Regardless of whether you agree with it or not, the 92nd "Oscar" awards ceremony that just came to an end will be recorded in history. The Korean film "Parasite" won this year's Best Picture Award, becoming the first non-English film ever to win this award. . This has almost subverted our understanding of this film award with a long history. You should know that the official name of the Academy Awards is "Academy Awards". Its appeal is very direct and represents the authoritative view of the American film industry.
"Parasite" is a highly controversial movie. Together with "Joker", it has become the most discussed film cultural phenomenon in 2019. These two films belong to the different cultural backgrounds of the East and the West, but both have a global influence across cultures and have achieved great commercial success. From this, it is not difficult to see the current split in the film manufacturing industry on social issues. On the one hand, the concern for the bottom and minority groups is incorporated into the mainstream discourse, and on the other hand, it is trying to cover and reform the problem.
Of course, this year is also considered to be a "female" year. Whether it is the Oscar hot "Marriage Life" or "Little Women", or the American dramas "Fatal Woman" and "The Great Mrs. Maisel", it has also caused a fever. However, no female director was nominated in the end.
Of course, from a positive perspective, Oscar's attempts to break through tradition and move toward diversity have been ongoing. More and more ethnic minorities enter the jury and receive nominations and awards. When Oscar changed the name of "Best Foreign Language Film" to "Best International Film", the film made the process of globalization not blocked by the plague or system.
Author | Yu Yaqin
This article was first published on WeChat public account: Beijing News Book Review Weekly, welcome to follow.
1
Oscar's dilemma
The taste of "old white man", high-quality but boring
In recent years, the Oscars have been considered more rigid and boring, and they have been personified as "old white men" (the driving force and backbone behind the "Oscars" are indeed such a group of people). It can even be said that when the glory of the past faded, the "Oscars" were generally considered to be aging, the authority was declining, and the ratings of the awards ceremony were also repeatedly declining. Criticizing it can be regarded as a kind of film critics. "Political correctness".
It is not so much that it rewards the artistry of the film, it is better to say that it is a concentrated display of American values. The political games and hot topics of the previous year will definitely be highlighted at the awards ceremony. As for the awards, perhaps it is no longer the biggest attraction of the Oscars, just as when this year’s awards season came, no one remembered that last year’s winning works were actually mediocre "Green Book".
The "Oscar" award is never awarded to unconventional art films, but to the balance of so-called art and commerce. From this point of view, "Parasite" is well deserved. Before that, it’s hard to imagine that a film that is so commercially successful can be accepted by the art film evaluation system represented by the Cannes Film Festival, and its affirmation at the Oscars is just an absolute phenomenon for this year. The movie's affirmation again.
As Justin Chang, film critic of the Hollywood industry publication Variety Show, said:
"Parasite actually doesn't need that Oscar award, because it has already returned with a full load, but Oscar desperately needs "Parasite" to prove that he can keep up with the times."
Although "1917" has the appearance of the best Oscar film, it also meets the expectations of most people, but only relying on humanistic spirit and gorgeous long shots is not enough to make this Oscars break the circle and break out of the current difficulties. Bureau. It is not difficult for those interested to find that the stars of the Oscar red carpet are not as bright as in previous years. In the new era, the Internet and other new media have divided up too many Oscars and also need more traffic and exposure.
At this time, the timely appearance of "Parasite" made Hollywood feel something new: Cannes blessing, Asian faces, genre movies, social criticism...every element is like a higher-level version of Hollywood movies in the new era. Something looks like. The most important thing is that this movie is popular enough and different enough from the past.
It is true that "Parasite" is a movie that can make people's eyes bright and shouting wonderful, and it is indeed a good one among the most well-formed "Oscar" awards season movies. Feng Junhao has manipulated a realistic fictional story to the extreme within his own control range, and transformed his criticism of society into a series of beautiful and exciting audio-visual experiences, attracting countless audiences around the world.
This film seems to be realistic, but in fact it is more like a social fable, or a conceptual display of social structure. The director extremeizes the gap between the rich and the poor and social injustice by means of comparison and symbolism, and finally vents the audience's backlog of emotions in a violent way, thus creating this movie that strongly stimulates the audience's emotions.
2
Oscar's "internationalization"
A variant of "American Centrism"
It’s worth intriguing that after winning the award, Bong Joon-ho quoted the defeated Martin Scorsese (Martin Scorsese) to pay tribute to his predecessors: "The most personal is the most creative." This sentence can be regarded as correct. The reiteration of the value of the "author's film" is also enough to show Feng Junhao's creative attitude. This move also caused the audience to applaud and stand to pay tribute to Martin, and it was the "New Hollywood" generation represented by Martin who revolutionized the already rigid American movies at the time.
No matter how Hollywood does all kinds of self-renewal, its essence is American centrism and anti-diversification. This time they chose Feng Junhao, perhaps because to some extent, Feng Junhao inherited American genre movies. The mantle of the country, and the nationalization and localization of the transformation.
Now it’s more meaningful to look back at this news that everyone didn’t pay much attention to at the time:
On April 24, 2019, the Oscar rules were changed, and the category of "Foreign Language Film" was renamed "International Feature Film", and the Best Foreign Language Film Award will be renamed Best. International Film Awards. According to the academy, the term "foreign" is now outdated in the global film industry. "We believe that the term "international feature film" is more representative of this category and promotes a positive and inclusive film concept and a global perspective. film art".
An article in The New York Times suggested that the reason why Parasite was so successful was related to the #Oscars So White# protests in 2015 and 2016. This protest forced Hollywood to examine its systematic disregard for minorities. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences) was accused of failing to nominate any minority actors at the time, and then promised to double the minority membership by 2020. In 2015, about 8% of the college's 8,500 judges were people of color, and now this proportion is about 16%. Not only that, in order to promote a more diverse voting team, the college expanded its foreign team. In 2019, the college invited 842 film industry professionals from 59 countries to become members, of which approximately 29% are people of color.
However, it is not difficult for us to find that for a long time in the future, even if "international" replaces "foreign", the change of words will not change the nature of the awards. Hollywood is trying to package itself less American, and it also shows that it is right. Concerns about the loss of the international market, since my original ability is declining, it is better to maintain the consistent principle of "use doctrine" to attract more international filmmakers to his embrace.
We might as well consider this year's best documentary "American Factory", because the Sino-US trade war is in full swing, this work has naturally become the focus of public opinion. Although the author photographed Chinese personnel from top to bottom, including Cao Dewang, he finally interpreted the differences between Chinese and American factories as cultural differences, avoiding sharper discussions. Therefore, this documentary is somewhat itchy, touching the problem, but not uncovering the scar. However, this does not prevent this documentary invested by the former President Obama and his wife from becoming the final winner. It reveals the law used by Hollywood: grab good stories and characters from all over the world and tell them in a way that Americans understand and are accustomed to.
In fact, whether it is "Parasite" or "American Factory", both show a shift in the Oscars' issue. The previous year’s Oscars focused on the rights of small people ("The Shape of Water" and "Three Billboards"); last year’s Oscars focused on the "black card", this year they began to focus on class struggle, the gap between the rich and the poor, and their eyes on both culture and skin color. Asia, which is more detached from the United States. As for why "Joker" could not be awarded, it is probably because it is still a story that takes place in the United States and is not international enough. Moreover, as a provocative story, rewarding this work is not completely "safe" in terms of position.
3
Speak for the unknown
The absent women and the bottom visible
Joaquin Phoenix's speech after getting the actor should also be noted. He said:
"The greatest gift given to myself and everyone present is the opportunity to speak for the silent, whether it is ecological issues. Gender equality or racial issues are essentially resistance to injustice."
To a certain extent, his speech can reveal the care that the movie "Joker" is trying to express. It can be said that the "Joker" released in the second half of the year can be said to repeat the success of "Parasite". The difference is that this DC comics adaptation film with a big IP as a prototype puts more energy on the characters. Therefore, the protagonist Joaquin Phoenix's magical acting skills are released. It also reflects social injustice. Unlike parasites, the clowns lead violence to the public, which seems more subversive, but it seems to be suspected of exaggerating "pan-violence". The criticism of the film is out of focus. How revolutionary is this film? Suffered a loss.
I believe Chinese audiences will not forget that at the awards ceremony, directors Steven Bognar and Julia Reiche of "American Factory" spoke to Chinese entrepreneur Cao Dewang, the protagonist of the documentary, in Chinese. Expressed gratitude. Perhaps, as everyone generally understands, this film would not have been born without Cao Dewang’s reasonableness, but we must also face the fact that the issue of workers’ rights and interests in the documentary is still unresolved and a large number of them exist in China. It is this group that makes this documentary have a humanistic meaning. Their names have not been remembered, and they have not appeared at the awards ceremony. They have become anonymous people who cannot speak.
Also at this awards ceremony, while we were discussing the nomination of the Oscars for "Parasite", female filmmakers in the United States have begun to protest the issue of gender inequality at this year's Oscars. The movie star Natalie Portman who attended the awards ceremony was wearing a coat embroidered with an unnominated female director to mock Oscar's male hegemony.
In fact, despite historical reasons, female directors are indeed in the minority, but in the 92-year history of the Oscars, only 5 women have been nominated for the best director award. In addition, Hollywood is the birthplace of the #me too incident. Female filmmakers have always endured various gender discrimination and unfair treatment. This year's Oscars are still criticized on women's issues.
In the popular film "Marriage Story", director Noah Baumbach (Noah Baumbach) designed a bridge to reflect the plight of female filmmakers. The story of the movie is not too complicated: the heroine is an actor, in order to find herself and want to get rid of her marriage, she returned to Los Angeles from New York. After some struggles, the couple resolved their marriage problems peacefully and found their own lives. At the end of the movie, the actor visits his ex-wife and children, and congratulates his ex-wife for being nominated for an Emmy Award. He rightly believed that the other party was nominated because of the performance, but in fact, she was nominated because of the director...
The film has been well received worldwide, and has also been heatedly discussed on Chinese social networks and media. Many viewers believe that the film accurately reflects the status of women in marriage. The movie seems to tell a very American story about how laws and institutions break down love. But after all, it tries to expose another truth: why women want to divorce, and how they are deprived of themselves by daily life, and become an invisible existence in the family.
4
The platform battle: what is a movie?
Movies are undergoing profound changes, and the impact of streaming media on the film industry has exceeded our expectations. This year's Oscars Netflix was originally a big winner. It received 24 nominations. It was the most nominated film company among all the Oscars, but it failed to win important awards other than the best documentary.
Last year, Netflix's "Rome" robbed a lot of the limelight. Although it did not win the best film, it also won several awards. It was interpreted by some as Hollywood bigwigs' acceptance of streaming media platforms. However, it was immediately reported that the great director Spielberg supported Oscar’s reforms to prevent Netflix from growing bigger. He would cooperate with some academies to make a proposal, “A movie must have a window period of at least 4 weeks in the theater (ie. It must be shown in theaters for at least 4 weeks before streaming) to be eligible to compete for Oscars."
Spielberg's identity is not only a director, but also a Hollywood magnate and the owner of a film company. This action seems to be a fight for the definition of the so-called movie art. Whether or not movies should be shown in movie theaters is essentially a business. Although the boycott will slow Netflix's attack on Hollywood, it will not fundamentally change the established reality. In the future, streaming media platforms will be more deeply involved in the production and production of movies, thereby completely changing the form and aesthetics of movies.
From a certain point of view, perhaps it is the impact of streaming media on the movie itself that makes many movies no longer need to pass through the theater as the main viewing channel. Movies are reaching audiences in a faster, newer, and cheaper way, which also allows Movies that audiences need have changed. Traditional feature films are likely to be replaced by dramas, while extreme situations will appear on the big screen: high-concept films or art films.
Martin Scorsese spent nearly 200 million US dollars to shoot "The Irishman" with the support of Netflix. Frankly speaking, it is the narrative film that has been replaced by dramas, and it has almost no revenue during the Oscars season. Although this master no longer needs any award blessings, his disappointed expression at the award ceremony spread all over China's social networks. Of course, this movie is not without flaws, and it is reasonable to have no prizes. What "The Irishman" summons is a kind of nostalgia for classics, and this nostalgia contains helplessness towards reality.
We might as well put at the end his previous article in the "New York Times" that criticized the Marvel movie. The director who made masterpieces such as "Taxi Driver" and "Angry Bull" wrote:
"For anyone who dreams of making movies or just starting to make movies, the current situation is cruel and not conducive to art. Just writing these words has made me sad."
Perhaps, in the current environment, the scope of application of this passage can be broader.
This article is exclusive original content. Author: Yu Yaqin; Editor: Xixi; Proofreader: Chen Diyan. Reprinting is not allowed without the authorization of the Beijing News, and you are welcome to forward it to the circle of friends.
This article was first published on WeChat public account: Beijing News Book Review Weekly, welcome to follow.
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