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Because the Oscar race has been swallowed up by publicity, it’s hard to tell what is real anymore, isn’t it? It’s hard to know who is being honest or who is pandering. It’s a very surreal moment to live through, that’s for sure. Either way, Timothee Chalamet earned praise for his work as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown (as a lifelong Dylan fanatic I will reserve judgment until I actually see it for myself).

Take it for what it’s worth. But between this and the AARP nominations (for whatever they’re worth) it does look like a bonafide Oscar contender.

Speaking of Best Actor, Ralph Fiennes has performed in MacBeth and you can now see his performance on streaming, should you be so inclined by going here.

Here is a clip:

Vanity Fair has released some “first look” images for upcoming films. An image of Scarlett Johansson in the new Jurassic World film, the new Edward Berger movie, and the new Celine Song movie:

Netflix has released a trailer for the new Wallace and Gromit movie, Vengeance Most Fowl:

From the brilliant Aardman and four-time Academy Award®-winning director Nick Park and Emmy Award-nominated Merlin Crossingham comes Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl. In this next installment, Gromit’s concern that Wallace is becoming too dependent on his inventions proves justified, when Wallace invents a “smart” gnome that seems to develop a mind of its own. When it emerges that a vengeful figure from the past might be masterminding things, it falls to Gromit to battle sinister forces and save his master… or Wallace may never be able to invent again!:

And Tom Cruise has released a teaser for Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning:

What I’ve been thinking about …

There has only been one other time in American history when the country was as divided as it is now. This is not about race but about class. We are living through the end of the second Gilded Age, the second Civil War and another Fourth Turning. The one thing that doesn’t move the needle in any way is Hollywood –almost no one watches the movies, and it appears that celebrities, as we once knew them, are a thing of the past.

According to this site, six companies own almost everything in entertainment.

But owning everything doesn’t mean audiences will show up. In fact, audiences aren’t showing up for the most part, and the funny part is, it doesn’t even make a difference because, to the monopoly power, it is barely a blip. It’s the people who need movies. The monopolies will do just fine moving their content to streaming for “managed decline.”

There has never been a time in American history when the Left has aligned itself with the “haves” over the “have-nots.” But that’s exactly what has happened. Throughout history, it was the progressives who sought to make things better for the forgotten working people because the Republicans and the Conservatives held power for so long. Still, for the few times the Democrats held it (FDR, Obama).

Obama’s influence shaped all of American culture after he won in 2008. It changed the Oscar race completely, which is why you had Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker — a movie that made just a small amount of money defeating Jim Cameron’s Avatar. Making history mattered. Making money did not. Why? By then, because of the rise of Silicon Valley and the popularity of Obama, wealth shifted leftward. Still, to justify all of that filthy lucre, the Left shapeshifted, and suddenly, class and wealth no longer mattered, only identity and identity politics (aka “wokeness”) mattered.

That made it really easy to become disconnected from the majority of Americans who traditionally counted on Hollywood to tell them stories. They paid to see the movies, and Hollywood was rewarded for that. Hollywood used to count on the market to tell it which direction to head in and what kinds of movies to make. But that changed after 2008. Hollywood wanted to be seen as “good” inside this thriving new utopia we manifested online.

That’s how you get to Anne Thompson’s piece on what she calls “Non-Fiction Films,” as opposed to documentaries. Her headline:

How can it be getting clearer, you might ask, when no nominations have been announced? It was just decided and that is all. Meaning, this group of people on the “inside” has coalesced around several titles that “fit” what message they wish to send. You won’t be surprised to find that all five are, well, pointed.

She’s basing it on the International Documentary Association Award nominations announced on the 19th.  Thompson names these films as leading the race:
SugarCane -“harrowing exposé of indigenous schools”

And:

Other frontrunners heading for shortlist and possible nominations include: Josh Greenbaum’s road movie “Will & Harper” (Netflix), me-too story “Black Box Diaries” (MTV Documentary Film), Johan Grimonprez’s “Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat” (Kino Lorber) and Palestine’s “No Other Land,” which lacks distribution

These are all good movies but, as you can see, the focus is mostly surrounding identity of a kind or another. That doesn’t mean “woke” necessarily but it does mean it’s like living NPR or the New Yorker. These are the stories that fascinate the richest and most educated among us.

Meanwhile, in the other America, Matt Walsh made the film Am I Racist, which speaks directly to one of the biggest questions asked by Americans in the past five years and where it all has taken this country. Not only is his movie not even considered for the awards race, but in our teeny tiny world, it’s offensive to even bring it up. Someone is going to have to explain to me why all of this is a good business model for Hollywood and the Oscars.

It isn’t only in the “non-fiction” realm. It has everything to do with the Oscars now. This is their world, and you are invited to peer inside it as if you were a diorama in a museum. What do the monopolists care? Lessons from the Gilded Age: they don’t. The people have to rise and rebuild outside of whatever it is Hollywood has become, and I hope they do.