” offers a comprehensive exploration of the Academy Awards’ complexities, highlighting both its failures and triumphs. Through engaging dialogue and insightful analysis, Detrow, Mondello, and Rivers invite listeners to reflect on the Oscars' impact on film artistry, cultural representation, and the ever-evolving narrative of Hollywood.

Transcript

[Scott Detrow]

That special day is here again.

[Bob Mondello]

Good morning everyone.

[Scott Detrow]

The members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have voted. And Thursday at 5:30am Hollywood time we finally found out.

[Bob Mondello]

Are we ready for some nominees?

[Scott Detrow]

How badly they messed up this year's Oscar nominations. Look, that's not to knock this year's picks. You can't disagree with Colman Domingo, Demi Moore, long overdue recognition. Wicked. It speaks for itself. But. But complaining about who got snubbed is an essential part of the Oscars experience. Last year the Internet was up in arms for Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie who missed out on best director and actress noms for Barbie, even though Ryan Gosling was nominated for playing Ken.

[Mark Rivers]

Actually, my job, it's just beach.

[Scott Detrow]

It happens every year. In fact, you can find annual biggest snubs and surprises, clickbait headlines going back to 2010 and probably further. Honestly, we just got tired of googling. Now sometimes these critiques are a matter of movie taste and sometimes they are broader matters of representation raising questions about who the movie industry chooses to celebrate or ignore. Like in 2015 when every nominated actor or actress was white, which host Neil Patrick Harris nodded to in his opening monologue.

[Mark Rivers]

Tonight we honor Hollywood's best and whitest, sorry, brightest.

[Scott Detrow]

Or the next year when it happened again, Oscars.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

So white Part two.

[Scott Detrow]

And even when the Oscars avoid glaring omissions like those with 23 categories, you are going to get some wrong. As Stephen Colbert made clear on the Late show in 2018, I've got this.

[Mark Rivers]

Well of a word, angry that I've got to focus at something. So this year I've just decided to be furious that the Lego Ninjago movie was not nominated for best sound mixing.

[Scott Detrow]

Consider this. The Academy Awards have made some truly epic misses over their long history. Coming up, two of NPR's film regulars Dip into those times when the Oscars got things very wrong and what that tells us more broadly about the art, culture and business of the movies. From npr, I'm Scott Detrow. It's consider this from npr. What do each of these movies have in common?

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Rosebud.

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

I love the smell of night palm in the morning.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

Alright, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close up.

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

Gentlemen, you can't fight in here.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

This is the war room.

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

I'm singing in the rain.

[Scott Detrow]

Working backward from Gene Kelly, that's Singing in the rain. Dr. Strangelove, Sunset Boulevard, Apocalypse now and Citizen Kane, all on many lists of the best films ever. But not one of them took home the Oscar for best picture. Some Oscar Blunders fall into the category of snubs. Others show a failure to recognize films that will endure the Academy on the wrong side of history. To talk about how that happens, what it means, and why we should care, we're joined now by NPR critic Bob Mondello. Hey, Bob.

[Mark Rivers]

Hey. Good to be here.

[Scott Detrow]

And our own producer and film fanatic, Mark Rivers. Hey, Mark.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Happy Oscars, Scott.

[Bob Mondello]

I'm glad we're celebrating. So, Bob, we started off with some.

[Scott Detrow]

Of the greatest misses in Academy history.

[Bob Mondello]

Like I said, this is always a conversation this time of year. Is there one particular movie that always jumps out to you is like an iconic miss?

[Mark Rivers]

Oh, my God. Yes. It was the first Oscars that I paid attention to. It was in 1968. It was the year that Oliver won best Picture.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Oliver. Oliver won't ask for more when he.

[Bob Mondello]

Knows what's in store.

[Mark Rivers]

And the biggest movie of the year, the most exciting movie I had ever seen in my life, came out.

[Scott Detrow]

Open the pod bay doors, Hal.

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that. This mission is too important for me.

[Mark Rivers]

To allow you to jeopardize 2001 A Space Odyssey. And it didn't get nominated.

[Scott Detrow]

It didn't even get nominated.

[Mark Rivers]

How crazy is that? And so at that point, I just sort of said, okay, the Oscars are stupid.

[Bob Mondello]

And here you are.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

This is crazy. My first Oscars was probably in 2004, and this was the year that Lord of the Return of the King ran the table on everybody. And that was my favorite movie at the time. So watching it, I was thinking, oh, my God, your favorite movie's just gonna win all the awards. This is great. And then I quickly realized the following year that that was not gonna be the case. So, yeah, there've been many in a mission, many Oscar history.

[Scott Detrow]

I feel like there's two kinds, right? There's the.

[Bob Mondello]

It didn't even get nominated. The Academy is just on a different planet than a lot of moviegoers. And there is the. It was nominated, but it's somehow lost. And I think to me, like, I guess we are going on. Twenty years later, like, I still think about Brokeback Mountain losing to Crash, which was like this cartoonish algorithm of. Of a dumb movie plot that was heavy handed. And Brokeback Mountain was so good in so many different ways. And that caused like, a bit of a scandal in interpro for a while of, like, why the voters voted one way as opposed to another almost always.

[Mark Rivers]

There's a good reason. It's a. Actually, let me Rephrase that. There's a dumb reason that makes no sense. But that makes sense to the Academy somehow. I mean, for instance, another movie that was not nominated for Best Picture is Singin in the Rain. Oh, my God. Right? I mean, today it's regarded as a classic musical. It is one of the great musicals. It's arguably the great movie musical. Right. But back then, it came out the year after American in Paris won the Oscar for Best Picture. They were not gonna give another Best Picture to a Gene Kelly musical. It just wasn't gonna happen. Another example is Apocalypse Now. How could you not give Apocalypse now the award for Best Picture? But the year before, Deer Hunter won? And so that would look like the Academy was obsessed with Vietnam and they didn't wanna be obsessed with anything. And so they shifted and they gave it to Kramer versus Kramer.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

Ted, I'm. Here are my keys. Here's my American Express card. Here's my Bloomingdale's credit card. Here's my checkbook. I've taken $2,000 out of our savings account because that's what I had in the bank when we first got married.

[Mark Rivers]

Was this some kind of joke? It's a nice movie. Perfectly nice movie. It's arguably a terrific movie.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

I'm glad. Yeah. I think that's an important point to mention about Kramer. B. Kramer. Like, I think, looking back now, obviously, as Bob said, that you have this kind of, like, timid domestic drama going up against this grand operatic vision by Christopher Coppola. But Kramer, B. Kramer was not considered the kind of. It wasn't weak in its time. This was critically acclaimed. So this was an example of a movie where the audience, critics and the Oscars all converged which I feel like is something that doesn't happen as much these days. You'll find more modest successes in this picture. And there's a kind of complaint that you'll find lately about. Are the Oscars out of touch?

[Bob Mondello]

I think there's one of the interesting trends that you see at different points in history is kind of this big movement happening that people are responding to in theaters and the Academy itself, the people who make it up don't quite like it. The direction that Hollywood is moving, and they snub it. And I think, Mark the Dark Knight is an example.

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

I'll show you. When the chips are down, these civilized people, they'll eat each other.

[Bob Mondello]

The big Christopher Nolan epic Batman movie, the one where Heath Ledger plays Joker changed the way movies were made in a way that we are unfortunately still living in even though to me, Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies of all time. And as a person of a certain age, I think about it all the time, but I feel like it came.

[Scott Detrow]

It made its presence felt.

[Bob Mondello]

People took signals from it, right or wrong.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

It changed the way movies were made. It changed the way it changed the.

[Bob Mondello]

Oscars because it didn't get nominated at all.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

It infamously did not get nominated. I remember at the time, there was someone who came out from the Academy who said, you know, when they voted to change the rules to allow more nominees, you know, to extend from 5 to 10, you know, it was part of the discussion where they said, you know, we can't lie that the Dark Knight wasn't our mind when we did this. I think the Dark Knight being snubbed is an example of just what voters are comfortable with. Right. I think you. You see biopics a lot. You see the kind of historical dramas. You know, there's. You know, we talk about familiarity. I think Academy voters also like what's.

[Mark Rivers]

Familiar, which is what happened with Citizen Kane. If you look at the stuff that was around then, there were nothing looked.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Like Citizen Kane, nothing at all. And no one was prepared for it.

[Mark Rivers]

They didn't know how to deal with it. I think it's actually incredible that it got nominated because that said, you know.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

This guy, it's like, we can see.

[Mark Rivers]

Wells is kind of a big deal.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

We respect the art, but it's kind of too much for us. But we'll give you our props, but it's too much.

[Mark Rivers]

It's the moderate opinion. And what I'm thinking of is Driving Miss Daisy versus Do the right thing. Oh, yeah. What kind of sense does that make? Right. Driving Miss Daisy is a nice, polite movie about race.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

You're speeding. I can see it. We're only doing about 19 miles an hour. I like to go under the speed limit.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

It has the word Daisy in it.

[Mark Rivers]

Exactly, exactly. It's an adaptation of an off Broadway hit, a theatrical hit. Do the Right Thing was just like an explosion happening.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Yeah. Spike Lee's movie from 89 about simmering racial tensions on a neighborhood block in Brooklyn, New York.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

Hey.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Hey, Sal.

[Unnamed Speaker 3]

How come getting the brothers on the wall here?

[Unnamed Speaker 2]

You want brothers on the wall? Get your own place. You can do what you want to do. You can put your brothers and uncles and nieces and nephews, your stepfather, stepmother, whoever you want, you see, but this is my pizzeria. American Italians on the Wall.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Only I remember reading contemporaneous reviews of it where, you know, some people Thought that black people were going to riot at the end of the movie. So people were legitimately losing it over do the Right Thing. And Driving Miss Daisy was like a hug, you know, it kind of touc. And do the Right Thing was a slap across the face telling you to wake up. You know, wake up to the realities of race relations. And people didn't want to wake up at that time.

[Mark Rivers]

Yeah.

[Bob Mondello]

Let me ask the flip side of this. Are there years that jump out to you in that the Oscars got it right? They perfectly put their finger on that moment in cinema, that moment in pop culture, and there was the right movie and they picked it.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

I have a couple moments, but. Bob, you want to go ahead?

[Mark Rivers]

I know. I'm thinking, oh, come on. Did they ever pick the right movie?

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Come on.

[Mark Rivers]

No, no, serious. I think the whole notion of art as a horse race is stupid, just dumb.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

But if we're gonna do it, if we're gonna do it. And I think about a year that arguably contained the biggest Oscar blender of all time, the infamous Moonlight, La La Land envelope envelope mix up. And you'll recall when a number of producers got on stage and actually gave thank you addresses before they realized the wrong movie was announced.

[Scott Detrow]

There's a mistake. Moonlight, you guys won best picture.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

I look at moonlight, which I think not only was the best movie of its year, 2016, but also one of the best best picture winners of all time. I think moonlight was representative in a lot of ways of how the industry and by proxy, how the society wanted to kind of view itself as far as what stories it valued. I mean, you look at La La Land and Moonlight, you have this big Hollywood production, these two bright white stars.

[Bob Mondello]

About la, about la, about Hollywood.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

And then you have moonlight, this really small, intimate drama about a gay African American coming of age. And what you have there is this movie came at the tail end of the Obama years, and Obama represented this historic expansion of what a black person could do or be in this country. Right. And moonlight, to me, represented an expansion of the kind of black stories we could tell. How they could look, how they could move, how they could feel. When something like moonlight does win, I think it does send a message to not only audience members. It sends a message to other directors and filmmakers who say, well, you know, I may not have a La La Land in me, but I do have a moonlight in me. And maybe that can get. Or a hurt Locker. Or a hurt. Or a Hurt Locker.

[Mark Rivers]

I mean, yeah, when those happen, it is magical.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Exactly.

[Mark Rivers]

It's really. It's great. It shakes things up for sure.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

And I think we look to the Oscars to shake things up. They rarely ever do, but when they do, I think it's worth noting.

[Bob Mondello]

Sin Pierre's Bob Mondello and Mark Rivers. Thanks to both of you.

[Mark Rivers]

Great fun.

[Unnamed Speaker 1]

Thank you, Scott.

[Scott Detrow]

This episode was produced by Connor Donovan. It was edited by Adam Rady and Claire Lombardo. Our executive producer is Sam McGannigan. It's Consider this from NPR. I'm Scott Detrowed.