Taking advantage of the fact that there are just over two weeks left until the Oscars presentation ceremony, on Sunday 12 March we will review how the best film is chosen, what the voting system is – and how it has changed – and also why marketing campaigns can be like this powerful (or not), what is allowed and what is not when campaigning for a film, an actor or a director.
For now, voting for anything other than Best Picture is easy. Voters (almost 10,000) can only choose one of five candidates in each category. The 3.8-kilo statuette is taken by whoever gets the most nominal votes.
Well, in the Best Picture category it’s not that simple.
Campaign: yes or no
It is not forbidden to campaign in favor of a film, a performer or a director. For one simple reason: Producers want to make sure voters have seen their film. Recall that many Academy members are active, not retired, and usually don’t have much time during the year to devote to watching all the movies.
How much does a campaign cost? It depends, but it can start anywhere from $10,000 to $50 million.
What is invested in? Mostly in the seconds of television and online advertising, and in travel. An Oscar favorite actor can fly from Los Angeles to New York and back many times. Also in London, and at various awards.
The studios behind the films, the production companies, rent rooms to show their films, send out DVDs, and throw “honor” parties, or host events where the director and performers attend after the film’s screening in a session questions and answers (questions and answers ).
The academy does not ban campaigning, although it tried to do so in the early 1980s. Legally in the United States you can’t prevent a company from trying to do business, the Oscar gives prestige, it rewards art, but it’s still a business that stakes millions of dollars. Winning the Oscar means for a film, if it hasn’t been released in other windows yet, to improve its price. And it involves an interpreter who substantially improves his next salary.
However, there are strict rules about what can and can’t be sent to Academy members, when parties can be thrown, and what can be said on social media.
How do you vote for best film?
Unlike the other 22 categories (including the one that interests us the most this year, Best International Film, for which Argentina, 1985 is nominated), a modified version of the preferential vote is used in the Best Picture election.
This voting method was reintroduced in 2010, when the Academy chose 10 candidates in this category for the first time since 1943. It was retained in 2011, when the number of candidates dropped from five to 10. The reason given by the Academy is that this “allows the collective judgment of all voting members to be more accurately represented.”
This preferential method was first used in 1934, when there were 12 Academy Award-nominated films (there were between three and 10 in the first six years of the Academy Awards), and was used the following year, when c ‘there were 12 candidates again, from 1936 to 1943 when there were 10 candidates, and in both 1944 and 1945 when there were only five chosen.
Now, therefore, voters across the globe are being asked to rank the top 10 nominated films in order of preference. If one gets more than 50% of the first place vote, they win.
If it doesn’t, the film with the fewest first-place votes is eliminated and its votes are re-assigned—the second-place pick is tallied.
If, thus, neither film gets over 50% plus one vote (half plus one, the Boquenses would say), the film that got the fewest first-place votes is next to be eliminated, and its votes are assigned to the next option still in play (if the second place option is no longer available). And it goes on like this, successively, until a film gets 50% + one rating.
Under the new rules, a film must get 5% of the first-place vote to qualify as a nominee.
If, for example, the spirits of the island It gets the most votes at number 1, with 30% appearing to achieve it. But if Top Gun: nonconformist he gets just 20% of the vote placing first, but is overwhelmingly popular in the #1 votes. 2, could allow him to win, if many of the voters put The Spirits of the Island in position 4, or lower.
So what you get is that one film wins the prize, not in terms of hard numbers, but in terms of consensus.
And maybe the best man won’t win, but the one who is among the favorites of the majority will win…
Source: Clarin
