Oscar Top 10? Hollywood mulls best-pic makeover

TORONTO — You would think doubling a film's chances for an Academy Award nomination would thrill everyone in Hollywood, where an Oscar is the highest form of ego-stroking in a town of big egos.

Yet attitudes among stars, filmmakers and executives range from cautious optimism to harsh disagreement over the big change at next March's Oscars: 10 best-picture nominees instead of the usual five.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is experimenting with the expanded slate as Oscar organizers hope to stoke more interest in the awards show and spread the prestige around to different kinds of films.

It's not without precedent. From 1931 to 1943, the academy generally had 10 best-picture contenders, and as many as 12 some years.

Since then, though, it's been only five. Many in Hollywood wonder if doubling the field will cheapen the honor of scoring a nomination for the biggest prize in show business.

"I think it's terrible. My knee-jerk reaction is that it's a really bad idea. We'll see, but I think 10 just dilutes it too much," said Matt Damon, an Oscar winner for the "Good Will Hunting" screenplay he wrote with buddy Ben Affleck.

This month's Toronto, Venice and Telluride fests traditionally mark the start of awards season, as studios begin trotting out their big guns for the Oscars. Such recent festival premieres as "Crash," "No Country for Old Men" and "Slumdog Millionaire" have gone on to win best picture.

"Generally, the five films that get nominated, people will make time to see those movies," said Damon, who stars in Steven Soderbergh's Toronto International Film Festival entry, "The Informant!" "Whereas 10, it just seems like, what aren't they nominating?"

"I hope it doesn't devalue the nomination. Because to be nominated for best film is obviously an incredible honor," said Peter Jackson, whose "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" swept the 2003 Oscars. If it's the same honor with double the number of nominees, I'm not sure. I don't know. I guess time will tell."

Academy officials say they would not mind seeing the occasional documentary or foreign-language film score a best-picture nomination. But the switch to 10 nominees mainly springs from Oscar planners' efforts to popularize the show amid generally declining TV ratings over the last 25 years, as smaller, sober dramas have come to dominate instead of big studio productions.