How the Oscars can help neutralize President Donald Trump’s agenda

Discussing Oscar voters in the context of the American electorate has always struck me as a little silly. The latter determines the fate of the nation. The former determines which celebrity gets to give a speech. 

But the Academy’s nominee choices last week feel like an exception: a real — and consequential — rebuttal to the changes swiftly sweeping the country.

President Donald Trump’s executive-order pen has been running low on ink lately as he eliminates programs assuring Black and brown people a place in the federal government; sends agents to root out migrants in schools and churches; endangers millions of trans people by declaring there are only two genders; and even, in an eye-catching bit of cruelty, halts U.S. efforts to remove landmines from foreign war zones as part of an America First agenda. “Pro limb removal” is a strange voter-pander, but here we are.

The Academy has been in overdrive itself lately but in a very different spirit.

This year features the first time two of the international Oscar nominees are also nominated for best picture. One of them, the France-backed and Mexico-set Emilia Perez, has gotten more noms than any non-English language movie ever. The other, the Brazil-based I’m Still Here, was a surprise best-picture choice to many pundits but voters put in anyway. And don’t forget Flow, a dialogue-free Latvian movie about a post-apocalyptic animal kingdom that landed both international and animated nominations. America First? Not for these voters.

The first two films speak directly to the Trump agenda. Or against it. Emilia Perez is about the deep humanity of a trans person. And while most people hadn’t seen it — it just opened in theaters — I’m Still Here is truly subversive, slyly showing the dangers of a drift to authoritarianism in Brazil’s right-wing military dictatorship of the 1970s. If you don’t look into this historical mirror and see a warning in its reflection, you’re not looking hard enough.

And these only scratch the surface. The Brutalist, about the struggles and triumphs of an immigrant, and Wicked, about the struggles and triumphs of living under fascism, each received ten nominations. (Marc Platt, the producer of Wicked who has not been shy in calling out the movie’s parallels to present politics, said in an interview that he thought the movie offered a blueprint for the current moment to “have the courage to find your voice and speak that voice to power.”) A Real Pain and September 5, both about trauma facing Jewish people at a time when platforming the issue is disturbingly verboten by both the far right and far left, each landed screenplay nominations.

In one of the biggest surprises, Nickel Boys — a movie about never forgetting the terrible scars of racial violence — wound up in the best picture and screenplay categories despite many pundits writing it off.

And finally, The Apprentice star Sebastian Stan — who literally plays Trump in a scathingly insightful portrayal — was given a best actor slot. At a time when people (legitimately) worry that Hollywood executives are dancing around Trump, the Academy goes out and honors the man not afraid to tango.

The reason for all of this (apart from voters’ sense of purpose) is, of course, a DEI initiative. In a movement that began back in 2016, as Trump was first ascendant, to diversify the Academy with people of many more backgrounds, countries, and experiences. This can’t be unwound. The choices testify to its permanence.

I know what you’re thinking. What difference does it make? So the Academy took some movies that humanize social issues and made them eligible for some statues, so what? How does any of that change the policies? Doesn’t it just underline Hollywood impotence? Trump hopes to change the direction of government. The Academy hopes people don’t change the channel.

But I’d argue they make a real difference. Because what Trump is doing isn’t just substantive — it’s symbolic. It’s a way to show a watching world that this is what 2025 America is about — a place where migrants get rousted from churches trans people get their medical care removed and people of color are told hiring practices are completely fair and lives in foreign countries matter less than American ones. That here lies our soul. Or lack of it.

But the Academy has a symbolic tool too. Hundreds of millions of people around the world watch the Oscars for cues about what America stands for. And what they’ll see this year is something 180 degrees in the other direction from all that: a place that elevates the stories of trans people, takes an interest in the lives of immigrants, looks outward to the rest of the globe, and worries about racism, anti-semitism, and nativism. One that sees the world not just as an opportunity for enrichment but a venue for understanding. 

I asked RaMell Ross, the writer, and director of Nickel Boys, if he thought these Academy choices mattered. Here’s what he said:

“It’s an exaggeration to say awards or even cinema changes lives. But I think it can make something meaningful that changes the world in an ineffable way. Maybe people vote differently, or think about policy differently when they see a movie being honored. It’s not one-to-one change. It’s a small ripple. It’s something that makes me think a little bit about a different direction. It’s something that I now understand that I didn’t understand.”

It’s something, in other words, that we need more than ever.