Because there’s no other reasonable way to ensure that Shrek, a film released in 2001, will be mentioned during this year’s Oscars, the Academy has decided to let the internet vote on which movie it would like to see honored at the awards next month.
The Hollywood Reporter writes that the Academy has launched a Twitter campaign that will allow any old schmuck to cast a ballot for their favorite movie from last year by writing it next to the #OscarsFanFavorite hashtag between today and March 3rd. In one of many cracks that will ultimately cause this whole idea to explode into something nobody from the Academy would like to see, the crowd-nominated movie can be written in “regardless of if the film was nominated for an Oscar.”
The winning movie “will be recognized during the awards broadcast on March 27th.”
Obviously meant to calm Kevin Smith down about the latest superhero movie not receiving a whole bunch of awards, the added detail that “Twitter users will be able to tweet out their submissions up to 20 times a day” has far more potential to result in complete mayhem than a true test of popularity.
While some may want to use this hashtag in an attempt to get deserving movies like The Last Duel, Benedetta, The French Dispatch, or Titane recognized on TV, doing so likely isn’t worth the effort. Somehow, despite all attempts by the Academy to stop it from happening, we fully expect the sheer meme potential of Shrek, Boss Baby, (or, better yet, something by Neil Breen) to outdo the “released in 2021" restriction and dominate the competition.
Speaking to the obvious artistic credibility of this campaign, a member of the Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences’ PR team told The Hollywood Reporter discussed with excitement how the campaign’s social media “activations” will allow people “to engage with the show in real-time ...” and, to promote this, will be handing out a bunch of prizes to the people who do that engaging.
In order to really capitalize on the disastrous potential of this concept, the campaign will also include an opportunity for people to “tweet about their favorite scene from a 2021 film using #OscarsCheerMoment” and have a reel of tweets and winning scenes shown during the ceremony.
We very much look forward to seeing a montage of bad Italian accents and adult men pretending to be teenagers when the Oscars air late next month.
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