Taking advantage of the fact that there are just over two weeks left for the Oscar delivery ceremony, on Sunday, March 12, we are going to review how the best film is chosen, what the voting system is -and how it changed- and also why the campaigns of marketing can be so powerful (or not), what is allowed and what is not when campaigning for a film, a performer or a director.
For now, voting for any item that is not best film is easy.
Voters (close to 10,000) can choose only one of the five candidates in each category.
The statuette of 3.8 kilos is taken by the one who obtains the most nominal votes.
Well, in the category of best film it is not so simple.
All for a prize.
The campaigns to position the films started in November.
Photo EFE
Campaigning: yes or no
Campaigning in favor of a film, an interpreter or a director is not prohibited.
For a simple reason: the producers want to make sure that voters have seen their film.
Let's remember that many members of the Academy are active, not retired, and usually don't have much time during the year to spend watching all the movies.
How much does a campaign cost?
It depends, but it can start from $10,000 to $50 million.
Tom Cruise, at the Luncheon where the Academy honors all the Oscar nominees.
He was the producer of "Top Gun: Maverick."
Photo EFE
What is invested in?
More than anything in seconds of television and online advertising, and on trips.
An Oscar favorite actor can fly from Los Angeles to New York and back many times.
Also to London, and to the various awards.
The studios behind the films, the production companies, rent rooms to show their films, send out DVDs and host "honoring" parties, or host events where the director and performers participate after the screening of the film in a Q&A. (questions and answers).
The Academy does not ban campaigning, although it tried to do so in the early 1980s.
Legally, in the United States a company cannot be prevented from trying to do business, the Oscar gives prestige, rewards art, but it is still a business that puts millions of dollars at stake.
Winning the Oscar means for a film, if it has not yet been released in other windows, to improve its price.
And it involves an interpreter substantially improving her next salary.
Santiago Mitre, also photographed at Luncheon, at The Beverly Hilton Hotel, on February 13.
Photo Reuters
Still, there are strict rules about what can and cannot be sent to Academy members, when parties can be held, and what can be said on social media.
How do you vote for best film?
Unlike the other 22 categories (including the one we are most interested in this year, Best International Film, for which
Argentina, 1985
is nominated), a modified version of preferential voting is used to choose the best film.
This method of voting was reintroduced in 2010, when the Academy chose 10 nominees in this category for the first time since 1943. It was maintained in 2011, when the number of candidates changed to between five and 10. The reason given by the Academy is that this "allows the collective judgment of all voting members to be more accurately represented."
Brendan Fraser -aspires to the Oscar for "The Whale" (premieres on Thursday, March 2)-, one of the many who traveled from one coast to the other of the US.
This preferential method was first used in 1934, when there were 12 Oscar nominated films (there were between three and 10 in the first six years of the Academy Awards), and was used the following year, when there were again 12 nominees, from 1936 to 1943 when there were 10 nominees, and in both 1944 and 1945 when there were only five chosen.
Now, then, voters scattered around the world are asked to rank the 10 best picture nominees in order of preference.
If one gets more than 50% of the votes in first place, she wins.
Gabriel LaBelle, Spielberg's alter ego in "The Fabelmans", who seemed a favorite.
Will he still be?
If that doesn't happen, the film with the fewest first-place votes is eliminated, and its votes are reallocated: the second-place pick is counted.
If, like this, neither film exceeds 50% plus one vote (half plus one, the Boquenses would say), the film that received the least number of first-place votes is the next to be eliminated, and its votes are assigned to the next option that is still in play (if the second place option is no longer available).
And the thing continues like this, successively, until a film reaches 50% + one vote.
Under the new rules, a film must get 5% of the first-place votes to qualify among the nominees.
Many analysts argue that the final fight is between "Everything everywhere at the same time" and "The spirits of the island."
In 16 days it will be known.
If, for example,
The Spirits of the Island
gets the most votes in Number 1, with 30% it seems that it would reach it.
But if
Top Gun: Maverick
gets just 20% of the No. 1 votes, but is overwhelmingly popular in the No. 2 votes, it could allow it to win, if many of the voters put Spirits of the Island in the spot. 4, or more back.
Thus, what is achieved is that a film wins the award, not in terms of concrete numbers, but in terms of consensus.
And maybe the best one won't win, but the one that is among the favorites of the majority will...
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