The Snubs and Surprises of the 2020 Academy Award Winners
“Parasite” Wins the Night, “1917” and “Joker” Do Well as “Irishman” and “Marriage Story” Get Shut Out
By: Keaton Marcus
Surprise: “Parasite” Nabs Four, Including Best Picture
The biggest surprise of the 2020 Oscar winners was foreign language film Parasite, which was hailed as one of the greatest cinematic achievements ever, but none of us expected it to win the most awards of any flick. Bong-Joon ho’s masterpiece took home four awards after getting nominated for six, winning Best Picture, Best Directing, Writing (Original Screenplay) and of course, Best International Feature Film. Also, it’s the only foreign language film to win Best Picture, especially against a line-up that included 1917; The Irishman, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Joker and more. So that’s one great shock during the night.
Snub: “The Irishman” and “Marriage Story” Come Home Empty (Could it be Netflix?)
What’s a real bummer was the grudge that the Academy has against Netflix produced films, and this year it was The Irishman and Marriage Story that got robbed. The two critically-acclaimed movies came home empty after the former was nominated for ten, and the latter six. While it wasn’t confirmed that two films that went straight to streaming would win several, but even if they aren’t released in the theaters doesn’t mean that the Academy can shrug. It’s a shame that this grudge is still going, but it’s better just to get nominated than nothing.
Surprise: Roger Deakins Earns His Second Oscar for Cinematography
It’s not classified as a surprise, but it’s still nice to hear that master of cinematography Roger Deakins has won his second Oscar for Best Cinematography after he won in 2017 for Blade Runner 2049. The given film was the technical achievement 1917, which won Cinematography, Sound Mixing and Visual Effects—the second biggest winner of the night. Deakins should have a much higher number of Oscars under his belt, however, as he was robbed from the Academy until 2017. He’s truly a god, filming The Shawshank Redemption, Fargo, two James Bond films (Skyfall and Spectre), True Grit, Kundun, Sicario, Unbroken and much more for a total of 80 credits.
Surprise/Snub: “Joker” Wins Two, but Loses in Many
After becoming the most-nominated movie of the year, at 11, Joker finished the night off with two wins, which isn’t bad, but we were expecting more. The controversial comic-book movie won Best Actor with Joaquin Phoenix, and Best Original Score, which are solid categories. However, a lot of people were placing bets on wins in Best Picture, perhaps Best Directing with Todd Phillips, and maybe Writing (Adapted Screenplay), while the rest was a tough bet. Still, for a DC movie, its sensational to get noms for this many categories, and will forever be remembered as the “superhero” movie that broke ground at the Academy.