close this window
Does an Academy Award Really Denote Quality?
Studies come to conflicting conclusions as to whether Academy Awards are a genuine measure of artistry.
A continuing debate among cineasts is whether the Academy Awards truly reward the best films of the year, or whether they’re highly publicized popularity contests. While the gap between critics’ top 10 lists and Oscar nominees has narrowed significantly over the past decade, conventional wisdom holds that truly groundbreaking work is seldom appreciated by the aesthetically conservative Academy.
The research points in different directions. In a 2004 edition of the Creativity Research Journal, University of California, Davis, psychologist Dean Keith Simonton looked at 1,132 films that had received at least one award or nomination from seven different sources: The Oscars, the Golden Globes, the British Academy Awards and four critics associations.
He found “a substantial consensus” among the peer-based and expert-based panels, “with the Oscars providing the best single indicator of that agreement.” He concluded that “Those who take an Oscar home can have a strong likelihood of having exhibited superlative cinematic creativity or achievement.”
Nothing stirs debates over movies like the Academy Awards. Researchers also argue about the Oscars: Does the Oscar represent artistic quality? Does winning the award help you live longer? Does the award increase box-office sales? For more on the studies of Oscar, check out these stories when they’re released in the coming days:
Predicting Oscars for Bigelow, Bridges, Bullock (March 4)
Death and the Oscar Winner (March 5)
Oscar Winners Should Thank Their Economist (March 6)
But will that judgment pass the test of time? Two French scholars looked at the films nominated for the Best Picture and Best Foreign Language Film Oscars from 1950 to 1970, as well as those winning the most prestigious awards at the Cannes Film Festival during those 20 years.
They then compared those 174 movies with the 122 films judged, in film guides published a generation later, to be the best of the era. They found a meager overlap of only 47 films.
“Judges in Cannes and Hollywood are thus both short-sighted and unselective,” they wrote in the Journal of Cultural Economics in 1999. “They cannot discriminate between good-quality movies and other movies.”
Of course, all that has changed in the decades since. Hasn’t it?
Sign up for our free e-newsletter.
Are you on Facebook? Become our fan.
Follow us on Twitter.
word on the street
more in this section
We’re Sorry: Not All Apologies Are Apologies
Studying Flags, Pins, Hope From 2008 Election
Showing Where Community Colleges Pass, Fail
Scholars and The Big Lebowski: Deconstructing The Dude
Fatherhood Scholars Know Best
Dr. Seuss Analyzed for Political, Social Effects
The History and Frightening Future of Forests
What Would Jesus Buy?
How Polling Places Can Affect Your Vote
Studies That Stretch to Infinity, and Beyond
also by this author
Tom JacobsStaff writer Tom Jacobs is a veteran journalist with more than 20 years experience at daily newspapers. He has served as a staff writer for The Lo...
The Perceived Delicacy of the Female ConductorNew research finds listeners judge symphonic music differently when they’re told the conductor is a woman.
Pressure to Conform Can Inspire CreativityNew research suggests less-creative people do more innovative thinking when they are told individualism is the norm, and instructed to conform.
Children’s Books Increasingly Ignore Natural WorldA survey of award-winning children’s picture books from 1938 to 2008 suggests our increasing estrangement from the natural environment.
Women Eye Dance Moves to Find Thrill SeekersHow to spot thrill-seeking men on the dance floor, “sweet” personalities in public, and bidding fever on eBay.
Morning People May Be More Creative in the AfternoonNew research finds problems that require a flash of illumination to solve are best approached during the time of day when you’re not at your peak.
Receive 1 year (6 issues) of our print magazine for just $14.95. Miller-McCune features polished, in-depth reports on research and solutions across the policy spectrum — from health care, education and energy to international affairs, poverty and the global economy. It's a must read for well-informed and solutions-driven individuals.
follow us on:
join our newsletter:
from the source
The wage gap between the sexes in America has been closing much faster than anyone realized, but that’s tempered by learning it’s been much wider than measurements had shown.
An effort to identify five performing orcas as slaves failed in part, argues one scholar, because there’s no legal precedent establishing them as persons.
Transportation used to be one of the few guaranteed areas of agreement when ideology trumped pragmatism in D.C. But that’s no longer the case.
A lot of people say they watch the Super Bowl mostly for the ads. But it turns out a good game surrounding those ads makes them seem better.
After decades of obstacles hindering the voting process, new laws will allow overseas and military voters to submit their votes in time for the 2012 election.
