Friday, January 25, 2019
How Black Panther's Best Picture Oscar 2019 Nomination Changes Everything
www.esquire.com: It's a surreal time to be a comic book fan. The single issues we flicked through in quarter bins in the back of our favorite comic shops have become the source material for the most profitable movies on the planet. In just a decade, superhero films have become a dominant force in the cultural conversation, with phenomenal critical and financial success, yet the highest honors from Hollywood have alluded these films.
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I have often thought about what differentiates a film from a typical Hollywood motion picture. At what point does the movie shift from a money-making machine, to an impactful story to be enjoyed for years to come? This article digs into these questions and poses more. Personally, I had thought the Marvel universe and many other superhero movies to be very commercial and unoriginal. But when my brother dragged me to see The Dark Knight a few years ago, I saw a new depth to the genre. The action elicited thrill rather than just violence, and I could see a complexity to the villains that is greater than just being one-sided. Black Panther carries within it deep racial themes that celebrates and honors the African culture. Individuals, such as I, who would not typically choose a superhero movie, are hopefully more likely to consider this one considering its inclusion on the Oscar nominations list.
This year in film has been a pretty amazing year, especially for superhero movies. A year ago, I did not think much of them at all. I might watch one for some mindless entertainment if I was in the mood, but I didn’t give them credit for being much more than that. That began to change last spring when I saw Black Panther. I ended up seeing it twice, and I was exceedingly impressed with how much they managed to cram into a superhero movie. In addition to making an entertaining plot, the movie tackled a huge range of relevant political issues and broke the mold with its POC and female characters, who exhibited much more depth than most films allow. After seeing those two movies, I gave the genre a little more credit, and since then my superhero-movie-education has continued, culminating in Spiderman- Into the Spiderverse, which absolutely blew my mind. Even with my toe dipped into superhero movies, I had a pretty negative view of animated movies, thinking of them as childish and shallow. But Spiderverse completely changed that with its diverse cast of characters, heart wrenching plot, and direct tribute to its comic book roots with its animation style. Between these two films, my perspective has been completely flipped on the superhero movies and animated movies, and by extension, the comic books that they both are derived from. I think Black Panther absolutely deserves its nomination, if not the award, and I hope Spiderman receives similar acclaim next year. The two movies have certainly changed my view, and I’m sure I’m not the only one. The artistic talent and value they exhibit is stunning, and they deserve their due.
I think that this is an interesting change in the film industry because even I have always thought of comic movie as just fun things to watch, not cinematic art. A lot has changed in this industry in the past couple years and I think that it will continue to change as more and more people begin to explore. In the past, it seems as though movies have generally followed similar structures and now directors and designers are branching out and coming up with new ideas and concepts. I love seeing a movie and walking out thinking that it was the best thing I'd ever seen. And in all honesty, that hasn't really happened a lot before this year, which is exciting because now I want to go see movies in theaters and not just wait until they come out on a streaming service or rent on amazon. I am super excited to see what this nomination does to future Oscars because it has broken a precedent set a long time ago.
This article brings up the argument about whether superhero movies are actually good when deemed as such, or if they are just ‘good for a superhero movie’. The article discusses the success of black panther getting a best picture nomination for the Oscars. The article didn’t mention how so much of the success was built on the fact that having representation in the media for POC made a huge difference in success. This is not just a success in making a movie that can be considered “good” for being based on comics. This translation from a fictive tale to a realistic view is difficult to execute. The drawn characters can almost have a power to them in their modeled perfection, where real people might not be able to achieve the same excitement. With special effects getting better and better, more previously animated or drawn media has become targets for “live action” versions. This creates a lot of art that brings a fantasy to life, but also a few that shouldn’t have seen the light of day. Black Panther was a good one though.
Black Panther is SO important, and I cannot stress that enough. Black Panther is simply one of the best pieces of cinematic art I have ever seen. Yes, it’s a superhero movie, but as we as artists and the author of this article can see: it’s so much more than that. My Senior English class last year was actually studying colonialism last year around the time Black Panther was released, and my teacher literally made it a homework assignment to see Black Panther. After seeing it I did not feel like I had just seen a superhero movie, but rather a movie that explored the depths of colonialism, racial issues, representation, gender stereotypes and so much more. Black Panther is truly a piece of art no matter what way you look at it and while yes, many of the movies Black Panther is up against are amazing films, none of them even come close with doing the ground-breaking work for society that Black Panther did.
This is insane to me to see that Black Panther actually got nominated! It’s definitely one of the biggest, if not the biggest, movie of 2018. When it comes to the Oscars, you never think of Superhero movies making it to the Best Picture category. Honestly it’s a huge snub, there have been some very deserving superhero movies in the past 7 or 8 years. When Black Panther first hit the box office, I went and saw it probably 3 times. Then coming to CMU, we had the Costume Designer of Black Panther come in and do a presentation. It truly became a revolution, and sparked a huge change in film and entertainment culture. As a person of color, I saw a huge shift with community amongst black people worldwide. This is a huge change in the film industry and I’m very excited to see what comes to future nominee lists.
On a similar note to Miranda and Chai I was quite surprised the article glossed over how large of an impact black panther had for the industry as a whole pushing to the forefront POC and female leaders. But I guess there were just too many industry smashing facts about it. Another interesting point about movies vs superhero movies is critical acclaim. Black Panther scored a 97% on rotten tomatoes where the commonly referred to Dark Knight only received a 94% and comparatively Bergman has an average score of 93%. So my question is if we are putting all movies on this supposedly equal rotten tomatoes scale doesn’t it reflect how good Black Panther is over all movies. Due to its success there will no doubt be plenty more Black Panther movies to come. Although I guess we will have to wait for the next infinity wars movie to come out first.
I’m glad that the article addressed the way in which superhero movies are often considered ‘not real art’, which brings up the question of why not, and what separates superhero movies as a genre? People consider comic books to be cheap and having no real story, just corny action. While this might have been true back at their origin, modern comics have really become an art form of their own, blending visuals and story in a really unique way. Superhero movies have become their own genre- a mix of action, fantasy, sci-fi, comedy, and/or drama, depending on which movie. I do think the article somewhat glossed over the fact that the focus on POC voices in the design and production of Black Panther was what led it to become such a box office hit and such a well-done piece of cinema- it’s not just culturally significant regarding a change in the way superhero movies are regarded, but also in the way POC-led movies will be seen by producers.
Up until I had read this article, I was not aware of the fact that there existed a difference in the way comic-superhero films and other films were thought of by the Academy nomination board. It seems obvious now as to why it exists, because people have always had the perception that all comic stories are meant to be read if nothing else is there to do- kind of like a pass time.
But with Black Panther and its success, things are changing in the entertainment industry and in the minds of the people. For one, Black Panther and its various facets were accepted by the audience with complete love, which in itself is a big advancement, since it opens the doors for other such groundbreaking projects. Another important point is the fact, with Black Panther being nominated for best picture, doors for other superhero to be applauded a true content and worthy to being in the race are opened, which is important because no one type of film is the best; everyone has its perks.
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