For Our Consideration on Labor Day, the Best American Movies (So Far) of 2023

So here we are September 4th, 2023 set as Labor Day holiday, when our hyper-capitalist society/government pays lip service to the vitality of Workers' rights (while businesses stay open forcing those workers to miss any actual vacation time).

In a nice touch, half of our entertainment industry out of Hollywood/LA California is currently on strike as the majority of workers - the screenwriters, actors, and associated trade groups - are fighting the studio CEOs - many of whom never worked as creators in the business - over royalties from the newer streaming services and guaranteed wages/hirings for their workforce, as well as putting a stop by the companies to using generative AI - computer programming - for cheap and disreputable methods of replacing the creative types altogether. 

There may be a lot of glamour and wealth associated to Hollywood, but the vast majority of people who put it all together - set designers (I know one), writers, editors, background extras (I know a few, ever watch the church fight scene in Kingsmen? The guy with the beard, wait there's like 20 of them well anyway he's in there), associate directors, stage hands, best boys, worst boys (Airplane! reference), second unit camera crews, actors who never get the name on the marquee but are relied on to provide memorable quirky characters - are barely earning minimum wage. Most of the jobs are temp, they're paid by contract that end when the filming projects end, and so a lot of them struggle to pay rent. Even Lawrence Olivier, one of the greatest actors of his generation, took on crappy film roles because "Money, dear boy."

So while we can cheer on the screenwriters and the actors who are fighting for their livelihoods - for better and consistent pay, for ensuring AI doesn't remove the human element of creativity, for bigger pieces of the pie that the CEOs are hogging for themselves - we should also take note of what Labor Day also signals: The unofficial end of the summer.

Technically, autumn begins on the equinox (this year's is September 23) but as most of our lives revolve around school (as kids and as parents and workers) we think of our seasons in that regard. Summer is when school breaks (usually after Memorial Day) and when school resumes (most places the week before Labor Day, although some places planning ahead for bad weather days have moved it earlier).

Hollywood noticed the summer months were great for business, starting in the 1970s when crowd-pleasing blockbusters like Jaws and Star Wars realigned the production model for the decades that followed. As a result, every weekend between Memorial Day and Labor Day were programmed for budget-busting extravaganzas that the studios gambled on generating insane profits to cover their losses on the gambles that failed.

While the summer blockbuster calendar has evolved over the years - Hollywood has found April as good a time for big-budget films as May - it's become an annual tradition. It's also become an annual tradition for Hollywood to release certain types of films in the other seasons: Autumn becomes a time for romance and horror (Halloween, kiddos) flicks, and Winter (at least before January) the time for stylish low-budget movies to get into the film critics Year's Best lists and aim for the Golden Globes and Oscars awards to give themselves artistic pretensions. January is when you dump the movies you don't expect audiences to enjoy - although some do become blockbusters because the studio heads didn't get it or else the film plays to a timely issue - before a mini-cycle of romance and horror flicks in February to lead into the next cycle.

Having grown up to the Blockbuster era - ever since I got hooked on Star Wars - I've paid some attention to how this system works, and have gotten a little frustrated over the years about how Hollywood and their film academy mistreats the big money-makers of the summer when it comes to doling out the awards signifying great work and craftsmanship.

I was livid in 2008 when the Dark Knight got ignored for a well-deserved Best Picture nomination, and it's been a point of contention with me since Mad Max Fury Road that Hollywood needs to realize that despite the money-making interest of blockbusters many of those films are genuinely well-made. Audiences may be lured to spectacle but they're also lured to well-written stories, well-acted performances, and eye-stunning camerawork. The Oscars do hand out technical awards and the production-value awards like Visual Effects and Sound Editing, but the top-tier awards like Best Actor/Actress, Best Director, Best Picture? It's insanely rare for a crowd-pleasing blockbuster to win any of those awards much less get nominated, especially if it was a summer release film.

The Vulture review site is with me.
BARBIEHEIMER OR DEATH!

To that I say "No More." It's high damn time that we start recognizing the effort, sweat and blood and tears that go into the blockbuster films and crowd-pleasing surprise hits. If there was anything good about the backlash following the Dark Knight snub was how it opened up the Best Picture category to cover up to 10 films, expanding the odds that a box-office winner can win the Oscar as well. Here's my list of "YOU BETTER NOMINATE THESE FOOKING MOVIES ELSE THE STREETS OF L.A. WILL SEE RIOTS" nominations:

M3GAN: It's about time the January dump movies get a champion to rally their cause. Yes, it's a campy horror movie. Yes, it's another "Robot Turns Violent" movie. Yes, it's not supposed to win awards. But the audiences picked up on the black comedy, caustic criticisms of the Silicon Valley business model of rushing production, and sly way the whole thing got put together. Getting any of the technical awards would be likely, but also Best Makeup or Costuming (for the work on making M3gan a believable humanoid) as well as Best Screenplay alongside the Picture nom. Horror movies need more love, dammit.

Admit it, this is the Hero Shot for M3gan

Cocaine Bear: IF RAY LIOTTA DOES NOT GET A POSTHUMOUS BEST ACTOR NOMINATION FOR HIS ROLE IN THIS THE GREATEST "ANIMAL GOES BERSERK" MOVIE SINCE SNAKES ON A PLANE I SWEAR TO GOD WE ALL RIOT.

Ahem.

Granted this is another horror-comedy movie in the M3GAN vein, with the caveat that this film had its own interesting real-life backstory that ensured a built-in audience. What gives this film the award-worthy boost is the quality of the cast - a surprising number of A-Listers and award winners - and people involved in its production (Phil Lord and Chris Miller, two guys responsible for the best post-modern franchise works of the past decade). Despite the silliness - and shocking gore - of the film's plot, there's a lot here to qualify Cocaine Bear for Best Picture, along with Best Actor (DAMMIT RAY DESERVES IT) and Best Catering.

Admit it, this is the Hero Shot for Cocaine Bear

Spider-Man Across the Spider-Verse: When the Dark Knight got snubbed in 2008, another critically-acclaimed blockbuster in Wall-E also failed to receive a Best Picture nomination. That snub was due to Wall-E being animated, which exposed the Academy's snobbery when it came to animated film. Apparently, nominating Disney's Beauty And the Beast back in 1991 did not set the standard: All it did was create a new Oscar category so that the award voters could go right back to ignoring high-quality animated works. 

Thing is, animated movies still count (Foreign feature films, after all, can get nominated for Best Picture as well). So Spidey better be under consideration Academy members, because GODDAMN this film was a literal work of art. Pulling from different art styles - watercolor, diagrammatic, cut-paste, stop-motion - and layering it with thousands of details - and thousands of differently drawn Spider-Men - you can hang individual cels from this movie in museums. Tying it all together are impressive voice-acting performances (ANOTHER thing that ticks me off is how the Oscars ignore voice acting, but that's another rant) and a tight yet expansive screenplay pulling on the Spider-Man mythos to set up legitimate drama, humor, pathos, and tears. The last third of the movie itself is considered one of the best (and darkest) cliffhangers since Empire Strikes Back.

This is a movie that deserves Best Picture consideration as well as Best Director, Best Editing, Best Sound and Sound Editing, Best Screenplay (adapted), and with any luck FINALLY a vocal performance - Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Daniel Kaluuya, Oscar Isaac - getting an acting nom.

This is NOT the Hero Shot for Miles Morales or Spider-Gwen Stacy.
You have to watch the movie to see their
individual moments of AWESOMENESS.

Barbie and Oppenheimer:

I've kind of talked about this already, but since both movies came out, the reality of both movies as Oscar-worthy contenders cannot be denied. 

It is hard to separate each movie now, not just because of the cultural memes that the Barbieheimer Event generated, but because of the eerie similarities and reflections shared between both films. Both movies with auteur directors deserving of Oscar consideration. Both movies with surprisingly well-plotted screenplays addressing the human condition (vanity, fear, the questioning of our place in the cosmos, gender role expectations (yes even in Oppenheimer)). Both movies with deep pools of actors that could earn the films multiple Acting nominations.

There is a terrifying possibility that given Barbie's blockbuster status (still ongoing) as one of the biggest box-office hits of all time that the Academy will ignore it for the Big awards - Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Screenplay, Cinematography - when this year's nominations are made. They dare not. Every critique and review of the movie spells out the artistic merits in spite of it being a mere "Intellectual Property" product. Audiences are not going back to re-watch that movie because of the memes but because Barbie - especially its themes of women's identity - speaks to them as an experience, something very few films - even the artsy pretentious ones - can affect.

Oppenheimer - as I mentioned before - was clearly Oscar bait from the get-go, but genuinely earns that consideration due to the high quality work put into it. That it will get Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Cillian Murphy), Best Supporting Actor (Robert Downey Jr), Best Screenplay (adapted), and likely Cinematography and Editing won't even be up for debate. 

What will be up for debate will be which of the two movies - joined at the hip by fate forever now - will actually win the big awards when the time comes next February 2024 when they open the envelopes and hand out the Oscars.

(glances back and forth)

I say go for it. Academy voters, figure out the math and plan ahead to make it so that BOTH Barbie and Oppenheimer tie in each category they qualify for. DO IT. SHARE THE OSCARS. Share the Acting trophies (Murphy and Gosling for Actor, Robbie and Blunt for Actress), share the Director's (Nolan and Gertwig), share the Editing, share the Cinematography, share the Best Picture (it's what they should have done for La-La Land and Moonlight). Hell, share the Sound Editing and Set Designs and the Costuming awards. I think the only things you can't share are the Screenplays (Barbie may be an IP but the script is original) but get the Original and Adapted anyways!

BARBIEHEIMER 4EVAH.

Granted, this will suck if you're a Spider-Man fan, but honestly Best Animated Feature by itself is still a worthy award...

ANYWAY. GET TO IT, HOLLYWOOD. MAKE IT SO THAT WE ONLY AWARD THE TWO BEST MOVIES OF THIS SUMMER TO---

(Hollywood releases in the winter season a Martin Scorsese historical epic Killers of the Flower Moon with its own cast of A-Listers and high artistic quality that makes it an obvious Oscar contender for everything other than Gratuitous Use of the Word Belgium in a Dramatic Presentation)

(muttering) Goddammit why does Martin have to do this every time other good movies are released that same year to snub his work again...?