Oscars 2018 Best Picture: Why Three Billboards SHOULD have won over The Shape of Water

Last night may have been the most predictable Academy Awards in recent memory.

The four main acting categories have been absolute shoe-ins for weeks, and rightly so for some extraordinary performances.

While Christopher Nolan fans were pleased the Dunkirk director was finally nominated for an Oscar, the Best Director award was another easy prediction with Guillermo Del Toro having picked up the gong at the other major ceremonies for The Shape of Water.

But when it came to the biggest prize of the night, Best Picture was either going to go with his fantasy romance or Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri.

Get Out and Lady Bird could have been a shock win, but the bookies were sure it was a two horse race between the other two.

Having won at the BAFTAs, Three Billboards was the favourite, – Del Toro even checked the envelope once on stage after last year’s La La Land/Moonlight gaffe.

Looking back at previous Best Picture winners it’s interesting to see which films are remembered, rewatched and enter cult status – and they’re usually those which missed out on the big prize.

Consider 1990’s Dances with Wolves winning over Goodfellas, 1996’s Braveheart triumphing over Sense and Sensibility and 1998’s Shakespeare in Love beating Saving Private Ryan.

What these winners have in common is a sentimental guff that appeals on the surface – and are often alright watches – but aren’t truly great films in terms of performance and the impact of ideas and themes presented to the audience.

Now Del Toro is one of the greatest directors of his age and his Pan’s Labyrinth is one of the best films of the 21st century, presenting a girl in the Spanish Civil War using her fantasies to deal with horrors of her war-torn reality.

However The Shape of Water just isn’t anywhere near its league, appealing to the Academy with a quirky, but superficial, exploration of sexism, racism and intolerance in a conservative world.

This tonally confused film, with two-dimensional black and white characters, has fantastic performances (although where was Michael Shannon’s Oscar nomination?) and beautiful visuals, but not much of a story to hold it all together.

Whereas Three Billboards’ depth and examination of the human condition is almost a direct contrast.

The audience is introduced to Frances McDormand’s Mildred Hayes, whose daughter was raped and murdered, while Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell’s cops – you take as default – are the bad guys who aren’t doing enough to solve the case.

However the twists and turns of Martin McDonagh’s jet black comedy play so well with how you view the complexity of each character, with Mildred taking repugnant actions and the cops’ situations and backgrounds making you toy with empathy for them.

Ironically its the films’s cheerful stupid character who highlights the film’s main point: that anger begets anger. This is a film that really makes you think and question your conscience as you laugh with Coen-esque characters, cry over the horrors these individuals are going through, wince at the brutal violence and smile at moments of redemption.

The Shape of Water may have won the big prize last night but it doesn’t take you on this sort of journey that is what a film worthy of Academy Award for Best Picture should – which is why it won’t stand the test of time, but Three Billboards will.