Ben Affleck himself confessed to being stunned that his film Argo took home the big prize -Best Ensemble Cast- at the Screen Actor's Guild Award ceremony last night. He said: “I thought, ‘There’s no way we’d win this award.’ I agree completely. Totally baffling. Not one of the actors in Argo received nominations for acting in any of the categories by the SAG. They also haven't been nominated for the Globes or the Oscars. Lincoln and Silver Linings Playbook (my favorite) both had three SAG nominations each in different acting categories, and both had winners. And while I truly enjoyed Argo, and agree with most critics that it will probably take home the Academy Award for Best Picture, it's not the acting that stands out in this film.
Rather disheartening. But not at all unusual for a movie award ceremony. I'm probably not alone in wishing that movie awards like the Oscars or the SAG were to movies what the Nobel, the Pulitzer or the National Book Award are to literature. Movies are art but unfortunately they are also an industry and so the influence of money is ever present; the campaigns, the box-office, pleasing the public and competing, so many external factors that influence the Academy or Guild voters.
So why care about these awards at all? I confess to feelings of love/ hate towards them. Some movie fans will probably wonder what there's to love about them at all. In my case it's not that I like them because they have become so much a part of the pop culture that engulfs us today. It's more about how much a part of my culture they are. And its not recent. I am taken back to the Hollywood that my father adored and talked about, the one of the late 40s that I was introduced to at a very young age Leafing through his piles of Ecran and Cinemundo magazines, hearing him talk about the stars and the glamour that surrounded them, going to cinema art clubs as a child to see old movies and stars, as old as Greta Garbo and Rudolph Valentino. And, most pertinently, sitting in front of the black and white TV with the family to watch the Oscars ceremony. Some families bet on horses or cars, mine bet on Oscar winners. And so it is today, now with my husband and daughters.
So at home we bet on what the Foreign Press, the Academy or the SAG will vote and then we bet on who and what we think should really win. They occasionally coincide. But we sit there as a family in front of the flat, HD screen now and are so very gleeful when we do agree ("Yes! Bryan Cranston for Breaking Bad!") and quite angry when they don't ("Whaaat? Argo for Best Ensemble Cast?"). We love to prepare for the award shows, make our bets, cook up a special dish, drinks and dessert for the occasion, make comments all through the show, cheer and scream..and love and hate them.
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