The Many Rantings of John: OVP: Production Design (2023)

Sunday, April 28, 2024

OVP: Production Design (2023)

OVP: Best Production Design (2023)

The Nominees Were...

Sarah Greenwood & Katie Spencer, Barbie

Jack Fisk & Adam Willis, Killers of the Flower Moon

Arthur Max & Eli Griff, Napoleon

Ruth de Jong & Claire Kaufman, Oppenheimer

James Price, Shana Heath, & Zsuzsa Mihalek, Poor Things

My Thoughts: We're going to finish off the Production Design nominees with a conundrum for me. The nominees in this category are all solid. This is maybe the only category in the 2023 Oscars where I'd give all of them at least three stars on my (admittedly tough) Oscar ranking scale. That makes it one of the better lineups of the 96th ceremony...but it also is one of the duller ones. The 2023 Oscars continued a trend that has been going on a while, but became super pronounced in 2019 with virtually all of the nominees coming from the same movies. With one exception, all of these films got at least 8 nominations, and this list is the exact same lineup as the Best Costume category. That's dull, and while I will applaud some of these nominees (and duplicate some myself)...they should've tried harder.

Napoleon is the only one of these movies that isn't in the Best Picture race, and unlike all of the other contenders, this is our last dance with it. In a similar fashion to its costumes, this is one of those situations where it's mostly just pretty dressing that doesn't add enough to the picture for my tastes. This isn't a bad-looking movie. I quite liked the drawing rooms, and thought that they played a bit on the trope of Bonaparte's height (look at how often they seem to dwarf a man who would attempt to conquer the world). But there's not enough there for me, and I wanted something more distinctive for this round (we've been here before-to paraphrase Jonathan Hyde in Titanic "give me something new to print").

Poor Things is the other film that I felt a bit flummoxed by with its production design. Similar to my judgment of its editing, the CGI is too much for me, and I wanted something a bit more organic to the picture (some of the backgrounds in the movie, according to moi, are simply too glossy & garish). But unlike Napoloen, there is one set-piece that stands out as having a lot of flavor, and that is the ship. I admire the way that the designers make it feel like a combination of a luxury liner while also giving us a sense of the limitations (it's a finite amount of space) of the place. I also am going on a cruise in three weeks, so maybe I'm just enamored with boats as I'm writing this. Like Oscar, you do have to make choice in the moment without foresight of how you'll think about this category for the next 40 years.

The remaining three are the same Top 3 from Costume, and like Costume, I could honestly give to any of the trio and sleep well tonight. In all three cases, part of my love for it was the use of an actual set. Barbie easily could've been a set design that was just CGI (like, say, every recent MCU film), but instead it uses an actual set, and it makes all the difference. You can tell these actors are walking around this world, sometimes slightly too big for it (just like a real Barbie house), and it feels like your toys have come-to-life. I loved it-every second inside this Barbie world achieved an effect like stepping back to the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter worlds where the director understood that you could tell the difference between a green screen and true sets, and it all just sparkles.

The same is said for Jack Fisk's studied work in Killers of the Flower Moon. This is another movie without a green-screen in-sight, and uses a solid combination of built sets and actual existing structures along the Oklahoma landscape. What I think is so fascinating here is the use of outdoor vs. indoor work (this is Fisk's speciality, and when are we getting him an Honorary Oscar because no one does this like him & he still hasn't won yet?). I love that we get the overwhelming expanse of the prairie, one where there is nowhere to hide, but he also pulls that off in interiors with the short, small rooms. Whether it's a case where you're overexposed or you simply have nowhere to hide, the approach in the production design is the same-the women that are the targets of the titular killers have nowhere left to run.

Our final nominee is Oppenheimer. Christopher Nolan's level-of-authenticity gets us a film that is bereft of CGI shots, and so we get ghost towns along the desert border. The reconstruction of an entire town, one that feels both settled (the men live there for months) and impermanent (much like not just the desert surrounding them, but in general in a world where nuclear weapons reign, nothing is counted upon) is so smart. I think having that place, the place of discovery, feeling like the one that is most exposed while the other decisions are made in glossy dining rooms and literal hypothetical classrooms shows an ingenuity to Nolan's message. This all looks great (like Flower Moon and Barbie), but it's punctuating a larger homage to the plot through visual storytelling.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Art Directors Guild spread their nominations between Fantasy, Period, & Contemporary designs. Contemporary rarely keeps inline with Oscar, and that was true this time with Saltburn beating Beau is Afraid, John Wick: Chapter 4, Mission Impossible 7, and The Killer. The other categories did get some Oscar overlap, with Poor Things taking Fantasy against Barbie, Dungeons & Dragons, The Creator, & Wonka while Oppenheimer picked a nomination up against Asteroid City, Killers of the Flower Moon, & Maestro (weirdly no fifth nomination, particularly odd given Napoleon, The Color Purple, & The Zone of Interest were all options). BAFTA gave its statue to Poor Things, and duplicated Oscar's lineup with the exception of Napoloen instead selecting The Zone of Interest. In sixth place, I am going to go out on a limb and think that the mega-box office power of Wonka showed up in a category somewhere, and this was the place it happened, though The Color Purple or The Zone of Interest probably make more sense. Sometimes, you have to pick the oddities, though, because it's not always the safe choice in sixth place (because it's also not always the safe choice in fourth or fifth).

Films I Would Have Nominated: One name I didn't mention above, but certainly should've made it somewhere was Ferrari. It's frequently thought of that the production design is just the sets, but it's more than that-it's also the objects on-display, and the use of the cars, alongside memorable spots in the picture (think of that opulent mausoleum or the wealthy city apartments of a 1950's Rome) is really spectacular, and I loved how it felt shiny and sexy.

Oscar’s Choice: Poor Things took one of the few Oscars that Barbie had a shot at outside of Song, and yes I do think it was Barbie and not Oppenheimer in second.

My Choice: I'm going to give it to Barbie, and I'll be real here-I think this is a case where Oscar missed something really special by ignoring it because it was super popular. Behind it will be Killers of the Flower Moon, Oppenheimer, Poor Things, and Napoleon, but I am very much with Greenwood & Spencer...this should've been a slam dunk.

Those are my thoughts-how about yours? Are you also steaming pink that Barbie didn't win, or do you understand the pretty colors of Poor Things being Oscar's choice? Are we ever going to see Jack Fisk holding an Oscar to match his wife's? And was it Wonka, The Color Purple, or The Zone of Interest in sixth place? Share your thoughts below!