The award for best picture is coveted among aspiring and established filmmakers alike. The Academy has recently announced that starting in 2024, new criteria regarding diversity must be met in order for a filmmaker to be eligible for this award, possibly making it harder to obtain.

To summarize what is stated on the The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences website, the underrepresented groups that the Academy lists are Asian, Hispanic/Latinx, Black/African American, Indigenous/Native, American/Alaskan Native, Middle Eastern/North African, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander or any other underrepresented race or ethnicity. At least one of these ethnicities must be present within the main plotline or main and central supporting characters. 

Women, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and people with cognitive or physical disabilities must also be represented within 30% of the supporting roles. Aside from the characters and plotlines, 30% of the crew must be made up of these groups with at least two people from these groups or racial minorities taking the mantle of creative or department heads. 

The Academy also puts emphasis on marketing and publicity. They state that executives in these departments must be partially made up of people from the groups above. Lastly, the Academy requires internships be given to young people in the industry who are within these groups.

To be eligible for nomination filmmakers must meet two of these requirements.

This is an unprecedented time in American history. Even though we are faced with the pandemic, the American people have made a point to fight against racial inequality, often protesting and speaking out against racial discrimination heavily in the past few months.

While diversity is important not only in the film industry but every aspect of life, the approach that the Academy is taking drives focus away from the merit of creators. I believe these regulations will have the opposite effect than what the academy intends. When attention is called to one’s work only because of their race, it cheapens the accomplishment no matter how good the film is.

This does not only undermine the accomplishments of talented and diverse filmmakers, it may also force white filmmakers to try and shoehorn these requirements into their film in order to be eligible for the award. This could possibly lead to studies misrepresenting people from certain ethnicities or sexual orientations. This may not be because they don’t respect these groups, but studios may not fully understand the struggles of these groups.

This is not the first time the Academy has been involved in racial issues. 2015 marked the first time that all twenty best actor nominations were white people. This caused outrage on social media with #OscarsSoWhite trending on Twitter and many people boycotted the award show. Since then, the Oscars have been more socially and racially conscious, but these new guidelines could aim to make the Academy feel better about an industry that has been dominated by white people for so long.

In reality, only one of these new rules directly correlates to the story of the film, and two regard actors. It will be very easy for filmmakers to get their films nominated within these requirements. However, by putting these rules in place, the academy implies that they do not have faith in diverse stories or casts winning without their input.

Creators have proved that they are capable of creating interesting, diverse stories without Academy intervention. At the Oscars last year, Parasite, a foreign film, won best picture. It did not win because the cast was all Korean, or because they were forced to diversify their set. It won because the film was well made and explored ideas of class struggles that are faced in all nations.

This movie was well made, but not an anomaly. There are many foreign or diversely-casted movies made every year that are snubbed or not even included in the Oscars ceremony.

Instead of putting restrictions on the people making these films, the academy needs to open their own minds and include more naturally diverse stories into their award show. This will feel like a more genuine act as opposed to having filmmakers feel pressured into telling stories of cultures that they may not fully understand.