Technical Formats and the Best Picture Oscar

If The Social Network wins the big prize this month, as many think it will, it will be the first picture to do so not shot on film. The Mark Zuckerberg biopic was shot digitally.

A year ago, a lot of people thought that Avatar was going to win, and it would have achieved that distinction. Instead, The Hurt Locker, becoming the first film shot in a low-cost, small film format (Super 16) to gain the big prize.

The Best Picture Oscar is meaningless as a way to recognize great films. But it can be invaluable in determining the collective mind of the Hollywood industry. It generally takes a few years after a new artistic or technical trend appears before it shows up in a Best Picture, but when it does, you know the trend has accepted.

Consider these milestones:

Sound: The first Oscars were given in May of 1929, as the studios were abandoning silents. But the Best Picture award went to a silent film, Wings. That the second one went to a talkie, The Broadway Melody (not just a talkie but a musical), shows how quickly silents became obsolete.

Color: The first feature shot entirely in three-strip Technocolor, Becky Sharp, came out in 1935. The first to win Best Picture, Gone with the Wind, in 1939. That seems reasonable considering how slowly color became common. But Wind, which boosted Technicolor’s business and popularity considerably, was the last color winner until An American in Paris, 12 years later.

Widescreen: The widescreen revolution, which permanently and literally changed the shape of motion pictures, happened in 1953. Suddenly, the screens were wider, color was becoming the norm, and many films were even in stereo. And for three years, the award went to black-and-white films that were as narrow as the new standards allowed. But when the Academy finally acknowledged the wide screen in 1957 (with the ’56 awards), they did it in a big way, with Around the World in 80 Days.

Large Formats: And by big, I mean big. Around the World was the first of seven Best Picture winners shot in extra-large 65mm formats (the last was Patton, for 1970). Five of those seven won between the years 1959 and 1965, when a large film negative and roadshow presentation (reserved seats and an intermission) signaled an important film. Until The Hurt Locker, these were the only Oscar winners shot on something other than standard 35mm film. And unlike The Hurt Locker, these sacrificed budget for image quality; not the other way around.

So what does it mean when a small format film wins Best Picture one year, and a digital one may quite probably win the next? That Hollywood is accepting technologies, both old and new (Super 16 has been around for decades), that were considered not-quite-respectable only a couple of years ago.

For good or bad, things are changing.