Is there still suspense about Best Picture?

After losing Best Director and Best Actor in a row, "12 Years a Slave" has officially announced the launch of the Best Picture competition, and like "American Hustle", the strong momentum of the second phase of the awards season has only blossomed and not borne fruit, with little thunder and little rain, but compared to the empty-handed "American Hustle", they have at least won one Best Adapted Screenplay Award, which is not too embarrassing, which is already the best consolation.

"American Hustle" and "12 Years a Slave" in the troika have fallen behind, and "Gravity", which won eight Golden Man trophies tonight, has been in a league of its own, sweeping all the way from the technical department to the surprise upset of Best Supporting Actress, and also winning Best Film Editing.

No!

Among the seven production technology departments, "Avatar" only won the best cinematography and the best visual effects, while the "Bomb Disposal Unit" won the best sound effects, the best sound effects and the best film editing, and the overall development trend can be seen early on.

And the "Titanic" has already swept thousands of troops in the technical department.

This also means that "Gravity" will become another commercial masterpiece after "The Lord of the Rings 3: Return of the King", which is undoubtedly a night worth remembering for the Oscars.

In the limelight, Will Smith took the stage.

Will Smith?

It's Will Smith!

Over the past three decades, Hollywood has produced countless black actors, but only Morgan Freeman, Denzel Washington and Will Smith can truly be called top superstars. Whether it is the status in the industry or the market appeal, they are incomparable to the highest existence.

The Academy's decision to honor Will Smith as the guest of honor for Best Picture suggests that it is not a casual arrangement, nor is it an arrangement to know the results in advance. There's nothing greasy about it.

First of all, the college has no way of knowing the results of the award in advance, only the accounting firm responsible for counting the voting results, and even in the accounting firm, only the two staff members who are ultimately responsible for escorting the winners' list know, so that the suspense can be maintained until the last minute to create the biggest surprise.

Secondly, the process of arranging award presenters is very cumbersome and complicated, and it must be started early, considering the list of nominees and guests, and considering the status of the award presenters, etc., all of which have been arranged before the statistics of the award results are completed.

Therefore, when the college arranges the award guests, it has knowledge in itself. The only exception to this is the acting department, where the tradition of the previous year's winners is kept alive, with the previous year's winners announcing the results cross-announced, but occasionally the previous winner's time not being able to attend the ceremony, and the academy will need to arrange guests on an ad hoc basis.

Overall, the Academy is based on the momentum of the awards season, and in a way, it reflects a kind of prediction of the outcome of the awards, which is a summary of the public's relations and wind direction within the college.

For example, in 2007, Martin Scorsese, who was a strong leader in the second phase of the college's public relations, was optimistic about realizing his Oscar dream with "The Departed", and the college arranged Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola, three celebrities who were called the "four directors of the eighties" alongside Martin, to witness Martin's coronation.

This is undoubtedly the best tribute!

But until the winners are announced, the Academy can't be sure that Martin will actually win the award, which is just a prediction. But this is also the most authoritative prediction for journalists, who are accustomed to predicting the final trend of certain important awards, especially best director and best picture, from the list of award presenters.

Tonight, the Academy invited Will Smith as the guest of honor for a simple reason:

Judging from the public relations momentum of the academy in the second phase, the ascent of "12 Years of Slavery" is a high probability event, so the academy invited the top and most recognizable superstars of black actors to appear, showing their importance and respect for the topic of "race/race", so Allen made those jokes in the opening remarks.

But the actual progress of the award ceremony was completely unexpected, the sweep of "gravity" was almost unstoppable, and now there is almost no suspense about the winner of the best picture, and all the guests are ready to witness the coronation ceremony of "gravity"! They can even imagine how turbulent, boiling, and sharp reproaches the Academy judges will encounter for not choosing "12 years of slavery" after the award ceremony.

As Alan said, you are all race/discriminators.

At this time, seeing Will Smith on stage, the expressions of the guests became interesting, and even Will himself was a little uncomfortable.

Bradley Adams, a reporter for The New York Times, was watching the live broadcast of the awards ceremony in the state media center, but at the same time, his hands were tapping quickly on his keyboard.

He knew what the hell was going to happen after tonight, because the rest of the fellow journalists in the media center were already gearing up to give it a try, and they were tapping on the press release, and the content all had the same theme: Strongly condemning the academy judges for ignoring the excellence of "12 years of slavery", is the academy too "white"?

It has already been confirmed that the Los Angeles Times, Variety, San Francisco Chronicle, Entertainment Weekly, Empire, and many other media outlets will cover this topic. In fact, the New York Times was on the same topic, and the editor-in-chief called to ask Bradley to write the article, but Bradley refused, and eventually the editor-in-chief gave the manuscript to another senior journalist, as for Bradley himself......

He wants to write according to his own ideas: to applaud "gravity"!

Although Bradley knew that the New York Times might not use it, he still wanted to finish it, even if it was published on his personal blog, he still wanted his voice to be heard, and he was still willing to applaud the victory of "gravity" after all.

He firmly believes that "Gravity" is a more affirmative work than "Twelve Years of Slavery", not because "Twelve Years of Slave" is not good enough, but because the cinema viewing experience created by "Gravity" is more important, which is an important work for the future development of the film industry!

All the thoughts in my mind flowed quickly through my fingertips, turning into words on the screen through the keyboard.

Then, Bradley's hands stopped, and the sound of the entire media center tapping on the keyboard came to a collective halt as Will Smith was about to reveal the answer.

"The winner of the 86th Academy Award for Best Picture is ......" opened the envelope and pulled out the card, Will did not continue to delay, he directly scanned the card, his expression appeared a momentary subtle pause, but before the audience could savor what this pause meant, Will's smile rose, a little strange and a little wonderful, "'Twelve Years a Slave', Brad Pitt, Steve McQueen, Dede-Gardner (Dede-Gardner) ......"

What the?

Wait a minute!

Who?

The entire Dolby Theater and the entire media center were silent for a second, but the pause and silence for a second were like a century, and the shock and disbelief rippled in the depths of everyone's eyes, and the first reaction in their minds was the same: Did I hear it wrong?

The "gravity" that swept the eight statuettes tonight, the "gravity" that won the three heavyweight trophies of Best Film Editing, Best Supporting Actress and Best Director tonight, the "gravity" that won the award unstoppably tonight, and the "gravity" that is about to write a new history tonight...... Actually lost Best Picture like this?

In a trance, time seems to have gone back in time, and it is back to two years ago when the "artist" who only won the Oscar for Best Original Score and Best Costume Design defeated "Hugo" and topped the Best Picture throne, which caused an exclamation, which is still vivid in my mind, and now history repeats itself!

The awards ceremony only won the "Twelve Years of Slavery" of the Best Adapted Screenplay, and actually defeated "Gravity" to reach the Oscars!

Everything seems to be going according to the trend of the second phase of the academy's PR, everything seems to fit the language of Allen's opening stage, and everything seems to be the standard ending that everyone expected...... But why does it feel a little wrong now?

Relying only on the strong advantage of the "race card", but successfully reversing the "gravity" that has been praised by various departments, can the golden man of "12 Years of Slavery" really be called "the best"?

Wait a minute. Wait a minute!

The impact was so powerful that everyone was stunned for a moment, and a second, even if it was just a second, created an unparalleled tsunami.

All the reporters in the media center were stunned, and after a second, they looked down at the manuscript on their computer screens, and the foul language began to burst out in a continuous manner, and they collectively opened a new document and began to write it in a more frantic and urgent manner.

It's messed up, it's all messed up.

Bradley was stunned for about three seconds, the thick loss made him unable to come back to his senses, he took a deep breath, he looked back at his computer screen, thought for a moment, or continued to write on the basis of the original manuscript, he still insisted on his idea: "gravity" is more worthy of praise than "twelve years as a slave".

As for "twelve years as a slave", winning after all still won, at least for them, this is good news.