The Oscars are my Super Bowl. As someone who grew up with two movie nerds for parents, it has to be.
My mom and I communicate solely in film references, my “Have Watched” list is over 1,000 movies long, the TV is always on in my common room, and I’m itching to do an interview for Letterboxd to let the world know my top four films of all time (La La Land, The Red Shoes, West Side Story, and the first Pirates of the Caribbean, in case you were wondering). If anyone could go gold in movie enjoyment, it’s me.
So given that the nominations for the most important night of my year were released two weeks ago, it’s safe to say that I was pretty excited. But as I scrolled through the various articles reporting who was up for what, a theory I have been developing over the past few years was unfortunately reaffirmed.
This theory is something I lovingly call the “Biopic Bait” theory. To me, biopics are becoming too oversaturated, are vehicles for your favorite actor to win an Oscar, and are ultimately part of a broader originality problem in filmmaking.
Biopics, short for biographical pictures, are dramatized versions of the lives of real people ranging from music makers to politicians. A quick Google search will reveal thousands, many of which you may have seen and enjoyed.
And hey, I agree they’re good. I adore Hidden Figures. And yes, I did cry from Taron Egerton’s performance in Rocketman. But as awards seasons come and go, one thing becomes apparent: If you portray a famous figure in a biopic, odds are you’ll be up for an award. And more so, you’ll win one.
It’s a trend that has potentially disastrous consequences. The data, you may ask? In the past 10 Academy Awards, 6 out of the 10 men to snag the Oscar for best actor won for portraying other people. These were as follows:
Cillian Murphy as J. Robert Oppenheimer in Oppenheimer (2023)
Will Smith as Richard Williams in King Richard (2021)
Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody (2018)
Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour (2017)
Leonardo DiCaprio as Hugh Glass in The Revenant (2015)**
Eddie Redmayne as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything (2014)
**The Revenant is based on a true story, so for argument’s sake, I’m counting it.
These are just some of the best actor winners from the past 10 years alone. If we were to look back further, we’d see that plenty of other men have won for playing famous figures. The same can be said for the acting categories of best actress, best supporting actress, and best supporting actor, though this trend only appeared in the past quarter of a century.
It’s no secret that Hollywood is in dire need of ideas. Just look at every Disney live-action film and 30-year-old-movie sequel—I’m looking at you, Twisters and Mufasa: The Lion King. People constantly poke fun at the movie industry for cranking out these cash grabs, but I think we don’t realize that the biopic is a similar concept with a different goal in mind.
Instead of using your favorite actor to resurrect your favorite franchise, producers are making biopics to win a coveted Oscar. Biopics have been gaining popularity exponentially in the past 25 years, which seems to correlate with the overwhelming lack of innovative ideas in recent decades. Biopics aren’t suspected of this because real events don’t need creativity—the story is history.
No original story needs to go into the retelling of someone’s life. But what happens when, inevitably, biopics aren’t good anymore because of how overdone they’ve become? What happens when they lose their ability to tell powerful stories of people who truly made a difference? If they keep on being made at this speed, these movies will lose their ability to educate the masses on really important figures. People will simply get bored.
Many of these films are inspiring and the extraordinary lives at the focus of these biopics should certainly be told. It’s no wonder people are nominated for awards for those portrayals—the ability to embody a real person is extremely impressive and deserves praise.
But instead of taking time to craft raw, sweeping films that are both original and well-written, there is a constant stream of new articles claiming your favorite celebrity is in the talks to be the lead in the next big biopic.
We’re losing the art of original, emotionally complex characters in favor of real people. As it now goes, if you want your film to win awards, make a biopic. And if you’re an actor who wants an award, say you’ll produce one and offer to play the leading role. They’re being made at a rapid speed without any sense of restraint.
I’m not trying to diss the genre by any means. While it’s not my favorite, I think biopics can be moving and powerful. Still, it seems they have ultimately been corrupted and are losing weight. I, a mere college student with no film industry connections, can’t offer a particular solution—maybe I should write some strongly worded letters.
If you want any more confirmation of the Biopic Bait theory, enjoy your popcorn as you watch Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan and Sebastian Stan as Donald Trump duke it out for Best Actor at this year’s Oscars. Personally, my money’s on Adrien Brody. Nevertheless, it is with the fact that two of the five nominees in that category are for biopics that I rest my case.
Leave a Reply