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A very weird, dramatic Oscars year, explained 

Kyndall: It's been a very odd, underwhelming year in Oscars movies. 

There just aren’t a lot of movies that came out this year that are definitive masterpieces, whereas, last year, everyone was like, “The Zone of Interest is the best Holocaust movie that's ever been made, and Anatomy of a Fall is a masterpiece.”

You hear a lot of caveats: Anora was funny, but it wasn't Sean Baker’s best movie. Conclave was interesting, but wasn't super intellectual.

Alex: It's also funny, because there are a few controversies surrounding some of the movies this year, like: Did The Brutalist use AI? The Twitter account of Emilia Pérez star Karla Sofía. There was an online narrative that Sean Baker makes the same kind of weirdly fetishy movies about sex work over and over.

All that is a big change from last year when the conversation was more like, “Did you see Barbie? Oh yeah, Barbie. I love Barbie.”

Sean: Can we talk about Karla Sofía Gascón for a second? She was caught having tweeted a lot of inappropriate things, right? 

Alex: So many. There was one where she was like, Hitler was just very opinionated about things. There was one calling George Floyd a drug addict no one really cared about. There were so many. There was one she denied sending that attacked her Emilia Pérez costar Selena Gomez. 

Sean: Are the Oscars still important? Do they matter?

Kyndall: The Oscars are always going to matter in terms of visibility, who's getting opportunities, and what subjects people are interested in seeing in movies. 

Alex: To Kyndall’s point, the stuff that wins does make it safe for studios to green light similar movies. Look at Parasite winning. That knocked down the door for more Asian representation. A few years later, Everything Everywhere All at Once comes out. 

Kyndall: The Oscars reflect the story that Hollywood wants to tell about itself. You see that in nominating Demi Moore for Best Actress this year, after brushing her to the side for years and years. Now the industry is saying, “Oh, we actually do value her.” 

Alex: With the Oscars, who wins is probably equal parts “this movie is good” and “if this movie wins, it will make the people who vote for the Oscar winners look good.” 

If you look at Emilia Pérez, it seems very progressive on paper.

But, if you look at the actual text of the movie, one of the criticisms it’s faced is that it’s regressive, and was made by a French director whose ideas about Mexican culture don't seem particularly thoughtful at all. And it’s still getting all these awards and recognition.

Cynically, I think it’s because there's a lot of stuff on paper that voters want to reward, and giving it an award makes your group look diverse and progressive. 

Kyndall: There’s a certain type of diverse film that I feel the Academy is willing to embrace. 

We see that in the distinction between Emilia Pérez, which has a lot of sensational violence and stereotypical depictions of Mexicans and trans people, and the much more nuanced Nickel Boys, which, especially compared to other Black films about the civil rights era, doesn't visualize violence, and is very tender. 

Sean: Say the Academy made you queen and king of the Oscars. Who would you give the top awards to? 

Alex: I’d give every award to Ariana Grande. Best Cinematography? Ariana Grande. Best Actress? Ariana Grande. Best Director? Ariana Grande. 

Kyndall: For Best Picture, Challengers would have been very delightful.

For Best Actress, I’d have to give a shout out to Marianne Jean-Baptiste who starred in Hard Truths, where she plays this working class British woman who’s very grouchy and screams at everyone.

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Fungal alert: I’m no fan of fungus, not even mushrooms, and so when Sam Delgado writes that we need to take airborne fungus more seriously, I say, she’s absolutely right. 

Democracy is durable: Abdallah Fayyad offers some hope to those worried about the state of the US’s democracy — he argues it’s stronger than it seems.

Nuclear NIMBYs: No one wants nuclear waste in their backyard, but it’s got to go somewhere; Ian Millhiser writes that the Supreme Court may soon decide where that somewhere is.

Cold War style: A new Russian spy agency reportedly targeted executives, shipping, and even European grocery stores in an effort to lash out against Ukraine and its allies. [Wall Street Journal]

DOGE’s DNA: This is a handy rundown of who is actually working at DOGE, and has some useful bios. [Washington Post]

A special relationship: President Donald Trump and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer met yesterday for talks that seemed more successful in some areas than others. [The Guardian] 

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Eric Levitz delves into the strange, sometimes utopian, often racist and authoritarian political philosophies of Elon Musk’s grandfather, and finds some striking parallels between the grandfather and grandson’s policy goals.

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Today’s edition was produced and edited by me, news editor Sean Collins. I hope your week is ending on a strong note! 

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