3# - Lifestyle or Popular Culture

You can see in Bradley Cooper's face that he wants this to end

 The Academy Awards or the Oscars is the time when the film industry comes together to recognize the excellence that has been achieved in the past year. In motion pictures, animated films, short films, documentaries and various other technical achievements like costume design or cinematography.  It is also a bloated three hour celebration by and for the people who run it, where a comedian who is either unfunny or just for tonight has had all of the funny drained out of them will try their hardest to fill time until the next award will be presented. The host might for example bring in a bunch of tourists of the street dressed in cargo shorts and sandals, to gawk at all of the famous people so that they and the members of the audience feel like they all have something in common with their fellow man. A host might try to be "funny" by having a pizza delivered to the ceremony because as we all know life is a modest mid-90's sitcom or they might in an attempt to be "current" make many members of the audience force a smile and take an awkward selfie. But, the biggest problem that an award show like the Oscars can have is if they dont have or lose the host that they have planned and are unable to find a replacement. This kind of problem can only be called a disaster and is unfortunately exactly what happened to this years the 91st annual Academy Awards.

Kevin Hart

Comedian Kevin Hart a man who I dont personally find to be that funny was the choice to host the show and that makes sense, he is a very popular stand-up comedian who has also been in many movies that people think are all right. Hart is one of those comedians that has reached a level of fame where when you say that you dont think their funny everyone has to ask why? Hart was going to be the host of the 2019 Oscars, until some of his old tweets from 2011 resurfaced that were insensitive to the LGBTQ community. The tweets were talking about if he saw his son playing with any of daughters toys he would tell him to "stop that's gay", which is similar to something that he had said in his stand-up. This kind of talk is something that we have all heard before from every father trying to force his son to do something that he dosent want to do so that the father may vicariously live through him. Hart said in one of his specials, "one of his biggest fears" is that his son would turn out-to be gay implying that he would not know what to feel or how to interact with his son. What Hart said was closed minded and showed that he fears his son will be different, but a fear like that a fear of things that are different is human. Hart apologized to LGBTQ community and stepped down from hosting the Oscars, but said that that he had made those statements a few years ago and has changed his views.

Cuaron's film Roma 

As if one disaster wasn't enough for this years Oscars, leave it to the people the who organize the event to create a new one. This year in an effort to make the show a "brisk" three hours certain awards will be presented during the commercial breaks. What awards you might ask, well things so unimportant in film industry like cinematography and film editing, because most directors just turn on the camera and shoot wherever. Then after that they dont take any time to pick there best shots and string them together in coherent way that people can understand what is happening visually, narratively, or thematically. Another award that will be presented during commercials is for hair and makeup, which as we know is a worthless endeavor. Why would a film need hair and makeup department when actors show up to a set and the magic of film making just does all of this for them. The other award that wont be televised is the award for best live-action short film because obviously who would care about that kind of thing, what do people think the Oscars is an award show for the film industry? This change in the way that awards would be handed out made many people, some of whom like Alfonso Cuaron who directed the best picture nominated Roma incredibly upset.

Christian Bale as Dick Cheney in Vice. 

Scene from The Favorite

In the history of CINEMA, masterpieces have existed without sound, without color, without a story, without actors and without music. No one single film has ever existed without CINEMAtography and without editing.

— Alfonso Cuaron (@alfonsocuaron) February 12, 2019

By cutting Cinematography and Editing from the show, the Oscars declare themselves as nothing more than a celebrity and marketing circus.

Photography & editing is filmmaking. It’s as simple as that.

— Nick Murphy (@nickmurftweets) February 12, 2019

If they feel so strongly about this, then I would like ABC and the Academy to produce the Oscars broadcast without any editing, cinematography, makeup or hair-styling.

— Craig Beilinson (@cbeilinson) February 12, 2019

So, with categories cut out, no host to waste time with bad skits, will the "brisk" three hours be exciting, will the awards go to the truly best films this year? Judging by what I have seen this year, I am going to say no.