Really Tall Guy

“Last time I seen my brother…Last time I seen the sun. Just for a few hours, we was free.”

This year’s Academy Awards is a Cinephile’s Dream. From the quiet, artistic brilliance of Sentimental Value to the rolling thematic road of One Battle After Another, a wider variety of genres are represented for moviegoers of all tastes. The markets are currently saying the latter film has a 74% chance of winning it all. I would have agreed with that number a few weeks ago.

Then, Sinners claimed 16 Oscar nominations.

Then, I heard the above quote all over my TikTok.

The quiet cadence with which Michael B. Jordan utters the line has been seared into my mind.

The raucous internal argument is a tale as old as time: what does Best Picture really mean? Should it go to the technically better films or to the ones that punched through pop culture and basically forced us to consider them for the top honor?

Best Picture as Conversation-Starter

When Sinners was initially released, the conversation immediately started with “Warner Brothers better NOT forget about this film like they did with Dune Parts 1 + 2 at the Oscars.” Not only have they not forgotten, they have thrown themselves a very strong and organic campaign across the industry.

For those unfamiliar, the Academy nominates each film based on their respective branches. Directors nominate Directors, Screenwriters nominate Screenwriters, etc. That allows really strong contenders to go against the grain of typical politics you see in some other awards considerations. It is why many consider the Academy Awards one of the last true prestigious ceremonies. When the nominees are chosen, the entire body gets to vote for their anticipated victors. The fact that Sinners has been widely recognized across almost all of its eligible categories speaks at a volume that says “we LOVED this film”. That momentum will certainly help its case come March 15th.

Best Picture as Personal

Best Picture is personal.

Which film helped shape our year in the way we see movies? What molded our conversations about the future of filmmaking?

In decades past, the Oscars were more about the glitz and glamour. People tuned in to see actors/actresses/directors they rarely got to see at any other time of year. Going to the movies was the only way to see these films. Winning Best Picture cemented your image on a larger scale to the average moviegoer. People would say “oh this won Best Picture we have to see this in the theaters.” Now with the rise of streaming, that question is the same, but leans more heavily towards “I will wait for it on a streaming platform”. Sinners both broke that more recent trend and paved a new path in the Hollywood Industry. The team behind every aspect of the film exposed a wound of hypocrisy in the industry. Studios kept saying that new ideas were not automatic guarantees at the box office. In fact, Sinners received backlash even when it WAS successful!

Best Picture as Cultural Leader

More recently, Parasite won Best Picture at a time pre-COVID when optimism about actually choosing the best film of the year burst through the seams. Everything Everywhere All at Once showcased that small films can be just as mighty as the studio ones. Oppenheimer thrust big studio films back into the spotlight in a classic Oscar way. Sinners could follow suit, while also paving new possibilities for big-budget original films. It has also empowered more individuals from younger generations to say “my stories matter too”. It made audiences stop and consider coming into the dark dream rooms of their local cinema. The cultural impact of the film runs deeper than its racial themes. The craft of filmmaking was at the forefront of the conversation for Ryan Coogler. It is a film that pushed the art of filmmaking forward by re-defining ways to tell a visual story.

Many have turned their minds away from the Academy Awards because of the view that it is just a huge pat on the back for industry leaders. How refreshing to have a line-up of Best Picture nominees to get many different types of people excited to go to the movies.

There is one film that stands tall above the rest. It speaks to the expansion of genre. It amplifies the thick underbrush of a history some citizens of the United States cannot begin to accept. It rejoices in its understanding of how music connects quite literally everything past, present, and future.

That film is Sinners.