With a World on Fire, We Need Fire Saga at Next Year’s Oscars
I see so many memes that start off with this “if 2020 were a…” Most are very funny. Some are painfully accurate. Here, let me try one. If 2020 were a movie it’d be the sequel to Ishtar and Howard the Duck somehow merged together but dubbed with the dialogue from Police Academy 6: City Under Siege. Wait, I’d actually want to see that movie. Let’s just start this article by saying this year sucks. Everyone knows it. Somewhere 2020 is sitting at home drinking its morning cup of coffee hating on itself knowing full well it is the worst. As, let’s just say “he,” he takes a sip of coffee his wife comes over and says, “hey what’s wrong?” 2020 goes, “I don’t know, I think I suck really bad.” His wife puts her arm on top of his right shoulder, and as he goes to hold her hand, she swats it away. Quickly, she says, “yes — yes you do.” She then walks away, and as he stares into his now cold cup of coffee, he hears the slam of a door and a screech of a car. Um, OK. That said, there have been a few glorious bright spots in this dark, dismal time but I’m focusing on one today and that is the 64-percent Rotten Tomatoes rated Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga.
The Will Ferrell/Rachel McAdams Netflix comedy about two small town Icelandic singers known as Fire Saga with pop star dreams is among the year’s biggest surprises. In a world that’s a vampire, the film provides so much joy — an intentionally silly yet tender story of a man with a dream to represent his country with his longtime partner (and totally not his sister) at the Eurovision Song Contest. It’s the best thing Ferrell’s done in awhile and McAdams is perfect but this isn’t a review of the movie. This is just ramblings of a writer who wants to get an Oscar campaign going for the brilliantly catchy songs that are featured in it. Here’s my campaign to attract attention — sign it and who knows!
The Oscars have been pushed back until April 25, 2021 due to the pandemic. They will now consider films that will be released between January 2020 through February 2021. Because of this, I fear this movie will be forgotten by then and let’s face it movies like this are forgotten anyway. Oscars don’t like comedies. It’s been well documented, but they also don’t like honoring silly movies in anyway. Aside from The Lego Movie getting a surprise nod for best song for “Everything is Awesome” some five years ago (that performance was epic), I can’t think of the Academy having any fun at all in any of the categories — especially the song category. I say this with apologies to Ray Parker Jr. and the late Isaac Hayes as well. Oh, and let’s not forget “Blame Canada” from the 1999 classic South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut which got a nod and had the late Robin Williams performing it. But, overall we rarely see fun songs get nominated. Where was “Pop Goes My Heart” from the 2007 Hugh Grant film Music and Lyrics? Why didn’t Bobby Brown spit rhymes about Vigo the Carpathian on the Oscar stage in 1990 after his Ghostbusters II hit “On Our Own?” If Pete Seeger can get nominated for “Shakedown” for 1987’s Beverly Hills Cop II surely Eurovision can pick up some love next year.
“Double Trouble,” which is written by Arbor Birgisson, Rami Yacoub and Savan Kotecha, is pure 1990s Euro throwback stuff that would totally be playing on Z100 back in the day. It’s the best song Ace of Base never made. Heck, I’m overplaying it on Spotify right now. “Husavik,” which is written by Fat Max Gsus, Rickard Goransson, and Kotecha, is a beautiful song that brings some weight and heart to the film, and should earn a nod as well. I’d even give some love to the delirious “Jaja Ding Dong” and “Volcano Man” for no other reason but to hear and see them performed on the Academy Awards stage assuming it’s not on frickin’ Zoom by next April. But, it’s going to be an uphill climb. Sign the petition or read this or something or keep Eurovision in your hearts all year long in an effort to get a really fun movie some air time during these war times. I never saw Kenny Loggins perform in shades and a glorious beard in the 1980s because of those stuck up Oscar voters. Don’t let that happen to Fire Saga.
