No Oscar for Society of the Snow: Anatomy of a Loss

Society of the Snow without an Oscar: State-subsidized cinema under fire

Why didn't Society of the Snow win the Oscar that half the country expected? Because the Academy distributed the statuettes elsewhere. The film about the Andes tragedy ended the night with zero awards, while the Best Original Screenplay prize went to Anatomy of a Fall. From there, the conversation shifted from cinema to the usual mudslinging: who funds the movies, who awards them, and which stories deserve the trophy.

The setback peine two simmering debates. The first concerns the remake, with suspicions that the film tells nothing new. The second involves subsidies, the idea that there is cinema living on public money, where the Oscar, if it arrives, comes with the bill paid in advance.

Awards won by the gala that left Society of the Snow without an Oscar

Best Original Screenplay went to Anatomy of a Fall, defended as a masterpiece of tight scripting with Sandra Hüller praised as wonderful. It wasn't the only foreign winner. Zone of Interest, described as another twist on Holocaust drama directed by a Brit, also took home an Oscar. Meanwhile, Oppenheimer appeared more as an example of pretentious, overacted cinema than as an object of devotion.

The reading is uncomfortable for Spanish cinema: the natural candidate left empty-handed. No prize, no headline, and the feeling that others wrote the night's narrative.

Alive remake: The accusation haunting the film

One repeated criticism is that Society of the Snow copies Alive. Less popcorn-friendly, slower, but a copy nonetheless. It is argued this is the fifth time the same episode has been filmed, shots are repeated, and viewers know when the plane turns, crashes, and who survives. A survival story turned into a succession of clichés.

Against this, the defense of the book. ¡VIVEN!, recalled by a participant as read in the eighties and described as a bestseller at the time, was written in the first person by one of the survivors. The circulating recommendation is clear: the text, with details films leave out, is better than any adaptation.

Why is Hollywood accused of only awarding proge cinema?

This thesis dominates much of the discussion. It is argued the Academy no longer rewards stories without mandatory elements: diversity, identity, and politically correct messaging. Under this logic, a film about men surviving in the mountains with camaraderie and resistance had little chance. "Go proge, go broke," some summarize.

The counterargument is simple yet uncomfortable: Society of the Snow is not a proge film at all. It tells a realistic survival story without concessions. Precisely because of this, it wouldn't fit the academics' taste. Here analysis splits: some see punishment for a non-conforming narrative; others, simple lack of merit against better-built rivals.

Subsidized cinema and who ends up paying the bill

Economic arguments appear early. It is claimed there is cinema funded by public money, where the Oscar is a consolation prize granted before filming. The specific suspicion: production arrived inflated, backed by a major platform and resources hard to explain solely by quality. The platform is pointed to as both pusher and beneficiary of the noise.

General mood is weariness. Some even question if the Oscar still matters.

The gala nobody watches anymore: Oscar heading toward irrelevance

For part of the conversation, awards are moving toward absolute irrelevance, despite media insistence otherwise. It is argued Hollywood changed skin with the new century, accelerating in the 2020s with diversity and unoriginal stories. The once-segarro showcase has become a predictable formality.

Some go further, pinpointing titles like Titanic or Gladiator as the final nail in a coffin of filmmaking that doesn't return. Nostalgia, however, doesn't fix the winners list.

With remake, platform, and subsidy in the same sentence, the Oscar became secondary. Next time a Spanish film approaches the statuette, controversy will precede the trailer.