Spazzing On Oscar

Hey, what's up, guys? Hope everyone is having a great and productive weekend. Me, I'm just revising, That Summer On The Ranch which is going very well. Still much to go, but hey, writing is a process.

With all that said, I'm back on my first spaz of the year. It is in the mist of the recent Oscar (ceremony will be March 4, also my birthday is that month, 18th) nominations, I thought I'd let you know what I think about that. Okay, throughout the week, I was scrolling twitter (like every other young millennial) and I kept seeing tweets about the groundbreaking film, Get Out. The film has four nominations (including best actor, best director, best original screenplay, and best picture). All I see is people tweeting, "Get out better win every award it's nominated for," and "Oscars is canceled if Get Out doesn't win," or "Daniel Kaluuya better win best actor." I've heard enough! Everyone, Get Out (and every other great black film) will always get the recognition it deserves if we go to the movie theater and show support. Get Out had the record-breaking success that it did because we went and saw the movie, the Academy awards didn't have shit to do with that. Same with Girls Trip, same with Moonlight (last years best picture winner and a new fav of mine), same with Hidden Figures, and same with Black Panther (that's not even out yet) And as a result, there will be more of those films to come. That sounds like recognition to me, the progressive kind. I know y'all want to see our people win, hell I do as well. In fact, I also think Get Out will win best picture. We just need to be real though. America was not established for us, so why are we going to act like the Academy awards was made for us? (and don't get me started on the Grammys which take place today, lord have mercy)

And if I can be a little more real, just because you want black people to win, doesn't mean all of them deserve to win. For example, while I think that Get Out should win best picture, I don't think Daniel Kaluuya should win best actor. His nomination is warranted for sure, but my pick for best actor is Timothee Chalet. I thought Call Me By Your Name was a remarkable film (wouldn't be mad if it won best picture) and this guy’s acting was a gargantuan reason why. Like, I thought I was watching my generations Leonardo DiCaprio (I never thought I'd ever be saying that). This is not a discredit to Daniel at all, but Timothee's character was fleshed out in so many ways, it was like I was watching a flower bloom and die. The story provides that for his character though, Get Out does not for Daniel and that's perfectly fine. These are just my views given I've seen both films. I respect all other viewpoints.

And to all these individuals that decided to boycott the Oscars, enough is enough. Boycott the police for all these heinous shootings of young black men. Boycott the ignorance that overwhelmingly resides in the white house. Boycott your industry so women can have fair say and fair pay. I just think the energy towards a pointless (in my opinion) Oscar boycott could be put towards something else of more merit. There's many hard working, dedicated, and proven young black writers/creatives who can't even get a consideration because we have no outlets, and not enough black prominent names providing them. Only passive encouragements and the "who you know" (FYI, it's more to it than that, it's who cares as well) phrases thrown around. You'd think that'd be something we stand up for, those with the platform to do so. But no, so and so doesn't win a trophy that they thought they deserved to win and want to protest it. I wonder if Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would be out here boycotting if he didn't win TPOTY (Time Person Of The Year). Probably not because he was busy caring about his people and their progression. This man was not caught up in his fame, in fact, his fame spawns from doing what was right. Doing what no one else was brave enough to do at the time. He wasn't thinking about no damn trophy. He was thinking about equal rights in the society for us (and don't get me started on Kaepernick, who's still jobless). It's just a lot of these people that represent us in the industry talk about how they're inspired by our prominent figures of the past like Dr. King, but they never seem to embody the mentality. It's just the results, you see what I did there? I'll just leave it there so all this can marinate up until the Academy award ceremony.

I hope you all enjoyed this week’s post (I was itching to speak on this) and I'll catch you next Sunday.