They did it. They really did it. And to judge by the astonished roar of joy when Jane Fonda paused, took in the moment at the end of three and a half hours, and announced that Parasite had won best picture, they could barely believe it themselves.
And so an Oscar season that began in a paroxysm of frustration, over a set of nominations that seemed to be a step backward for inclusiveness, ended with a milestone moment: the first foreign-language film to win best picture in Oscar history was also the biggest winner of the night, taking home awards for best director and best original screenplay as well as the newly named best International feature. All hail Bong Joon Ho, the first man to walk away with four statuettes in one night since Walt Disney did it 66 years ago.
Every year of the Oscars writes a new chapter in the tense relationship between what the Academy Awards could be and what they so often seem to settle for being. As this year’s show began, that anxiety and distress seemed scrawled right on its surface. Janelle Monae came out to lead a production number that came perilously close to pulling the whole enterprise into the realm of vintage 80s camp (were those dancing…Jokers? And WWI doughboys?) before announcing herself as a black queer artist and snapping the ceremony firmly into 2020. For much of the generally brisk show’s length, the Oscars seemed at furious odds with…the Oscars. We’re not the bad Academy that omitted all those people, the producers seemed to be saying, we’re the good Academy that’s pissed off at the bad Academy, just like you!
In the early going, what unfolded felt a little insistent, a little needy, a little I would have voted for Obama a third time if I could. Chris Rock and Steve Martin shouted out Eddie Murphy, unnominated for Dolemite Is My Name. The Frozen II song was performed by Idina Menzel and a number of women who sang dubbed versions of it for its release in other countries. It all started to feel like the rest of the show had been carefully designed to atone for the eventual winners.
Whether or not that was true, it was ultimately unnecessary; Oscar voters, so often derided as a thoughtless, culturally sluggish monolith, came up with a roster of honorees that, remarkably, let the Academy be both true to itself and true to its aspirations. True to itself in that the list reflected enthusiasms that were spread over a set of wildly varied movies; of the nine films to receive best picture nominations, eight—all but The Irishman—walked away with at least one statuette, and even that film didn’t leave entirely unhonored. In a moment that would have been seen as the evening’s highlight had it not been gloriously topped 30 minutes later, Bong Joon Ho, after receiving a standing ovation for his best director win, generated a mid-speech second standing ovation for Martin Scorsese. The spontaneous outpouring of admiration for a director whose passion and advocacy for films made outside of America is second to none was the kind of moment that will get rewatched on YouTube many, many times: a cross-cultural, cross-generational salute that reminds you that the Oscars, while sometimes stodgy, are also venerable. At their best, they respect film history while writing its next chapter.
Was this the Oscars at its best? Not entirely. The systemic inequities that underlie the paucity of nominations for women—and, especially this year, people of color—weren’t a mirage that vanished because of Parasite’s wins. But as the night proceeded, the winners were, collectively, a reminder that inclusivity can proceed on many fronts. The winners for best animated short said their movie Hair Love was created “to normalize black hair.” Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit’s best adapted screenplay winner, dedicated his win to indigenous kids—“we are the original storytellers,” he said. Women took home awards for best production design (for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood), best costume design (for Little Women), best original score for the first time in 22 years (for Joker), best documentary feature, and best documentary short. A nice choice to have Sigourney Weaver, Gal Gadot, and Brie Larson present together was a nod to steps forward made in the most popular genre in film. Zack Gottsagen, the star of The Peanut Butter Falcon, became the first actor with Down syndrome to present an award, with his costar Shia LaBeouf in support at his side.