The 85th Annual Academy Awards

 

I heard that the Oscar committee, or whoever is in charge of these kinds of things (probably some PR guru or something), decided to no longer call the Academy Awards the Academy Awards. And, God forbid, they mention how long the awards have been in existence. Instead, the powers that be decided to call them simply, The Oscars. I understand its because all the youngfolk think that if you mention 85 and use any kind of traditional name for anything, it must not be cool enough.

Now, I am a child of the 80s… or maybe 90s… (I’ve never quite been sure what to call myself, since I was born in the 80s, but spent most of my childhood in the 90s. Who knows? It’s not that important.) and I grew up every year watching the Academy Awards. I never particularly cared about them, and I rarely had even watched but one or two of the movies, but I always watched them. I’m not sure I’ve missed a year yet. That, my friends, is 28 years of watching this stodgy, old award show. Nearly 1/3 of the years it has graced this great earth.

Also, I don’t feel particularly old, but… but I suppose I’m not in the hip age group anymore. Still… I grew up with these awards. I don’t particularly think the change from The Academy Awards to The Oscars is exactly going to make anyone else watch or even care about the awards. In fact, I would almost go so far as to say that this illustrious name change makes the awards less prestigious. Almost.

That said, I took it upon myself this year, for the first time ever, to watch every, single movie up for the Best Picture award. It is a good crop of movies. I never realized exactly the quality of movies that vie for this award. After having watched them all, I can honestly say I have no idea which movie will take home the golden statue. No idea. How do people even choose? Do the judges just put all the movies in a hat and pick blindly. Or maybe they put all the names on the wall and play a game similar to Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

It doesn’t matter which movie wins in the end, I do believe that it is an honor just to be nominated. I always thought that was a cop-out, but it turns out that it is especially true.

If I were giving out the awards, I would have a hard time choosing between Argo and Silver Linings Playbook for the win. I believe the former is the better movie, but the latter… well, it features crazy people and Jennifer Lawrence. ‘Nuff said.