Oscarrific

The Oscars are changing their rules. Responding to plummeting ratings, they plan to keep the show down to three hours, partly by handing out the less exciting awards during commercial breaks.  I think this is unfair--the people who win the "minor" awards are never heard from again.  This is their one chance to shine, don't take it away from them.

Instead, I would suggest instead of separate performance of the nominees for Best Song, all of them should be sung in a medley that takes less than two minutes. (And perhaps that should be done during commercials.)

But the biggest change they're making is to create a new category, Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film.  This is presumably so that blockbusters, often left out of the non-technical categories, can win a big award.

How you feel about this depends on how you see the mission of the Academy.  If you see the Oscars as essentially a TV show, why not?  But if you see them as an annual award for artistic quality, then this is stupid.

Sure, people want to see the films they watched win awards. (Though it is funny that some feel the Academy is too highbrow, when they're about as middlebrow as you can get.) Some years ago the Academy allowed more films to be nominated for Best Picture, and added a separate animation category.

But this is a bridge too far.  The awards are for quality, take it or leave it.  We don't need a separate category for superhero films.  We didn't used to have this split.  It's true to first Oscar ceremony gave an award for Outstanding Picture and Unique And Artistic Picture, but they were working out the bugs and that was gone by next year.

Over the early years of the Oscars, what was considered the Best Picture was often the same as the high-grossing picture.  Then, a few decades ago, it's hard to say when, there came a separation between what was considered quality films and blockbuster films.  If that's the way it is, so be it.  There are plenty of people's award. The Oscars can be one night of the year where grosses don't matter.