No change in the Academy Awards tradition compares with inflating the number of Oscar nominees for Best Picture, starting this year, from five to ten.Five has been the standard for 65 years.(It was five for the first 4 years, then anywhere from 8 to 12 nominees from 1932 through 1943.)
No one suggests that any award honoring movies stacks up to the clout and prestige of the Oscars.Nominating ten films for Best Picture is an unabashed marketing tool that cheapens, maybe even embarrasses the meaning of an Oscar nomination.
Granted, the Academy Awards is an unabashed marketing tool anyway.
It’s not like any of the additional five nominees are going to threaten to win the Best Picture Oscar, although in some years, it is conceivable that one of these tacked-on contenders could tip the tally among the top two or three real contenders.
CampChuck guarantees that its ability to guess the winner incorrectly will not be diminished by the doubling of the number of nominees.