The Representational Politics of Oscar Winning Movies of Obama Period

This paper attempts to focus on Academy Awards belonging to a particular timeline, specifically during the administration Council of America's 44th President Barack Obama ( 20 January 2009 to 20 January 2017). It concentrates on the selection of movies and its themes that has been reflected in three wider sections such as war, black and LGBTQ movies. The primary objective of this particular paper is to discover the obscured and parallel politics that usher the process of selection in Academy. This paper tries to exemplify the actuality that in selecting foremost movies in the Academy entertain superior authority and their governance and also how the assessment of movies are culturally and politically biased. All discussed movies are the findings of chief objective and are primary sources that fundamentally appease its argument that selection of Oscar winning movies are culturally and politically biased.


Introduction
The Academy Awards, universally familiar as Oscars, are awards of artistic and technical merit in the film industry. It is given by the Academy of Motion Pictures Art and In his article he comments on five points out of which a film had to meet at least one to be considered as political. fourth official criteria for selection of movies states that "the movie must open in a commercial theatre, for paid admission in Los Angeles county between January 1st and midnight December 31st and run for 7 consecutive days at least three screenings daily (one of which needs to be between 6:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m) be sufficiently advertised in Los Second ironic factor is that the selection is done by the voting system in which strains through which the US Combat team goes through is immense. James is presented in a fairly conventional heroic term but he is also shown to be suffering from PTSD, he is addicted to war, disobeys orders and prone to lapses of judgement. ( The Hurt Locker Mapping) The title of the movie denotes this idea of pain and discomfort that the US Army had gone through. "Hurt Locker is a slang term for a place of deep pain and discomfort, to be put in Hurt Locker signifies that something profoundly troubling or painful has happened to you" Though the Navy has credited him with 160 kills, the thought of lives of soldiers he couldn't save haunts him ever after quitting his job.
The discourse of movie is Eurocentric which represent Arab Muslim Middle Eastern communities 'enemy'. " with the use of eurocentric discourse, common stereotypes and trops of empire, American Sniper delivered a racist portrayal of Arab and Muslim populations hypnotizing scenes of American patriotism" ( Ready).
Applying the theory of Orientalism by Edward Said who was one of the most important cultural figures of the late 20th century. In his 1978 book Orientalism Said made the influential argument that the scholarly writings from America and Europe presented an inaccurate, misleading and stereotyped cultural representation of the East. Said believed this biased perception hindered a true understanding of Middle Eastern and East Asian culture.
He argued when Western Scholars studied Eastern culture they couldn't understand it because of its deviant nature from their own culture. So they portrayed East as exotic, enigmatic. "Orientalism," as defined by Edward Said, is the Western attitude that views Eastern societies as exotic, primitive, and inferior. A way of seeing that imagines, emphasizes, exaggerates and distorts differences of Arab peoples and cultures as compared to that of Europe and the U.S. It often involves seeing Arab culture as exotic, backward, uncivilized, and at times dangerous.
The word 'savages' pop up several times in the film, the crude language of the film which dehumanizes enemy "a lot of people myself included called the enemy 'savages' I only Common thread through which these movies are connected to Obama politics is Patriotism. Obama politics always had a hope and assurance of 'One Nation'. Also these movies depicted US military defense forces and their tireless passion towards their country in an empyreal elegance. When we look back to Oscar history most of the war movies are with the repeated theme of patriotism but particularly in Obama period war movies centralised in true events that were associated with poignant political movements. Also the representation politics in 'othering', elements of self-sacrifice, the reputation of the Army highlights the uprightness of the US defence force.

BLACK MOVIES
The conception of 'Oscar only to white' was profoundly entrenched in the psyche of important because the capacity to influence the thought of the colonized is by far the most sustained and potent operation of imperial power in colonized regions. For Gramsci, hegemony was a form of control exercised primarily through a society's superstructure, as opposed to its base or social relations of production of a predominately economic character.
For Gramsci the ruling class used hegemonic ideas to gain domination over the subjugated classes. Gramsci argued that the ruling classes achieve domination by manipulating language, culture, morality and common sense. Throughout history the term hegemony was used to describe physical and political control. In cultural hegemony, dominant groups use their culture to legitimize their dominance. It is the fundamental idea that the power is not just exercised through physical force but is also reinforced through the story that we tell and images that we make.
Throughout the movie the master is presented as a man dominated by his animal instinct. The depiction of violence and torturing of slave bodies, stripping of identity and abusing scenes taken against enslaved African Americans are numerous in detail. McQueen attributes the need for the violence to understand not just physical abuse elements of slavery but the psychological as well.
The movie can be evaluated from the spectrum of enduring determination and hope of Solomon Northup and his saga of survival through the act of perseverance.

Django Unchained
The protagonist of the film is a black slave Django (Jamie foxx) who becomes a free Obama's belief was to treat people equally, render them equal protection under the Americans no matter who they are or who they love. He legalised same sex marriage across the nation and included gays openly in the forces. He has built stonewall a National monument for LGBT community in addition to this he contributed special medical aids to queer people.
It is in this contest the two movies winning Academy Award going to be discussed together with the application of the queer theory.
Prepending queer theory in this frame of referance.
The goal of this theory which emerged during the 1990's is to change the monolithic thoughts, taxonomies and social norms about sexuality. Queer theory seeks to debunk common misconceptions about sexuality and gender. It seeks to find the cultural and political space for all genders where homosexual is no longer considered as perverted immoral or 'sick 'other of heterosexuality. Basically this theory problematizes the binaries of sexual politics and argues that these binaries such as male-female, masculine-feminine, hetrosexual-homosexual establish a hierarchy and as a consequence reinforce the notion of minorities as abnormal and inferior. It consider the performativity of which was coined by Americans in all sectors. Also Obama becomes the first president to support same-sex marriage. He signs an executive order protecting LGBT employees working for government contractors. In 2014, this administration interprets the Civil Rights Act as supportive of LGBT rights and he becomes the first president to use the word 'transgender' in a State of the Union address.
Here the points suggested by Ben Zausmer in his article out of which a film had to meet at least one to be considered as political is relevant. Artist is the only movie that is under the French Company production that has won best picture award. Oscars of 2020 have also enthusiastically welcomed the movie under Korean production (Parasite). Parasite made Oscar history as the first film not in English to win best picture. The comment made by Donald Trump on its selection is contemptuous and ironic.
" How bad were Academy Award this year ? the winner is a movie from South Korea, what the hell was that all about. We got enough problems with South Korea with trade and on top of it they give them best movie of the year" ( Trump) Hence this paper has focussed to well define the universal propagation of American agendas through Oscar winning movies within a particular time period. Movies play a great role in moulding one's understanding and opinions about worldview and leads to an internalization of total human conception. When they are credited with all encompassing ratification, it generates hidden superior vital forces to general human inception of thought.
All discussed movies of this paper are the findings of chief objective and that fundamentally appease its argument that selection of Oscar winning movies are culturally and politically biased.