{"id":54134,"date":"2020-02-03T10:00:25","date_gmt":"2020-02-03T17:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/?p=54134"},"modified":"2020-02-03T10:00:25","modified_gmt":"2020-02-03T17:00:25","slug":"and-the-oscar-for-the-movie-no-students-have-heard-of-goes-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/2020\/02\/03\/and-the-oscar-for-the-movie-no-students-have-heard-of-goes-to\/","title":{"rendered":"And the Oscar for the movie no students have heard of goes to…"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Going for gold: <\/strong>Carter Dawood relaxes between classes at SAIT on Jan. 31. Dawood said he would only watch the Academy Awards Feb. 9 if a movie he supported was nominated. (Photo by Brennan Black\/The Press)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

T<\/span>his year’s Academy Awards might be a big deal for some movie fans, but many SAIT students say they plan to give ‘Hollywood’s biggest night’ a big miss.<\/p>\n

T<\/span>he annual ceremony to be held on Feb. 9 will see nine films vying for best picture Oscar.<\/a><\/p>\n

But many students interviewed by The Press recognized only about a third of these films, and most of them don’t plan to tune in to the Oscar show.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t watch a lot of movies,\u201d said Emily Raddatz, a business student.<\/p>\n

Raddatz said she recognized three of the movies, but Joker<\/em> was the only one she wanted to check out.<\/p>\n

Nicolas Neyrinck, a film and video production student at SAIT, said Joker <\/em>was the only movie he had seen of the nine nominees.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very disappointed in myself that I\u2019ve only seen one,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Joker<\/em>, which chronicles the origins of the DC comics supervillain, has been nominated for 11 Oscars, and it was the only film that every student interviewed had either seen or recognized.<\/p>\n

The controversial<\/a> film, which stars Joaquin Phoenix, also had students divided about whether it should have been considered for the best picture category.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was decent, but not the best,\u201d said Ryan Leonard, an information security systems student.<\/p>\n

Isik Keklik, a power engineering student, said Joker <\/em>was his favourite film of the year and that the movie definitely deserves all of the nominations it has received.<\/p>\n

Other films in the best picture category that were recognized by the students included Little Women, 1917, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, <\/em>and The Irishman<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The four remaining nominees in the category are Ford v Ferrari<\/em>, JoJo Rabbit<\/em>, Marriage Story<\/em>, and Parasite<\/em>, which is considered a front-runner<\/a> for the award.<\/p>\n

Many students said they would not be watching the awards ceremony.<\/p>\n

Carter Dawood, a business administration student, said he would rather watch the highlights of ceremony on YouTube than watch the show live.<\/p>\n

He said he might consider watching the ceremony next year, but only if there were movies nominated that he wanted to support.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t bother if there are movies being honoured that I haven\u2019t seen,\u201d Dawood said.<\/p>\n

He emphasized that the film Avengers: Endgame, the latest in the Marvel Comics series, was the top film of the year in his view, and should have made the best picture list.<\/p>\n

One student, Alice Grose, said she watched the awards last year and will likely watch them again this year.<\/p>\n

Grose, an academic upgrading student, said she watched almost all of the nominated films last year before the ceremony and then she watched the awards to see who won.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was happy with the winners last year,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Grose said she has not watched as many of the best picture nominees this year, but plans to watch as many as she can in the week leading up to the ceremony.<\/p>\n

Low viewership<\/a> has become a common occurrence for the Academy Awards in recent years.\u00a0 A particular worry for the Academy has been flagging interest among young people.<\/p>\n

In response, the Academy membership has considered introducing a \u201cpopular film\u201d category<\/a> to bring in more viewers.<\/p>\n

Despite the Academy pushing this potential category back for several years, many students said it would be a great idea.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomething like that would give people who work on these big movies the recognition they deserve,\u201d said Dawood.<\/p>\n

Grose said a popular film category would be a good idea because the movies that get nominated now generate very little interest.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody\u2019s interested in a movie like Little Women. <\/em>That\u2019s something my gran would enjoy watching,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Leonard said he would be more likely to watch the Academy Awards if a popular film category was included, as the movies that usually get nominated aren\u2019t his style.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the time it\u2019s weird movies no one has heard of,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

I just don\u2019t watch a lot of movies. – Emily Raddatz<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Despite optimism at the potential category from students, SAIT film instructor Philip Letourneau said the awards do not belong to the viewer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Academy Awards is the industry congratulating itself,\u201d he said<\/p>\n

Letourneau said that while Oscar-nominated films still have meaning, movies in general are as popular as they\u2019ve ever been, and each person will have their own tastes in film.<\/p>\n

\u201cMovies are escapism. That\u2019s why we go watch Pikachu,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Most SAIT students will not be watching the Academy Awards this year due to unfamiliarity with the nominated films. [ READ MORE ]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":576,"featured_media":54135,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_ef_editorial_meta_text_assignment-slug":"S2 Academy Awards","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,711,2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-54134","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"category-featured","9":"category-campus-2"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/576"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54134"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54144,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54134\/revisions\/54144"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}