It’s Oscar season again, and with movies like Damien Chazell’s Whiplash, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman, and Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel nominated for Best Picture it begs the question what kind of power does being nominated for an Oscar and winning afford a director, and subsequently the sociopolitical causes they might stand for (or against)?
This year all twenty of the nominees in the actor and actress categories are all white. The lack of diversity has not gone without drawing much attention and controversy within the months leading up to the Oscar premier, even causing the creation of the now popular ‘hashtag’ on tweeter #oscarssowhite. The cast of Selma, the biopic of civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr., premiered in New York on January 9th. The cast including director Ava Duvernay and a large portion of the cast appeared at the movies first screening donning “I Can’t Breathe” T-shirts over their party wear and raising their arms in the “don’t shoot” pose. Many expected Duvernay to be nominated for Best Director, making her the first black female nomination in this category since the Oscar’s nativity, but the film was shut out of every category other than Best Picture and Best Original Song. It is no secret that Hollywood has a history of “whitewashing” big blockbuster films and as part of that industry, the Oscars, have kept up the status quo of the entertainment industry’s power dynamic.
Naomi Spencer naomi.spencergz@udlap.mx