May the best film win?

I was going to write a post about the movement towards an "Everybody Wins" society and how it's effect could, in fact, lessen the overall quality of culture ... but then I found this brilliant article by Neal Gabler (written for the LA Times) which scores the points of the argument far better than I could have ever hoped to.

It's about the Academy's decision to nominate ten films for "Best Picture" instead of just five.

Below are some of the highlights of the article, of which the full version can be found here.

Read. Digest. Feedback. Cheers.

By letting more films compete for the top trophy, the academy is merely following where others have led. Call it "cultural inflation": a growing number of opportunities for the less deserving to get a taste of ultimate victory, as part of a growing aversion to disappointing anyone.

It wouldn't be the first time that the pursuit of money trumped the pursuit of quality, even in a contest purportedly designed expressly to reward quality. Indeed, one of the defects of capitalism is that it has only one standard of worth: monetary value. Money and excellence are certainly not mutually exclusive, but neither do they necessarily travel hand in hand. When excellence isn't profitable, it usually is usurped by something that is.

...cultural inflation is not only a function of money. It is equally a function of modern democracy. Put simply, people in a democratic society such as ours don't understand why they can't always get what they want. The culture obliges by pandering, which is what the Oscars are doing by expanding the field. It is a form of cultural demagoguery that doesn't dare disappoint people -- the adult equivalent of those children's soccer trophies. In effect, we live in a "panderocracy."

Just as printing more money depreciates its actual worth, cultural inflation depreciates the value of the honor, in the case of the Oscars, or the victory, in the case of sports. In effect, the NCAA and professional leagues have cheapened the championships by expanding the field, though they are savvy enough to realize that so long as the fans are satisfied, no one really cares. Similarly, the motion picture academy may risk tarnishing the Oscar, especially if votes are split and an outlier wins.

What cultural inflation fails to appreciate is that excellence is a moral quality. It isn't, in the end, subject to popularity or money or a sense of personal entitlement. Rather, it is endangered by all three. It is entirely possible that a great film will win the Oscar this year, just as it is entirely possible that the best team will win the Super Bowl, but cultural inflation lengthens the odds, just as it lengthens the odds of our recognizing which is best.

And if the best film or the best team doesn't win, we have no one but ourselves and our desperate need for gratification to blame, should anyone still care enough to assess blame.

[He's a real nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land, making all his nowhere plans for nobody]