After a forced move due to the pandemic, the Oscars return to their traditional hall on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Sunday for a tight competition. A Swiss short film is in the running.
German-Swiss director Maria Brendle’s short film ‘Ala Kachuu’ has been nominated for one of the world’s most coveted awards. The film, whose title means ‘pack and run’, tells of a bride’s robbery in Kyrgyzstan. Around 12,000 women fall victim to this custom each year.
Best feature film
In the Best Feature category, favorites ‘CODA’, ‘Power of the Dog’ and ‘Belfast’ battle it out for the top prize. A dark and psychological western regarding men who do not assume their sexuality, ‘The Power of the Dog’ has long been in the lead, giving Netflix hope of a historic victory in this flagship category.
But for the past few weeks, ‘CODA’, a dramatic comedy full of optimism adapted from the French success ‘La Famille Bélier’, has returned at full gallop. The film follows a high school student torn between her newfound passion for singing and her family, all of whose other members are deaf and depend on her to communicate with the hearing world. He won one following the other all the prizes awarded by the unions of the American cinema industry.
Friday, for the first time, this low-budget film whose journey began at Sundance in January 2021 rose to the top of the predictions of experts in the sector, ahead of ‘The Power of the Dog’. In third position is ‘Belfast’, a black and white evocation of Kenneth Branagh’s childhood in the midst of the violence in Northern Ireland at the end of the 1960s.
‘It’s a race between two or three horses’, confirms Clayton Davis, specialist in film awards for Variety magazine, a reference in the field. For him, the ‘dynamics’ of the last days played in favor of ‘CODA’. ‘The last two years have been very difficult for everyone. And ‘CODA’ is positive, comforting. I believe voters are in a feeling good mood,” he told AFP.
Netflix versus Apple TV+
Many professionals have raved regarding ‘The Power of the Dog’, noting its aesthetic prowess and the performances of the actors. Four of them (Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons and Kodi Smit-McPhee) are in the running for this 94th edition.
But many others have also criticized Jane Campion’s film for a certain coldness. “It’s not everyone’s cup of tea,” says Scott Feinberg, columnist at The Hollywood Reporter magazine.
This can prove to be a handicap because the strange multi-round preferential voting system used at the Oscars for the category of best feature film generally favors the most consensual films.
But a surprise is always possible at the Oscars and the competition ‘has never been so open’, said one of the voters on condition of anonymity from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which awards the prestigious trophies .
Trump in the sleeve of ‘CODA’, it is a low-budget independent film (15 million dollars) perceived this year as the outsider and which might as such attract the sympathy of voters, even s it is broadcast by Apple TV+.
“Some members of the Academy I speak to are still reluctant to vote for a Netflix film in the category of best feature film”, explains this voter to AFP.
Will Smith et Jessica Chastain?
Among the actors, the big favorite this year is the always very popular Will Smith, who plays the father of champions Serena and Venus in ‘The Williams Method’.
‘CODA’ star Troy Kotsur is up for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. The deaf actor, who plays the loving but sometimes helpless father of a hearing teenager, has been a hit in the various film awards this season.
On the actress side, the competition is fierce but Jessica Chastain, unrecognizable in her role as televangelist of ‘In the eyes of Tammy Faye’, seems the best placed. She might be threatened by Penelope Cruz, who wowed with her performance in Pedro Almodovar’s ‘Madres Paralelas’.
Ariana DeBose is set to win for Supporting Actress in Steven Spielberg’s remake of ‘West Side Story’. But the latter seems on the wrong track to establish himself as best director once morest Jane Campion, who has a good chance of winning the second Oscar of her career as a director following ‘The Piano Lesson’.
The grandiose space opera ‘Dune’ should stand out in multiple technical categories, from photography to sound and special effects.
Reconnect with the public
The organizers and broadcaster ABC hope that this 94th edition will allow them to reconnect with the public and with their audience, which has been in free fall in recent years. The 2021 edition had only attracted 10 million viewers, a 56% drop compared to the previous year which had already recorded its lowest level in history.
To attract fans, the organizers launched this year a ‘fan prize’, called to vote on social networks. It is for the Oscars to “see how they can reach a new audience, this TikTok generation”, believes Clayton Davis.
The queen of pop Beyoncé and her young runner-up Billie Eilish will also be fishing for viewers on the Oscars stage. They are both in the running for the Oscar for best song, respectively for ‘The Williams Method’ and that of the latest James Bond.
/ ATS
