Over the past decade, discussions about the worth of blockbuster cinema versus almost every other kind of cinema have burbled on as, centuries ago, once burbled theological disputes about the existence (or not) of Adam’s belly button. Poor old Martin Scorsese can’t get through a week without being pressed on the tyranny of the comic-book picture. “The danger there is what it’s doing to our culture,” he told GQ magazine after being nudged in that direction. “Because there are going to be generations now that think movies are only those.”
Never mind that. The related story that really caught the eye this week was the latest attempt by the beleaguered Golden Globe Awards to claw back a little attention. Next year’s event, which does yet not have a broadcast home, will introduce a new award for “cinematic and box-office achievement”. Well, that sounds vague. Aren’t all the awards for cinematic achievement? Don’t most have something (something unspoken, perhaps) to do with box-office achievement? Are you rewarding the best film or the one that made the most money? Why the hell would you do the latter? When are you going to stop me asking these banal questions?
It seems films that make more than $150 million – or “commensurate digital streaming viewership”, whatever that means – qualify to be considered among the eight nominees determined by the Golden Globe voters. That same electorate then decides the winner “based on excellence”. Certain films need a bit of a help up. They can’t compete fairly in the best-picture categories. Aw, diddums. Is all that money not reward enough for poor wee Batman? It’s as if an employer brought in a form of positive discrimination that ended up benefiting only those with a bank balance over some many millions of dollars.
This notion that some sinister elite has it in for popular art has been around more or less forever. There is some truth to it. There is much baloney too
This may ring a bell with award-show veterans. It feels like longer ago – because the concept was so very dead so very quickly – but it is just five years since the Oscars tried to introduce the Academy Award for outstanding achievement in popular film. The idea lasted a month before being taken into the academy’s parking lot and put to humane death. Nothing about the concept made sense. If you got into popular film then that would surely decrease your chances of winning a “real” Oscar. The language invited the inference that the main award was for “unpopular” films. In an irony that put a neat full stop to the saga, the next ceremony saw Black Panther become the first superhero film to get a nomination for best picture. Happy now?
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Of course, this is largely about ratings. The Golden Globes hopes the prospect of big movies with big stars (presuming the actors’ strike goes away) will attract a broadcasting partner and invite millions to tune in. The new award means that Barbie and Oppenheimer are sure to be nominated. They’re already certain to be nominated. Indeed, the former is big favourite to win best comedy or musical, and the latter is a marginal favourite to take best drama. But now they will be nominated twice. That means ... something?
Historically brainless theses argue that the studio superhero flick (hugely expensive, few in number) is the equivalent of the old-school western (variously priced, proliferous)
The move is, however, also indicative of a wider discontent in culture. This notion that some sinister elite has it in for popular art has been around more or less forever. There is some truth to it. There is much baloney too. Critics of the Oscars are right to point out that, in the 1970s, the winners of best picture were often huge grossers. The Godfather, which triumphed in 1973, briefly held the title of highest-grossing film of all time. But what changed was not so much the sort of films that win Oscars as the sort of films that make a lot of money. The current success of Oppenheimer, boosted by its association with Barbie, is little short of a miracle. For the past 20 years the yearly box-office top 10 has been the preserve of superheroes, sequels and kids’ flicks.
Meanwhile, social-media-juiced fandom has come to see the effusions of giant conglomerates – vast malign octopuses – as oppressed texts that need to be boosted at every turn. Gimcrack conspiracies suggest critical disdain for comic-book movies is based on racism, sexism, ageism. Historically brainless theses argue that the studio superhero flick (hugely expensive, few in number) is the equivalent of the old-school western (variously priced, proliferous). Now they need positive discrimination at awards ceremonies. Please sir, can I have another?
It all suggests a famous scene from a TV show that, though never an enormous hit, has survived and prospered in the cultural imagination. “You never say thank you,” a disappointed Peggy Olsen says to her boss Don Draper in series four of Mad Men.
He does not pause before yelling.
“That’s what the money is for!”
