Cultural Voice-Over

The Oscars keep changin’ up their program. In 2010, The 82nd annual Academy Awards will have not one, but two hosts for the first time since 1987. Luckily, these two are none other than Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin. But this isn’t the first big change the Academy has made to its next ceremony.

Quite a few months ago, The Academy announced that it was expanding its Best Picture category to include ten nominees instead of the normal five. According to a Variety article, this will not affect any other categories, such as Best Director. This seems a little odd…And to top it off, the people at the Oscars are possibly drawing on the past once again for this big change. Variety says:

The Acad had 10 pic nominees between 1931 and 1943.

(Quick note: “The Acad” is short for “The Academy.” Variety loves to do these kinds of things with their lingo. See: “thesp” instead of the completely normal and necessary “actor.”)

All trivial nicknames aside, I personally find it odd that The Academy is opting to go back to something that hasn’t happened since 1943. And it’s such an obvious change. The expansion of the Best Picture nominee seems…pointless. After all of the past films that have been overlooked for Best Picture (ahem, Children of Men, anyone?), you could look at this as a good thing. However, given The Academy’s record taste in nominees, I can assume this just means five MORE not-so-deserving films to be added to the list.

Of course, I’m sure that the phrase “deserving films” means something entirely different to me than what it means to the Oscars. Come to think of it, maybe there’s no point in debating the relevancy of what is Oscar worthy, seeing as how I’ve rarely agreed with The Academy’s decisions in past ceremonies…

Oh hell, who am I kidding? I’ll watch the Oscars in 2010 just like I do every year. I’ll throw a small viewing party, sip on champagne and pretend to be Charlize Theron while hoping from the bottom of my little heart that the unassuming film wins it all. Because that’s what the Oscars mean to me – hoping for what probably won’t happen. And this coming year, I suppose I’ll have five more reasons to yell and throw empty plastic cups at the TV screen.