Chad’s Grade: B+
Netflix executives must have been steaming mad during the 94th Academy Awards ceremony as they watched their heavily favored “The Power of the Dog” lose the Best Picture Oscar. The streaming giant had poured big money on the Jane Campion western epic, although she did pick up the Best Directing Oscar, becoming only the third woman to win the prize.
The first streaming Best Picture nominee was Amazon Prime’s “Manchester by the Sea” in 2017. This caused many hands wringing amongst the Hollywood elites, especially Steven Spielberg, who didn’t think films released via streaming were worthy of the Oscars. But that didn’t stop Netflix from chasing after the big prize as they lured A-List directors David Fincher (Mank) and Martin Scorsese (The Irishman) with big budgets and creative freedom. Jane Campion was their latest gamble, and the deconstructionist Western seemed like a sure bet to take home the historic win that night.
Instead, “CODA,” the heartwarming family/coming-of-age drama with no big-name stars, became the surprise winner, taking home three Oscars, including Best Picture. Apple TV, an upstart in the streaming era, can now claim to be the first streamer to win the Best Picture Oscar. And Apple TV didn’t even develop the Sian Heder-directed indie as they bought it after a screening at the Sundance Film Festival for a cool $25 million (a record at the time.) And one can only wonder how the crowd-pleasing flick would have played if it had a big theatrical release via one of the major studios.
“CODA” is an acronym for “child of deaf adults” and can also mean a concluding passage of music in a composition. The film follows teenager Ruby Rossi, the only hearing person in her deaf family and works for the family fishing business. For much of her upbringing, Ruby has had to be the family’s connection to the hearing world, often translating for her parents, mainly as it deals with business affairs. When Ruby enrolls in choir class on a lark (and follows cute classmate Miles), Mr. Villalobos’s irritable choir teacher discovers that Ruby has a genuinely good singing voice. Ruby reluctantly accepts Mr. “Vs.” offer to prepare her for an audition at the Berklee College of Music to pursue her music career dreams. But her vocal training soon clashes with her family’s plan of starting their own fishing business, unaware of Ruby’s extraordinary musical gifts.
“CODA” shines mainly with its winning cast. Director Sian Heder smartly cast the deaf characters with actual deaf actors that give Ruby’s family scenes an air of authenticity. The standouts are Marlee Matlin (an Oscar winner for 1986’s “Children of a Lesser God”) and Troy Kotsur (winning a much-deserved Oscar for this performance) as Ruby’s randy, sometimes vulgar parents Jacki & Frank. The movie mines much humor from Ruby having to translate the obscene language of her feisty parents, who are unaware and don’t care how the hearing world views them. While the movie prides itself on being a window into the deaf worldview, the film never presents its deaf characters as angelic ciphers. Even Ruby’s older brother Leo (a cute and charming Daniel Durant) is shown as a bit of a horndog and frustrated that the family leans so heavily on his kid sister.
Much of the film hinges on Emilia Jones’s performance as Ruby, and the British (!) actress is more than capable. She’s so thoroughly American in the role and gifted with a gorgeous singing voice. Until this point, her most significant credit was on Netflix’s supernatural mystery “Locke & Key,” and watching her confidently step up and lead the movie is an impressive feat. Jones spent months and months learning American sign language and singing lessons to strengthen her vocal chops. There’s never a false moment, and Ruby is a character we enjoy spending time with.
The film isn’t charting new ground here. It confidently blends the family dramedy with Ruby’s coming-of-age story. The early scenes with Ruby mustering up the courage to sing in choir threaten to veer into “a very special episode of Glee” territory. But the performance of Eugenio Derbez as Mr. “V” has real bite as he singles out Ruby during class. And the romance between Ruby and her duet partner, Miles, is sweet but undercooked. We know these two will end up together when they start singing together. Even the climatic Berklee audition has shades of 1983s “Flashdance, despite some genuine tension.” I was surprised that Ruby’s audition song wasn’t Irene Cara’s “What a Feeling.”
Even with the straightforward, generic story beats, the movie is punctuated with surprisingly powerful sequences. During Ruby’s spring choir show, where she and Miles are about to sing their duet, something the whole movie was building toward, director Sian Heder cuts the sound. We now see the performance from the deaf family’s viewpoint, where they watch in the silence of the audience, cheering, crying, and being moved by their daughter’s talent. And in the film’s most emotional scene, Frank asks to touch Ruby’s throat as she sings, feeling the vibration, finally understanding that it would be cruel to keep his daughter from pursuing her dreams. It’s here where the movie moves from being a window into the deaf worldview but the experience of it as well.
“CODA” was a surprise nominee during this year’s Oscar season, nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Picture. It won all three in a rare feat, becoming the first movie since 1932’s “Grand Hotel” to do so. And Troy Kotsur became the first deaf male actor to win an Academy Award. Many award pundits thought the little-seen, streaming movie had a slim chance of winning. But the feel-good movie rode the late surging, underdog goodwill to its historic wins.
THE 2021 BEST PICTURE NOMINEES:
Nightmare Alley
Don’t Look Up
Dune
Drive My Car
Belfast
Licorice Pizza
The Power of the Dog
West Side Story
King Richard
CODA
2021 was when theatres began to reopen confidently and hopefully repair the damaged exhibition business. Despite the nasty Delta/Omicron covid variants that hit later in the year, audiences started heading back to the theatre, especially for the third Spiderman film.
Thankfully, many of these nominated films were shown in theatres (except “CODA” & “The Power of the Dog,” ironically.) And for a strange year of movie-going, this is a solid list. I immensely enjoyed “Nightmare Alley” and “Licorice Pizza” but was puzzled by their nominations. “Dune” really wowed me, especially in IMAX. I was glad to see it win many technical awards, as that’s where that movie shines (but baffled by the exclusion of Denis Villeneuve in the directing category.) Spielberg’s criminally underseen remake of “West Side Story” was the magic trick of the year, taking a classic film and successfully updating the material. “Belfast” was a sweet, semi-autobiographical entry from director Kenneth Branagh, filmed like a classic photo in black and white. And I didn’t hate the comedy “Don’t Look Up” like many other critics, but I found the satire so accurate that it became uncomfortable to watch.
So for me, it came down to “The Power of the Dog” vs. “CODA.”
DID IT DESERVE TO WIN?
I’m going to indulge my inner film snob and say no. “CODA” is a solid, well-made movie with some extraordinary emotional moments, but I feel it’s too small for the big prize. Especially compared to the more epic “The Power of the Dog.” I know the western gets knocked for being quite long and deliberately paced, but I was mesmerized by the performances of Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst, and especially Kodi Smit-McPhee. Exploring toxic masculinity colliding with homosexuality filtered through the American West was powerful to watch. And the tension building during that masterful switch and bait ending stayed with me for days. It was Jane Campion’s best film since her 1993 masterpiece, “The Piano.”
This was a very tough call, and ask me tomorrow; I might change my mind. “CODA” is a heartwarming film that featured many breakout performances, especially from its talented cast of deaf actors, but I think “The Power of the Dog” felt more like the best picture winner. In a year where the pandemic still casts a long shadow, along with the war in Ukraine, I can see why the Academy reacted to the uplifting, underdog “CODA” by awarding its top prize.
Sadly, the 2022 Oscar ceremony, despite its triumphant return to the Dolby Theatre, completely went off the rails when Will Smith assaulted Chris Rock during the live broadcast. The shocking moment overshadowed the night’s historic wins and was a depressing footnote to an industry still recovering from this never-ending pandemic.