The Oscars are the Super Bowl of films. 300 films are released in the U.S. on average each year, and about a third of those films have a shot at some kind of award (Peoples Choice, Kid’s Choice, MTV Movie, Golden Globe). However, only the best and the brightest (not counting Crash ’06) have a shot at Best Picture at the Oscars. Most people think that to win an Oscar you just make the best movie, but that could not be farther from the truth. You have to prepare your film for success by attracting the proper cast and pedigree to be involved. Finally you have to hope that after your film is made, it is marketed properly. This is the toughest part. If you make the best film, but no one knows about it, did you really make the best film? One man knows how to play this game better than everyone else. His name is Harvey Weinstein. I know this because I’ve seen the successful campaigns he’s run for his films from his Miramax days, and now as the head of the Oscar-machine The Weinstein Company. I have further knowledge, because I sat in on a focus group for one of his latest potential Oscar favorites, Lee Daniels’ The Butler.
Inglorious Bastards, The Fighter, The Kings Speech, Blue Valentine, My Week With Marilyn, The Artist, The Iron Lady, The Master, Silver Linings Playbook, and Django Unchained have all been released in the last four years from Harvey Weinstein’s company. All of these movies were either nominated or big winners at the Oscars and all of them, minus the Tarantino films flew largely under the radar. Harvey Weinstein and The Weinstein Company cultivated these films. They planned very specific and thought-out release patterns to ensure that a film got the perfect weekend and/or the perfect screen roll out. Sometimes picking when a film comes out is as important as the film itself. Take The Master for example. It came out in early September. We know September to be a dumping ground of sorts. It’s where the fourth or fifth sequel of a franchise no one cares about like Resident Evil gets it’s release. Films that are not marketable get dumped here. We know this. So did it hurt The Master to be put here? Absolutely. The Butler, will avoid this by jumping out ahead of September and coming out this week. When you think about it, few films have much success coming out prior to the fall prestige season, but The Butler has one key advantage: controversy.
About two months ago, The Butler came under fire from Warner Bros. because of its title. Apparently Warner Bros. had a movie called The Butler that came out 80 years ago and they would not grant The Weinstein Company dispensation to use the title. This almost NEVER happens. Usually when a film is released with the same name as a pre-existing film, the studios agree to a small fee for the right for the new film to keep the same title. Warner Bros. was being purely petty. It is largely believed that WB has a beef with TWC over rights issues related to the Hobbit films. Who knows if that is true or not, but instead of playing along, they stuck their heels in, and refused to settle on keeping the name. This allowed Harvey Weinstein the opportunity to look like a victim in the court of public opinion, and it also raised the stock of The Butler. Being shrewder than your average bear, he took this opportunity to bump the release date from mid-October, to mid-August. This was smart. People were talking about Butler-gate all summer, so you might as well get the film out a bit earlier. Eventually an agreement was met, and The Butler was retitled Lee Daniels’ The Butler, which is funny to me, because he does not yet have the cache to have Lee Daniels in front of the movie.
So now Lee Daniels’ The Butler is coming for us a lot sooner than expected, and it’s got that prime The Help release window and SHOULD be successful. It should be and it will be because Harvey’s had this movie in screenings since April. I saw The Butler in late April. The film I saw at the time, was mostly finished, outside of a score and few scenes, but it was good. It was the kind of biopic that we love to award, it had a giant all-star cast, and “happy story” racism was the central focus. That formula alone usually works, but by test screening it so early, they were able to figure out the tone that would work best, and how to sell the film. In the focus group I sat in on, I was able to offer opinions of how to tighten the film up a bit. This was really fun. Harvey Weinstein even attended the focus group afterwards and took notes of the critiques given by the group. I had no idea he was this close to his movies. That night, I was able to see the genius that is Harvey Weinstein. He doesn’t just pick the movies that will do well and get accolades. He shepherds them from the jump. By keeping involved with each part of the process, he can ensure his bombastically meticulous natures keeps his vision for the film on track.
Lee Daniels’ The Butler is a good movie, and it will get plenty of nominations. Some will be earned, and some will not be. But one certainty is that come Oscar season, there is no one better to have in your corner than Harvey Weinstein. Also, The Butler is pretty good. I recommend it.
About Russ Stevens
Russ Stevens is an editor and writer at Rookerville and a guidance counselor at Nyack HS. He mostly writes about either loving or hating things. In his spare time, he performs Improv comedy with his troupe Priest and The Beekeeper and is a co-producer of their monthly variety show Pig Pile. He loves all the New York sports teams that are historically bad, and he hates lateness more than anything in the world.