Oscarwatch --which I've been linking to a lot (tis the season!) just linked to and agrees with
this article by Dan Harris in Entertainment Weekly which is critical of Oscar's shortened schedule. I absolutely and vehemently disagree with it. Can't people see that extending the Oscar season only makes the studios lazier about distribution models. The long schedule helped to create the Miramaxization of Oscars: long expensive campaigns, agonizingly slow rollouts, one week qualifiers. That old system did not do moviegoers any favors. It just left them out of the equation. It turned film conversation into marketing conversation.
It's not the Academy's fault that their members don't have time to see the movies. It's the studios. The Academy should stick to their guns.
