Once a decade, the British Film Institute gathers the world’s foremost critics and directors for its prestigious Sight and Sound poll of the greatest films of all time. To put the poll’s durability and gravity in perspective, “Citizen Kane” reigned as the greatest film of all time from 1962 until it was dethroned earlier this year by Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo.” Neither of these films won the Academy Awards for Best Picture the Year they were nominated. In fact, of the 20 films named on the 2012 Sight and Sound poll, only two won Best Picture.
Given the academy’s shoddy hit ratio for selecting the best films of any given year, why do the Oscars matter at all? It’s easy to deride the Oscars as the major studios’ self- congratulatory circle jerk in which they mount multimillion dollars “For Your Consideration” campaigns so the plastic husk known as Joan Rivers can cling to social relevance through her red-carpet fashion reports. These are all valid criticisms of a stodgy, mostly conservative representative from an institution whose sequestered voting remains out of step with the current trend of American idolization of pop culture.
However, those who look to the Oscars for validation of their favorite films or the coronation of the year’s greatest film achievement are missing the point. In an age where film critics are relegated to the unemployment line in droves, the Oscars matter because they generate discussions about film that aren’t related to box office receipts. Oscar nominations lead to watercooler talk regarding the merits of films among the general public. The Oscars pull viewers into films that aren’t backed by a marketing campaign budget greater than the gross domestic product of small nations.
Look to the success of 2011’s Best Picture winner “The Artist” for proof of the Oscars’ importance. A black-and-white silent film by French Michel Hazanavicius with two unknown lead actors in the U.S. attracted audiences solely with the strength of its Oscar buzz. How many people heard of “The Hurt Locker,” let alone watched it, before Oscar season?
The Academy Awards invite audiences to care about stories without sparkly vampires or robots in disguise purely through its inflated sense of self-importance. The film industry as a whole is better as a result.
