The Performative Politics of “Best Picture”

The Academy of Motion Picture Art and Sciences has always had a tenuous relationship with films that exist (and succeed) outside of the bread-and-butter period dramas and biopics. While many genres toe the line between what is generally held to be acceptable Oscar-material (thriller, superhero, musical), none seem to be more despised than the horror movie and no narrative remains more contentious than stories of blackness. So what does it mean to see three Best Picture nominations this year feature leading black characters while fantastic horror performances were yet again snubbed? Less than you might think.

In the 91 year history of the Oscars, only six best picture nominees have been horror movies. These six movies included titles like Jaws, The Silence of the Lambs and Black Swan - films which more accurately fit the category of psychological thrillers rather than true horror. Movies such as Psycho and The Shining, now considered foundational film classics, were rejected from the top award, with The Shining receiving no Oscar nomination at all. Such inconsistencies are first the result of popularity bias, that is, the deeply ingrained idea that popular things are inherently less worthy of praise.  Secondly, horror movies are subject to the pervasive idea that in order for such a film to garner recognition from the Academy - an institution which remains overwhelmingly white and male - it has to present itself as something other than a horror movie. There is a distinct understanding that the traditional blood-and-guts, serial killer, cabin-in-the-woods tropes of horror exist outside of acceptable Oscar canon.

Similarly, movies with prominent black characters must present as submissive and non-violent in order to garner recognition; radical narratives, rather than being praised as groundbreaking (as they often are with white directors and screenwriters) are shunned when they coincide with blackness. This brings us to the first of this year’s Best Picture nominees to feature a black narrative: Black Panther. A wildly popular, black superhero movie, Black Panther’s nomination seems like something to celebrate - at least at first glance. But when looked at along with its two Best Picture counterparts, BlacKkKlansman and Green Book, a pattern emerges which rewards traditionally conservative political and racial messages. Black Panther follows T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman), the hereditary ruler of a fictional African nation named Wakanda who loses his position fairly to a militarized African-American-Wakandan named Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) who wants to lead the people of Wakanda to liberation from global imperialism. Killmonger is eventually defeated, with the movie favouring neoliberal racial management and humble compromise over militant revolution. In BlacKkKlansman, Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) is hired as Colorado Springs’ first black police officer and subsequently tasked with infiltrating a local group of black power student activists and, later, the KKK. Forced to stoically endure racial slurs from his coworkers, Stallworth is the poster child for black passivity and is ironically complicit in upholding the deep-rooted belief that black radicalism must be monitored. Finally, Green Book is the story of Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), the black and gay piano star of the 50s and 60s and Tony Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen), his driver. Shirley, a black man of sophistication, is set up as the gracious teacher of rough-and-tumble Vallelonga yet as the movie progresses it is Tony’s journey of acceptance and reconciliation that becomes the focus. At its core, Green Book is simply a white saviour movie dressed up in Oscar-trappings.  These themes of black submissiveness and the nobility of non-violence were lauded along with the American mythology of racial reconciliation without accountability.

The intersection of these two distinctive cinematic worlds came to a head at last year’s Oscars, when Jordan Peele’s Get Out was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, out of which Peele won the award for Best Original Screenplay. Peele’s film was groundbreaking; not only was it extremely popular, but it remained unapologetically direct with its message, using common horror tropes to examine how omnipresent and destructive racism is in the world today. Many praised the film as a turning point for future filmmakers wanting to explore black narratives and/or the horror genre. Yet in reality, Get Out’s success might more accurately be understood a type case of the “token” - the outsider whose success served not to alleviate discrimination but perpetuate it. Peele’s success in 2018 gave the Academy the room to return to its tried-and-true cinematic categories, snubbing notable horror films like Hereditary and A Quiet Place while bolstering convenient narratives of black passivity to the forefront.

At the end of the day, the Oscars are Hollywood’s own annual performance for the world. This performance gives the Academy a chance to sell not only the magic of the movies to us, the audience, but also the myth of Hollywood itself. This myth is meant to perpetuate the glossy, edited version of the industry; one in which a united array of dazzlingly creative individuals unite to correct society’s failings by working to create authentically diverse narratives. Yet the actual winners remain the class, racial, and gender politics that have governed filmmaking in Hollywood for generations. Considering all of this, the truth of the 2019 Academy Awards is unsurprising; the Oscars, in its relentless obsession with prestige and performance, remains far from a genuine reflection of issues today.