As the Oscars nominate Avatar: The Way Of Water and Top Gun: Maverick for Best Picture, Steven Spielberg harks back to the snubbing of Batman.
Amidst the flurry of Oscar nominations yesterday were the Best Picture nods for two blockbuster sequel movies. The Academy bestowed the possibility of its top prize on Top Gun: Maverick (fair enough) and Avatar: The Way Of Water (er..), marking something of a sea change in the long-term snobbery of the Oscars towards blockbuster movies.
Steven Spielberg has had his ups and downs at the Oscars over the years, and once upon a time there was a feeling that such snobbery had cost him a gong for E.T. in the year that Gandhi walked away with the prizes. Still, with several Academy Awards on his shelf and a chance of another for The Fabelmans this year, he’s hardly grumbling. Moreover, in celebrating the fact that blockbusters have fully broken onto the Academy’s radar, he adds that there’s been one major omission over the years: Christopher Nolan’s second trip to Gotham City.
Chatting to Deadline, he says this more open-minded consideration of big movies “came late for the film that should have been nominated a number of years ago, Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight”.
Spielberg is a fan. “That movie would have definitely garnered a Best Picture Nomination today, so having these two blockbusters solidly presented on the top 10 list is something we should all be celebrating”.
Spielberg has nothing to add on why Geostorm was robbed all those years ago, but Deadline must have forgotten to ask him. You can find what the outlet did ask him, here.
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