Award Ceremony Criticism

I am certainly not a fan of award ceremonies. As such, when "big" nights roll around like tonight, when the Academy Awards are presented, I present the idea of me watching the ceremonies satirically and find myself doing activities that I actually enjoy, instead of being guaranteed for disappointment.


Before continuing, you should know that I don't disapprove of the concept of award ceremonies. I love the ideal ceremony; deserving actors, directors and workers in the business get rewarded for their convincing performances, phenomenal ideas, and hard work. However, that's just it -- This is an ideal concept. Every winner is trivialized for various reasons.

My biggest problem with any of these ceremonies is the ridiculous approach of attempting to shoehorn a massive amount of content into so few categories (in comparision), that nothing seems fair. Looking straight at the Grammys (because I feel it's the most prevalent there), there is an ungodly amount of music produced in one year, and certainly not enough ears to listen to all of it and then judge on all categories fairly. So, the attention is then focused on what sold the most and what generated the most buzz. This severely limits the amount of music that then is put up for possible awards, then the best seven or so are given a free ride on the hype train to hell, until they reveal which "big surprise" won the category. Yay for music!

I will say that the approach to awards with "sold and buzz" is a very clean idea; clean as in it makes the most sense, as that specific media was popular to the point where it garnered a lot of public attention. However, as any good researcher knows, consumers are simple-minded -- they fail to do a lot of their own research, choosing to let the media do research for them. Most people won't look into a new product for themselves with an open mind, attempting to find all the pros and cons, ultimately weighing the consequences. Rather, they choose to watch advertisements and trailers, follow popular people's opinions, or decide what to buy based on reviews.

Advertising, then, in this sense, has the capability to create the buzz that a media product needs to make it to the medium's respective awards ceremony. Following this trend of thinking, it becomes a matter of who has the most money and when the movie was released. "Oscar Season" is a pivotal time for those directors and producers who are looking to score in the ultimate, publicity-based game show -- the Academy Awards. Releasing at a time when the cutoff date is just around the corner, using that lateness to stay fresh in the minds of the critics and Academy members.

Why do I even have a problem with these ceremonies? Because it causes people to want to go see the movies that win or get nominated. Why is this a bad thing? It's the same reason I hate reviews of movies or albums or anything as such that give an artistic work a number or letter, in hopes of grading it appropriately; there is very little independent thought involved. This is not an argument of "I saw it before it got popular" -- this is arguing for people to use their cognitive abilities to discern and define their own tastes. I am certainly against pop culture for a multitude of reasons, but the one reason I will always stand behind is the idea that it breeds and fosters to inhibit people's ability to think for themselves. An anecdote will help me here.

My sister is a 15 year old girl; she is in the heart of pop culture. She goes to school and receives feedback from her friends about what to watch, listen to, and ultimately like. As a result of this, she spends her time watching Jersey Shore and listening to Lady Gaga, recently buying a $80 North Face jacket. When I asked why she does these things, she responded with, "Because that's what my friends watch/listen to/have!" I spent a good 15 minutes attempting to get her to buy a much cheaper jacket that was much more colorful. She repeatedly said no.

Where's my point? Pop culture, in her case, makes it so she "has to have or be a part of something" in order to be "in". How is what is "in" decided? By the products that are advertised best, or, less frequently, have a notoriety for being the better product. This all seems to hark back to the age old "everyone else is doing it" mentalities.

Genres play a role in my argument that is so large, I think I should just say "Genres" and force you, as the reader, to think about my possible arguments.

My final thoughts; I see the point of award ceremonies. They award great people in the industry. I deeply respect that, as the people who work the hardest should be recognized. However, oftentimes, there are sometimes swaying when total sales are involved, or (especially) when the media in question has the use of a person the industry likes and whom they think should be "rewarded" for winning their approval, ultimately resulting in that production making more money. It is this gross perversion that makes me tired of award ceremonies.

To end, I think the best way to handle these ceremonies would be to approach it like a Groundhog's Day thing. The Academy members adopt a child who is then forced into captivity, effectively keeping it from all forms of media, bias, and advertising, and is raised to be in it's mid-twenties. The child is properly educated and told stories of the movies of old, and shown a select handful; One per decade, to be specific. Finally, at the end of the season, when it's time to decide the winners, all the Academy members seal themselves off in a dark cave for about three months; it is during this time they all watch the most popular movies of the year, and each one of them has to also nominate a movie that grossed less than $15 million dollars. Every member then watches all these movies together, discussing them afterwards, refusing to get in any confrontational situation, defending or attacking any of the entries. Then, emerging from their cave in a fashion bigger than Jesus Christ's resurrection, these media moguls announce the six nominations. No more and no less. Then, around Groundhog's Day, they expose the adopted child to the sunlight and make him watch all six movies; one per week, starting on Sunday. He is then asked a series of questions for a day, then asked to ponder and consider the movie in its own rights for the remaining five days. At the end of this process, the child decides which movie was really the best. And then no one can say anything negative about the winner, ever.

If they do, they are killed.

Why Do Some People Ask Questions First and Experiment Never??

I have had a dilemma during my time here at AU. I transferred in, so I'm a third year graduate. What keeps happening, however, is rather perturbing. I don't hate the people who are responsible, I just feel like I grew up in a totally different generation.

Because of my stature, I am often called when something has gone wrong with the radio station or when someone needs help with editing in Pro-Tools. I used to be called for Avid help too, but ever since we got Final Cut machines, no one really uses Avid. There was one time someone wanted my help with Adobe Premiere...

Anyway! Last week, during our winter storm nightmare, WRDL went off air. Ever since I've been here, I've experienced this about once a year, always during the cold season. For some reason, the transmitter just shuts itself off. In all those previous cases, for the most part, all I've done was just turn it back on, as the directions are right next to the unit to do such. Well, my ops manager sent me a text, telling me she couldn't get any meter readings, and, after some questioning, I realized I'd have to go over there. Not a big deal; I had a small bit of free time at the moment.

When I got over there, without many words, I booted the thing up and it worked fine. She was very surprised, and asked me what I did. I told her, and in turn, I asked her what she tried to do. Turns out, she didn't do anything.

It's really not a big deal, but I've just never had that mentality. If something goes wrong, I try and fix it every way possible (within reason), then I call for help. I've hardly ever had to call for help because of this. I hate to even bring any of this up, but I taught myself Avid because I shot about four hours of interview footage with about half an hour of b-roll and I wanted to make it into a documentary. It took me three days to do such, and I ended up getting into the Advanced Editing class without having to take it's prerequisite. Not to mention, when I got here, there was not one student that knew how to use Pro-Tools effectively and efficiently. So I taught myself that. Of course, with instructor help, I've improved and honed the skills, but I still am surprised other students (in my class at least) didn't seem to care to learn.

I know a lot of tips and tricks for editing just by playing around with different settings and effects. Growing up, I've picked up little bits and pieces from life experiences; I once messed around with my mother's EQ on her stereo because I was bored, and I now have a simple understanding of such. I miss that passion and desire to learn more and become proficient and dependable in my peers. Instead, it seems like either people don't care, or they learn one thing so good that it becomes their primary identifier and they choose not to learn anything else, because they either don't care, or are too prude and stubborn to ever believe that learning something else would be necessary.

I miss the fiery passion I have in those people around me. I miss having people in the editing labs with me, bouncing ideas off each other. I hate that everything in this major seems to be a "my way or no way," with arguments around every corner. I don't understand why people get so invested in the tiniest piece of an argument that it actually turns into a full-on fight.

I learned from my philosophy club friends that you should never hold on to your opinions so much so that they blind you to the other possibilities around you. That seems to be everyone's problem around here. Either that, or my philosophy friends broke me.