Peter Bart: In A Chaotic Year, Will Oscar Voters Feel Better About A Feel-Good Best Picture Winner?

deadline.com:

Pre-Oscar week always spells angst for Hollywood, but will voters feel better if a “feel good” movie is crowned Best Picture?The debate about CODA epitomizes that moment each year when the studios get grumpy about the omniscient streaming moguls and the film nerds complain that the “big spend” distorts voting preferences.The Academy, meanwhile, asks: Has anyone really seen the movies?

In fact, many Oscar voters this week are still playing catch-up while wondering why the rules of the game keep changing.It seems like only yesterday when the studios were studying how to ban streamers, not embrace them.

They were also still throwing lavish parties for voters – especially Golden Globe voters (remember them?).All the while the cast of characters has kept changing.

Ted Sarandos invested big bucks to promote Roma in 2018 to remind us of Netflix’s expanding ubiquity. Only a year earlier, the mercurial Elon Musk had performed a similar ritual on behalf of The Big Sick.