In the context of the Hurt Locker producer Nicolas Chartier’s smear campaign against big budget movies, Avatar specifically, the blog interviewed Matt Damon. Apparently, back when Good Will Hunting was nominated for best screenplay, someone put doubt in the voters’ minds and suggested that Ted Tally, the dude who wrote Silence of the Lambs, was the actual ghostwriter of GWH. Damon made what I thought was an interesting comment:
“I actually think the way they should do the awards, I really think this, is they should give them out 10 years later. Like the way they do the Hall of Fame in Baseball. They do it in five years, but if you did 10 years later, if this year, we were voting on what was the best picture of 2000, I think it would be much more honest. It’s like, when you pick up great old movies and you go, why the hell didn’t Brando win the Oscar for this one? Who won that year? Whatever the sizzle was about that year. 50 years later you’re looking at a movie and going, this is a historic cinematic performance.”
I keep trying to think about this and about awards in general: movies, books, anything really. Sure the Baseball Hall of Fame admits players five years later, but isn’t that what a canon is? Is winning a World Series or MVP kind of like winning an Oscar or the National Book Award? Sure, winning a Booker is nice, but is that book going to be on the shelves of every literary scholar in 20 years? 50 years? I wonder these things aloud in anticipation of the Oscars this weekend and the Pulitzers being announced in a little over a month.
Do people even care about these awards? I invite you to fill the comments space below with your own attempts at reading this sporty analogy or to share a specific nominee you’re pulling for this weekend. Inspire me to watch for more than the dresses, please.