Why the Oscar Almost Always Goes to the Wrong Song

The rules governing which songs are eligible for the Oscar are out of date and out of whack. Okay, it’s fine with me if “Everything is Awesome” from “The LEGO Movie” wins this year, first because I love the song and second because I will get to laugh every time I hear the words “Oscar-winner Andy Samberg” (he co-wrote the lyrics). Gosh, if he gets a Grammy, too (the song is nominated), he’ll be halfway to an EGOT!

But nominees often include at least one song no one even remembers because it played over the credits after everyone has gone home. Also because it is completely forgettable. Songs that play an important role in the storyline are often overlooked or ineligible.  I was glad to see a terrific article on the A.V. Club by Jesse Hassenger spelling out how wrong the rules are and how absurd the results are because of the strange rules.

For example, take the 74th Academy Awards. One of the five Best Picture nominees was a bona fide musical, Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! Most of the film’s songs were mash-ups, covers, and reimaginings of previously existing pop songs, but one had never appeared in a film before: “Come What May,” a crucial romantic duet between Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman. But the song was deemed ineligible as an original—because technically, it was first written for Luhrmann’s 1996 version of Romeo + Juliet, only to wind up in Luhrmann’s next film instead. Never mind that “Come What May” never actually appears in Romeo + Juliet or on its soundtrack; the mere intention (and, presumably, some manner of accompanying songwriting registration) was enough to invalidate its obvious centrality to the movie in which it made its actual debut.

On its own, this case would be a frustrating technicality. But taken in context, it seems downright arbitrary. One of the more respectable recent Best Song winners, “Falling Slowly” from Once, appeared on not one but two albums released for general sale well before the movie came out. But while the Academy’s music branch did review this case, they eventually concluded that the movie’s gestation period was protracted enough to make the case that the song being written in 2002 and performed on two different albums since then had no bearing on its eligibility as part of a movie released in 2007. (The two albums on which it appeared were “venues,” in the Academy’s words, “deemed inconsequential enough not to change the song’s eligibility”).

Hassenger makes an important point about the difference between a song that is important to the movie and one that will go over well in the Oscar award television show. “We Are the Best” is a terrific movie about three girls who form a punk group. Their song is a critical part of the movie. ““Hate The Sport” is vital to the bond the characters in We Are The Best! form. It’s catchy not as a pop song, but as a piece of these characters’ lives.” But it is not going to provide a “Let it Go” television-friendly moment. Also, since the movie is Swedish, the nominees’ names would be a bigger challenge than Idina Menzel. The song should be nominated just to let John Travolta try to announce it.

The song I was rooting for this year did not get nominated. In my opinion it is by far the best movie song of the year: “For the Dancing and the Dreaming” from “How to Train Your Dragon 2,” with lyrics by Shane MacGowan (of the Pogues) and music by Jon Thor Birgisson and John Powell. It does everything a song in a movie is supposed to do. It gives the characters a chance to express what is going on and it moves the story forward. And it is gorgeously beautiful and so touching.