The Hollywood Academy undertakes a grand opening, since last year and hardly anyone knows it. It’s like a magical movement, perhaps unthinkable a while ago. Taking advantage of the fact that on March 27, 2022, the most celebrated film awards are presented, the Academy Oscar, in its 94th edition – almost a centenary – we will make our comments on the changes that are coming and the favorite films.
the power of the dog, with 12 nominations, will likely become the night’s big winner and Jean Campion the first woman to win an Oscar twice. Years ago she won the statuette for Best Director with the memorable film The piano.
It was very rare for women to win awards in the film industry and the reason is because the composition of the juries in 2016 was as follows: 76% men, 93% white and with an average age of 63 years; that is, many white and old men.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS for its acronym in English) is not only responsible for giving the award of excellence called Oscar -the most attractive- but it is a global community that has more than 10,000 artists, filmmakers and executives. They have many other programs: science and technology awards, Nicholl scholarships and grants to students, as well as the opening of the great film museum, archives, libraries and film store, among others.
All this is connected with equity and inclusion initiatives in the so-called Academy Opening 2025. Impressive. They are no longer “throwing so much straw” at Latinos, as was the case before, who always put them as the ugliest and most villainous; and the macho culture was a supremacy that devalued women. Blacks, Latinos, women were always the losers, the disposables of society or annoying or uncomfortable minorities.
Everything has been an open process democratically discussed with the American film associations and reviewing legal precedents from other countries, such as the United Kingdom.
In conclusion, the Academy is making a great effort to recognize traditionally excluded racial groups or underrepresented ethnic groups, be they people with physical disabilities, women, black, LGBTQ+, indigenous or native.
Now the panorama is different, Hollywood is no longer the villain of the industry and they start talking about “Training on unconscious prejudices”, avant-garde ideas. Beginning in 2021, they have increased membership so that more talented Black and women in the industry vote on the Board of Governors.
That is why a woman like Campion, director big leaguerhas more options at the Oscars and Latinos like Guillermo del Toro, who once again surprises us with his fantastic stories full of monsters in the play, can continue to make inroads with success the alley of lost souls. Also stories that address issues of physical disability such as Coda or the black Will Smith can end up taking the statuette. OR Belfast, in black and white, by Kenneth Branagh, who makes a biographical story about the horrors of violence. Or the Japanese Ryusuke Hamaguchi, who with the adaptation of the story of the writer Murakami can win the award for the film driving my car and defeating the heartbreaking Danish film in the category of Best International Film Fleewhich can win in the category of Best Documentary.
In short, cultural diversity at its best. Hollywood Remastered. Today all the standards promoted by the Academy, in front of and behind the cameras, point to inclusion and equity, not mediocrity – as conservative critics and doomsayers allege.
Our old critical look at the mecca of cinema has changed because we celebrate all the changes promoted by humanity. I hope the Academy Opening 2025 be a true dream of justice.
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