EW’s Oscar revote

From Thompson on Hollywood:

Entertainment Weekly wants Hollywood to rewrite Oscar history by giving the film industry a chance to revise the Oscar history books. It’s called “Recall the Gold.”

On October 6, EW is inviting more than 7,000 Hollywood insiders to participate in an extensive survey to re-vote on past Oscar races. EW wants to test which movies truly stand the test of time. With the benefit of hindsight, did the right films and performances win over the past 25 years? To look at 2003, will Robert Begnini still beat Tom Hanks? Will Shakespeare in Love still beat Saving Private Ryan? Will Gwenyth Paltrow still beat Cate Blanchett?

Alright, let me stop it right here and get this out of the way: a nice diversion, nothing else.  Not to poo-poo the experiment, because it’s a fun idea, but the buzz and manipulation of a given Oscar season is in the same league as the manipulation that comes from loud fans and film-goers who think this film deserved to win over that and scream about it for years after the fact.  Nothing like this can happen in a vacuum, so let’s not consider an “Oscar revote” anything more than it actually is.

And when you see that EW editor Sean Smith’s idea was inspired by the “Brokeback Mountain” loss to “Crash,” it becomes a little more irritating, in my book.  Let it go, folks.

More:

Monday EW is mailing out their official “Recall The Gold” ballot inviting the industry to vote in six major categories for five given years spaced five years apart–2003, 1998, 1993, 1988, and 1983–five, ten, fifteen, twenty and twenty-five years ago…

“We built it from scratch,” says Smith. EW reporters and editors scrolled through their rollidexes. They added everyone who had ever been nominated or won an Oscar, and crew members of films that grossed over $100 million. They looked at the news reports of Hollywood people who had been added to the Oscar ranks in recent years. They culled creative directories for execs, producers, publicists, editors, costume designers, art directors, directors, cinematographers, writers, animators, sound mixers, composers–all the categories covered by the Academy.

EW made one HUGE change. They invited top film (not TV) agents, who are not permitted to belong to the Academy, to join the list of Oscar revoters. And Smith thinks his list may skew slightly younger than the Academy’s. “We’re not trying to duplicate the Academy,” he says. “What do people working in the film industry think about these Oscar-winning movies now?”

So, they added more people with agendas to the voting pool.  Nice.  Click the ballot image above for a larger image.  And read the rest of Thompson’s story here.