EW’s Owen Gleiberman makes an interesting argument on the race being down to Avatar vs. Up in the Air for Best Picture. The Hurt Locker and Inglourious Basterds are there to muck things up (he addresses those film as well) – if everyone is sick of everything else they might go for Up and thus give that animated film a chance to make history. The difference this year is that there are ten nominees. To me that means something. Figuring out the whole point of having ten and what significance that will have, if any, is where your answer lies.¬† Here is Owen G.:
That leaves Up in the Air vs. Avatar. And to me, at least, that’s a very, very symbolic race. In this case, though, it’s not Establishment vs. Outsider. It’s Old School script-driven Classic Hollywood vs. New Age post-script 21st Century Entertainment. Up in the Air is a movie of such nimble wit and craftsmanship, and such timely humanity, that it has been compared, often and justly, to the venerable films of the studio system — the screwball comedies, for instance, that were rooted in clockwork elegant screenplays, incandescent star performances, and a certain tossed-off (but, deep down, rigorously achieved) insouciance. Whereas Avatar is the eye-popping techno spectacle of the Now era: a vision so “revolutionary” that it leaves many of those pesky old-fashioned story elements behind, but (at least according to its adherents, who are legion) more than makes up for that by placing the audience directly inside an organic wonder-world, using technology to return fabulistic awe to the big screen. I may be mixed on Avatar myself, but to me that certainly sounds like a potential prescription for Oscar victory. Especially now that the jaw-dropping success of Avatar has sealed the film’s promise as a preview — and a savior — of the movie industry to come.
I don’t claim to have a clue as to how the kremlinology of this year’s voting procedures will influence all of this. But if I’m indeed right about these two films becoming the front runners, what I do know is that each one, on Oscar night, will represent a radically different, even opposed, set of dramatic/aesethetic/pop-cultural values. And so the voting, as it always does, will inevitably reflect what the majority of the Hollywood establishment has chosen as a symbol of its values. In more ways than you can count, it’s the past versus the future.