This is literally my point nn. All are better but Anora is somehow more Oscar-worthy because it’s more palatable or “attainable” to Oscar voters.
Anora getting recognition feels almost as misguided as Emilia Perez getting recognition.
Oscars Race 2024-25
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Anora getting recognition feels almost as misguided as Emilia Perez getting recognition.
I don't actually think Anora is more palatable to Oscar voters than the others - certainly not Florida Project. It just happens to have a bigger push behind it because of its Cannes win.
Zoe Saldana Go Away Challenge
I think it deals in tropes about women and sex workers that tend to "make sense" to the Academy. Anora's unlikeably brash on the surface, but the flip at the end paints her as an essentially "good" young woman who struggles to be "good" because of her circumstances. It elicits pity if anything.
Florida Project doesn't really give Halley any opportunity to redeem herself in the same way (that I can remember, and certainly not as forcefully as the finale of Anora). I actually appreciate that choice (and it's why I prefer the movie), but it basically makes Halley illegible or impenetrable to Academy voters. She's too difficult. She's "bad" and undeserving of empathy.
And then of course Mikey Madison has a very different status than Bria Vinaite. Bria would never get the same campaign as Mikey. And I doubt Oscar voters really grasped what Bria pulled off, probably thinking -- questionably -- she was just playing herself.
Honestly, justice for Bria Vinaite.
She was so good, as was Michele Austin. Hard Truths is pretty bleak and purposefully tough to watch at times, but those two performances really pushed it to be something truly special.
Center Stage (2000)
I get what you're saying, but in the year of our lord Elphaba Thropp... this is not it.
This rebuttal actually kind of just...doubles down on their point.
To say that The Substance had an impact leveling a "cultural zeitgeist" as opposed to the 5th biggest film in the world this year is just patently wrong.
I get y'all love The Substance, but it's impact is not larger than Wicked, come on now.
Elphaba wasn't even the biggest green pop culture moment last year.
I love Wicked but a movie that cost that much to make, with that many brand deals, being only the fifth biggest film of the year - it wasn't the Barbie moment you think it was.
The Oscars aren't the MTV Movie Awards. Demi in her yellow coat alone is a million times more impactful to cinephiles than anything that came out of Wicked.
You're better than this.
But I'll bite - the press tour alone fed y'all for months. Cynthia Erivo's been all over the world cracking out that final riff of Defying Gravity to every member of the press that'll shove a mic in her face. And surprisingly, it's one of the best scenes of the whole year in film. The Substance doesn't have that - regardless of how good Demi is in the film. Sure Wicked's marketing budget is a zillion dollars - but that's how culture is reflected sometimes, whether we like it or not.
Well I won't argue this point - but cinephiles aren't paragons of a cultural "zietgeist".
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Everyone was laughing at it, not with it.