Academy Awards Takes it Back Once Again with Voting for 'Best Picture' Oscar

On June 24, 2009, former Academy president Sid Ganis announced the expansion of the Best Picture category to 10 nominees, which is basically taking it back to the days when there were 10 films in the category. Keeping with history, the Academy announced on Monday, August 31 that members will be asked to rank all 10 nominees in a preferential voting system.

The Academy already uses the ranking system to determine the nominees and it was last used on the final ballot for Best Picture winner back in 1945.

The change was made to secure their already questionable decision to double the 5 nominees to 10, something that has certain mathematical dangers. The doubling of nominees can present a situation where one film with little more than 10% of the votes can win.

The new, or should I say old preferential ranking system is simple. Voters will rank each Best Picture nominee on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the best or their personal favorite. The process would then call for PricewaterhouseCoopers, the tabulator and certifying accounting firm of Academy votes, to first determine if one nominee has more than 50% of the first place votes. A film with that many votes will go on to win Best Picture.

If none of the nominees has achieved this, films will then be eliminated progressively, starting with the film ranked first on the fewest number of first place votes. The film ranked second will be granted the eliminated film's first place votes. The elimination will continue until one film remains with the majority of the first place votes and that film will win Best Picture.

In the past, as recent as last year, with "Slumdog Millionaire" winning the grand prize, the award for Best Picture would go to the film with the most votes.

Back when they announced the reinstatement of the 10 nominees, I was disappointed to know that a good number of undeserving films will always be labeled Best Picture nominee. Could you imagine the many below average films that would have been nominated in the recent past if there was room for five more nominees? Overrated films like "Dreamgirls" would be called Best Picture nominee today, and would have had a chance at winning the prestigious award.

At first glance, I had my reservations about this new-old ranking system for the Best Picture winning as well, especially in the wake of the 10 nominations. But then, when I came to understand the system, I thought about undeserving films like "Crash," which would not have won if this system was still in use at the time. Now, with 10 nominees, this ranking system will eliminate a few of the discrepancies in having so many nominees and the majority voting system of the past.

I am looking forward to seeing how this works.

Click here for the Academy announcement of reinstating the 10 nominees for Best Picture.