Does Oscar Need A Makeover?

With Mike Pesca in for Tom Ashbrook

It’s time for the Academy Awards. We’ll talk winners and losers and ask whether it’s time for an Oscar revamp.

The lead up to the Oscars is extremely loud, what with the ceremony being incredibly close.  Wooing voters is a war, tracking it all is like a horse race, money’s on the line, because it pays well to be the belle of this ball.

It seems like the Oscar goes to the huckster as often as the artist.  The ceremony itself goes well past midnight; in Paris they call that matraquage excessif. Hugo to the movies to see the descendents of Hitchcock and Wilder ply their trade. But a tweaking, if not an overhaul, of the awards is in order. We’re here to provide the help.

This hour, On Point: comprehensive Oscar reform.
-Mike Pesca

Anne Thomson, writes the film column “Thompson on Hollywood” at Indiewire.

Peter Bart, vice president and editorial director of Variety, where he writes a weekly column.

Manohla Dargis, co-chief film critic for The New York Times.

Variety "The nation's ideological temperature is already soaring and the head-to-head presidential campaign hasn't even started yet. Even a political junkie like George Clooney admits he could not have created anything as off the wall as the Newt-Mitt-and-Rick show for one of his films."

Slate "We at Slate want to fix the Oscars, but we need your help. Read the introduction and submit your brilliant, offbeat, or outrageous idea for how to make the voting process and the Oscar telecast better."

Time "The list of movie greats who never won an Academy Award is long and sad, but there are significant artists and pictures eliminated from contention before Oscar races even begin."

Paka Ua by Ozzie Kotani & Daniel Ho

Man or Muppet  by The Muppets

George Valentin by The Artist