The Oscar Quest began in May of 2010. I finished about fifteen months later, and wrote it up for the site. That was really the first major thing I did on here. It was the reason this site even exists.
Five years have passed since then. I’ve grown, my opinions have changed, my tastes have matured, I’ve had a chance to reevaluate some of the films. It feels fitting that on the five year anniversary of the site, and of the end of the Oscar Quest, I’m revisiting it.
The main impetus for this is that I realized over the past four years how poorly I wrote everything up the first time. I wrote those articles with the assumption that I was one of the only people who would read them. I didn’t think anyone would actually seek them out and use them as a guide to watch movies or see them as any kind of authority on the Oscars or even care about my opinions.
And yet, at least once a month I see a comment on one of the old articles saying, “What the hell is wrong with you? (This movie or performance) is amazing. How could you really say it wasn’t better than (another movie or performance)?” And I want to go, “Don’t you realize that was written five years ago? Don’t you remember all the stupid shit you said when you were younger?” But how can anyone really know that? You find something when you find it.
It’s like if someone found a list of your favorite movies that you wrote when you were 14 and started talking to you as though they were still your favorites now. Only this isn’t Live Journal. Or Blogspot. (Remember those?) Or Xanga. A lot of girls in middle school had those in the early 2000s. That’s how old I am now. I was around when Facebook got started. I’ve seen it all.
I started this as a place to write up all the movies I watched (for myself and for no other reason) and get out all the stuff I wanted to say about movies that I never really had a chance to say in every day conversation, because no one is as insane about movies as I am. And certainly no one thinks about the Oscars as much as I do. I never figured anyone would actually read it, and never gave much thought to the idea that anyone would.
And yet this site has (somehow) become a place where I (somehow) appear to be a person who actually knows a little bit about this stuff. So I felt I owe it to myself and all the people who stumble upon this site in the future to actually write these articles up the proper way and discuss everything in a mature and thought-out manner. I’m going to be objective about everything as best I can.
I’m going to actually analyze the categories this time, rather than say, “This is my choice and here’s why the others shouldn’t be voted for.” Which I assume is how I did things last time. I haven’t gone back and looked. And I won’t. I’ll leave all those old articles there, because I did write them and they (in a way) represent how I thought at the time. But these are really the ones that you should be looking at. This is what an Oscar Quest should be.
I’m going to write everything up the way I write up the Oscars every year, where I discuss the merits of each film and performance and discuss what seems like a good choice in the category and what doesn’t, and then discuss how I’d vote and what I think would be good choices for most people voting.
I want to really dissect the categories. I want to look at what won and why it won and discuss if it should have won from the perspective of the year it won versus now. The true function of an Oscar Quest should be to see the films and then look at how a nominee functions within its category, within its own year, and all time at the Oscars. I want to treat this as an analyst and not a voter.
And, more importantly, I want to do it in such a way where I not only discuss them as nominees within a category and as a function of the Oscars, but also as films. I want to give you films to watch. You’d be surprised how influential a movie being nominated for an Oscar is in terms of getting people to watch it.
Not to mention, I also want to see how my thoughts and views have changed in the five years since I did this Quest, having had time to see certain films again, actually digest them (since there were times when I was writing categories having seen one of the nominees for the first time the day prior. Plus I was watching six or seven films a day during the Quest, which hardly allows one to really consider a film intellectually the way it deserves) and see which ones stuck with me more than others.
I’m not going to do one category a day like I did last time. That will take too much time. That’s over 500 days of coverage. And given how a year usually plays out on this site, that means it would take two whole years to go through it all. Sure, it’s content and would make it easier on me, but I like to keep things moving and force myself to come up with new or interesting things. So I’m going to consolidate everything in order to have everything written and posted this year. I’m going to do two categories per article. Added up, all the categories plus the recap articles will take us right up to Thanksgiving. And we get to wrap everything up this year just in time for all the year’s end stuff I love doing. And that allows us to kick off next year with something else really cool. (Hint: It’s an expansion on something I’ve already done and continue to do. But don’t try to guess what it is. I won’t tell you and that takes all the fun out of life.)
Now that we’ve got all that out of the way, I want to lay down the logistics for how these articles are going to work:
The one rule I gave myself for all this (which I will repeat a hundred times as I write them) is: Consider each category as its own entity.
What that means is: vote based on the category and nothing else. If a film or a performance is the best choice in the category, then that’s the vote. (Best choice, in this case, means that I consider it the best in the category or my favorite in the category. There’s always an element of subjectivity to this, since I’m still casting votes.) I’m not going to not vote for somebody I thought was the best choice because they already won two Oscars or will later win two Oscars or because I already voted for them three times before. I’m not going to vote for a second choice in order to “get them an Oscar” because that was their best or only chance to win one. I’m not going to play the game of, “I’ll vote for this person here and make it up to the other person in this other category.” None of that. That does no one any good.
I’m going to consider each category as it is. If someone gave the best performance or had the best direction on a film, they’re the vote. Or at least I’ll say they’re the vote. Sometimes I will say a performance is best, but I preferred a different one and will vote for that instead. But I’ll still tell you flat out the other person was best and should be the vote. That’s part of my trying to be thoughtful and reasoned and fully analyze the category. And this part is me trying to consider the efforts rather than the history.
If I’m looking at a category from 1956, I’m treating it as though I’m voting in 1956. Treat each category as though it’s this year’s Oscars. I don’t care if someone I vote for will win twice after this, and the film or performance I voted for is one of their “lesser” works. If they’re tops in the category, they’re tops in the category.
Now, I may look at the past in certain situations. That is perfectly acceptable to do, if that’s how you want to play it. Someone having won twice before theoretically could play into your voting methodology at any given time even now. But, for me, trying to be as objective as I can about it, I’m really only going to let that sway me in a really tough scenario. It’s only for breaking ties and not as a strike against someone. I’m not going to fault someone for winning before, even if it was for something that seems “lesser” than the current nomination.
I’m not not voting for Frank Capra for It’s a Wonderful Life just because he won three Best Director awards beforehand. Sure, I consider the Mr. Deeds Goes to Town win a “lesser” win that I don’t necessarily think should have happened, but he did win. All I could have done was vote for someone else. It’s not his fault he won. I may say, “Well, I consider David Lean and William Wyler perfect alternatives and don’t know which way I want to go,” and then use Capra having won three times to lean (pun ridiculously intended) toward one of the other two. That I deem acceptable. (Not saying that’s gonna happen, I honestly have no idea what I’m gonna do there. Just a hypothetical.) But even there, I’m not letting that be something that disqualifies him. (That was 1946, by the way. For those keeping score.)
The idea is to treat the category as its own thing. I’m voting on categories based on the categories themselves and the individual efforts therein and am not focusing on how many times I vote for somebody or how my voting affects history. You know, that whole, “In my timeline, Paul Newman has three Oscars because I voted for him three times, but that also leaves (insert actor here) with no Oscars.” That’s not happening here.
If you want to treat this as a game, or an exercise, here’s how I suggest you go about it (which is how I’m going about it): vote for the category based on the category itself and nothing more. Treat it as though you have a ballot and are turning it in. But don’t let your votes dictate how history goes. Pretend as though history turns out the way it did. For instance, you voted for The Quiet Man for Best Picture in 1952. But when you get to 1953, The Greatest Show on Earth has already won Best Picture. Use the actual history if you need or want to for whatever category you’re at.
If you’re at 1952, it’s perfectly reasonable to consider the fact that John Ford had already won three Best Director Oscars. If, because of that, you want to vote for Fred Zinnemann instead, go for it. My only request is that you provide a reasoned account of why you voted the way they did and be able to explain that’s why you did it. The idea is to be objective about things and analyze them. So you should be able to say, “I’m voting for (x), even though I recognize that (y) is a very good choice. But (y) won a couple times before, and since I think they’re really close, I’m gonna take (x).” Don’t simply not vote for someone because they won before. Reasoned analysis can take that into account, but it can’t be the only reason. (I’m telling you, we’re doing this shit for real this time.)
Oh, and for god’s sake, if you’re gonna vote for a category, at least have seen all the nominees first. Or admit when you haven’t seen something. Nothing is worse than screaming about how something should have won, meanwhile you’ve only seen 60% of the nominees.
I want to be honest and deliberate in my analysis. I want to give the full picture of each category. I’m going to say what really would or wouldn’t hold up as a choice over time (or what has or hasn’t), what is a legitimate choice in the category, how I feel people will or should vote, all of it. I’m going to tell you my personal feelings on the categories and also separate them from the category in order to better analyze it. I really want to break these things down, and hopefully give everyone something to read that actually lives up to what a thing called an Oscar Quest should be.
And then hopefully in five years I’m not fixing how I wrote everything up this time and am instead simply reconsidering my opinions. But that’s wishful thinking.
Oh, and in case all that took away from the major headline of all this — the Oscar Quest is back.
