By the time Everything Everywhere All At Once took the top prize this year, victory felt an inevitability. It had been leader of the pack for weeks. Then, once the Oscars finally began being handed out, those hot dog fingers were in all the pies.
Ke Huy Quan took the first, for supporting actor; producer Jonathan Wang the last, for best picture. In between, we saw Jamie Lee Curtis (supporting actress), both Daniels twice (screenplay and directing) and Michelle Yeoh (actress). It was almost everything, almost everywhere, over the course of almost four hours.
Yet when the film finished shooting this time three years ago, just as the world shut down, few movies would have seemed less likely to sweep the board at the Oscars.
The Academy does not like comedies. Nor does it like comic-book films or action movies or anything that looks like a superhero movie. And if it stars someone female and Asian and over 60…? Rarely a plus.
Hence the decision of distributor A24 to premiere not at Cannes or Venice, and not even at Sundance (where previous indie films that have broken through at the Oscars have started, such as Precious, Little Miss Sunshine and last year’s winner, Coda) but instead at South by Southwest, the annual nerd/hipster knees-up in Austin, Texas.
The film didn’t look like awards bait, so they didn’t position it as such. SXSW has some track record with the Oscars: Spellbound, Undefeated and For Sama all began in Texas, but nothing fictional has ever broken through.
It proved an inspired launchpad. “I cannot imagine a better audience and crowd for this movie,” said c0-director Daniel Kwan as they took to the stage to present it. “This movie is almost perfectly tailored to your guys’ brains.”
Those guys also had tongues – and blogs. Word of mouth began strongly from a crowd at fever-pitch excitement, on the opening night of their first in-person festival in years. A24 rode the wave and opened the film domestically shortly after. It soon became their highest-grossing film ever, packing out arthouse cinemas, then nudging into multiplexes.
The strategy slowly began to shift. Amongst the cast, A24 found they had an eager, willing and winning trio of stars with unique comeback narratives. Yeoh, Curtis and Huy Quan were sure bets; all already held in deep affection by hardcore genre fans and cinema influencers.
The three were drafted into energetic service to support the film’s international release. It paid dividends. Gradually the film’s clout snowballed along with its box office, as more and more critics - as well as industry insiders - declared their love.
By the autumn, it was clear the film had a real shot at the gongs, and A24 set about securing them. They did this by stressing the film’s popularity with real people - the sorts of people (young, cool, see superhero movies) with whom the ailing Academy is eager to align itself.
As well as cute traditional advertising - billboards of Yeoh in her “movie star” incarnation declaring “Everything has led to this” - the campaign leant heavily on the zeitgeisty lingo which also defines its aesthetic. Apparently-viral Instagram marketing saw Curtis cheerlead with remarkable vigour for months, chastising those who disliked the film and hollering her approval for those who did.
Yeoh joined in too, and last Tuesday screenshotted an article on her personal account explicitly comparing the career prospects for herself and fellow nominee Cate Blanchett, should each of them prove triumphant. She took the post down fairly fast, presumably as it violates the same rules which had Andrea Riseborough investigated. But Tuesday was the last day of voting, and in a tight race, every little helps.
Such strategies encouraged the idea of a grassroots push for an underdog. But in fact Everything Everywhere has been a robust frontrunner for a while, both with pundits and commercially.
So far, it has made $74m in the US; more than double the rest of the obvious competition put together (The Fabelmans has taken $17m in the US, The Banshees $10m and Tar $7m).
In celebrating Everywhere, the Academy was offered the chance to show their tastes aligned with those of real people, but without the accusations of pandering to populism that would have come with big wins for Top Gun or Avatar.
And while Spielberg, McDonough and Field’s films all come with messages that are either thorny or in some way uncomfortable, Everything Everywhere is comforting as custard. The film’s key takeaway, frequently reiterated by its makers, is that everyone’s life has value. That dreams are worth following. Prejudice is bad. Mums are nice.
Everything Everywhere proclaims its progressiveness at full volume and wears its philosophical flash firmly on its sleeve. It looks like a film from the future and relies for its pull on the past. You might be dazzled by the graphics, but you are moved by the nostalgia of the cast and an old-as-time central tension (fogey mother vs mardy daughter).
This year’s SXSW began on Friday. The opening night film for the 2023 edition was Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Amongst Thieves. A precedent has been set. Let’s see how far it takes us.
