--- description: The Spirits go to the very indie films that Oscar is likely to award tonight. When will Hollywood return to honoring its own best product? title: The Indie Spirit Awards and the Oscars, or (Why Does Hollywood Hate Itself?) image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb70e51ffd5be18d8/6987806e0b72e3776e6ddcdd/oscars-academy-awards1.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Entertainment](/section/entertainment/) ## Entertainment Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [movies](/tag/movies/) ## movies Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # The Indie Spirit Awards and the Oscars, or (Why Does Hollywood Hate Itself?) by [Richard Corliss](/author/richard-corliss/) ## Richard Corliss Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Feb 22, 2015 8:25 PM CUT  A member of the crew works on the red carpet of the 87th Annual Academy Awards at Hollywood & Highland Center on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood. A member of the crew works on the red carpet of the 87th Annual Academy Awards at Hollywood & Highland Center on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood.Ethan Miller—WireImage by [Richard Corliss](/author/richard-corliss/) ## Richard Corliss Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Feb 22, 2015 8:25 PM CUT Oscar night: it’s finally here! Or did it happen yesterday? The Film Independent Spirit Awards, which pay tribute to American movies with production budgets of $20 million or lower, are held in a billowing tent in Santa Monica the Saturday afternoon before the big show. This year, it was basically the Oscars a day early. _Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance_) took Best Film, _Boyhood’_s Richard Linklater got Best Director, Michael Keaton won Best Actor for _Birdman_ and the three inevitables — Julianne Moore, J.K. Simmons and Patricia Arquette — earned Best Actress, Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress, respectively, for _Still Alice_, _Boyhood_ and _Whiplash_. (My predictions for this year’s Oscar winners are [here](http://time.com/3712257/oscars-2015-predictions-who-will-win/ "undefined").) The Spirits also confirmed Oscar’s ignoring of the racial litmus test _Selma_. Nominated for five awards, the Martin Luther King Jr. bio-pic won none. Yes, the actual Oscar for Best Actor could go to Eddie Redmayne; his _The Theory of Everything_ was ineligible for the Spirits because it’s a Limey import. _Birdman_ and _Boyhood_ could swap statuettes, with Linklater winning Best Picture and Alejandro G. Iñárritu taking Best Director. (Or either film could cop both big prizes.) But — as occurred last year, when all four of the Spirit’s acting awards plus Best Picture went to the eventual Oscar winners — this was a laid-back dress rehearsal (casual dress) for tonight’s starchier, fancy-dress event. The show is shorter, the acceptance speeches less predictable. Pawel Pawlikowski, who directed the winning foreign film _Ida_, spoke warmly of the other finalists, then pertly added, “Thank you, my competitors, for losing this time.” The Spirits haven’t gone Hollywood. It’s the Motion Picture Academy that’s gone indie, by virtually limiting its Best Picture nominees to art-house entries. Of the eight films nominated for the top Oscar tonight, only _American Sniper_ cost more than $20 million to produce or earned more than $85 million at North American theaters. The rest are U.S. and British niche items — the very films the industry marginalizes the rest of the year. ### Academy Awards: Classic Film Stars With Their Oscars  Vivien Leigh places the Oscar she won for her role as Scarlett in Gone With The Wind on her mantlepiece at home, 1940. Peter Stackpole—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Luise Rainer, the first woman to win two Oscars, holds her Best Actress award for her performance in The Great Ziegfeld during the 1937 Academy Awards ceremony. Rex Hardy Jr.—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Joan Fontaine doing the household bookkeeping next to the Oscar she won for her role in Hitchcok's Suspicion, 1942. Bob Landry—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Elizabeth Taylor at a Hollywood party with the Oscar she won for her role in Butterfield, 1961. Allan Grant—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Grace Kelly with the Oscar she won for her role in The Country Girl, 1955\. William Holden, her co-star in the movie, stands behind her. George Silk—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Audrey Hepburn with the Oscar she won for Roman Holiday, 1954. Ralph Morse—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Joanne Woodward smiles radiantly while holding her Best Actress Oscar for her role in Three Faces of Eve, 1958. Ralph Crane—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Best Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress winners Frank Sinatra and Donna Reed (both for From Here to Eternity) and their Oscars, 1954. George Silk—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Bing Crosby (Going My Way), Ingrid Bergman (Gaslight) and Barry Fitzgerald (Going My Way) with their Oscars, 1945. Walter Sanders—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Gloria Grahame with her Best Supporting Actress Oscar for The Bad and the Beautiful, 1953. Loomis Dean—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Marlon Brando (right) with his Oscar for On the Waterfront, 1955. George Silk—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Onstage presenters seen from the wings during the 1950 Academy Awards. Ida Wyman—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Jimmy Stewart, back from WWII, talks with the oldest employee of his family's hardware store in Pennsylvania, George Little; nearby is a table of various mementos, including Stewart's Best Actor Oscar for The Philadelphia Story. Peter Stackpole—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images  Joan Crawford with her Best Actress Oscar for Mildred Pierce, 1946. Martha Holmes—Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images And the losers? They’re the popular movies that fund the industry and often bring it distinction. To name six ambitious hits from 2014: _Gone Girl_, _Interstellar_, _The LEGO Movie_, _Into the Woods_, _Noah_ and _Unbroken_. Their total haul in the Oscars’ top categories was two: nominees for Best Actress (Rosamund Pike in _Gone Girl_) and Best Supporting Actress (Meryl Streep in _Into the Woods_), and neither has an atheist’s prayer of winning. This disconnect hasn’t always applied in the five years since the Academy, in 2009, expanded its roster of Best Picture nominees from five to as many as 10\. In 2010, five of the 10 finalists (_Black Swan_, _Inception_, _The King’s Speech_, _Toy Story 3_ and _True Grit_) earned more than $100 million at the domestic box office — the standard threshold for a popular hit— and _The Social Network_ wasn’t far behind at $97 million. Two years ago, six of the nine (_Argo_, _Django Unchained_, _Les Misérables_, _Life of Pi_, _Lincoln_ and _Silver Linings Playbook_) reached $100 million, with _Zero Dark Thirty_ at $96 million. Even last year, when indie films were the big winners in big categories, four of the nine Best Picture shortlisters (_American Hustle_, _Captain Phillips_, _Gravity_ and _The Wolf of Wall Street_) reached nine figures at the North American box office. Not so this year, when little is big, and less is Moore. The biggest challenge for the inevitable Best Actress winner — and for Simmons, Arquette and possibly Keaton, if he triumphs over Redmayne — will be to save their best acceptance speech for the sixth or seventh televised awards show where they’ve had to say thanks. Home viewers will shrug at awards given to movies endlessly promoted in the ramp-up hoopla but which they haven’t seen. And the members of the Academy, most of whom work on medium- to high-budget pictures — the kind that employ artists and artisans by the hundreds — will again have voted against the macro-movies they make and for the micro-films they maybe wished they did. The inescapable takeaway from Oscar night: The industry wishes it were indie. To put it bluntly: Hollywood hates itself. Perhaps that’s putting it _too_ bluntly — but one thing is certain. Many of those swells in tuxedos you’ll see tonight at the Dolby Theatre in L.A.: they’d rather be in a tent in Santa Monica. ### Oscars 2015: Celebrities on the Red Carpet  Emma Stone attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Scarlett Johansson attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Chris Pratt and Anna Faris attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Jessica Chastain attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Benedict Cumberbatch and Sophie Hunter attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Chris Pine attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Reese Witherspoon attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Anna Kendrick attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Frazer Harrison—Getty Images  Rosamund Pike attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Bradley Cooper attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Neil Patrick Harris, right, and David Burtka attendsthe 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Lupita Nyong'o attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Gwyneth Paltrow attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Eddie Redmayne attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Julianne Moore attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Oprah Winfrey attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Nicole Kidman attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  America Ferrera attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Cate Blanchett attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Michael Keaton attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  David Oyelowo attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  J.K. Simmons attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Zendaya attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Josh Hutcherson attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Kevin Hart attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Dakota Johnson attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Melanie Griffith attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Hans Zimmer attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Ethan Miller—WireImage/Getty Images  Giuliana Rancic attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Jason Reitman attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jeff Kravitz—FilmMagic/Getty Images  Margot Robbie attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Joanna Newsom, left, and Andy Samberg attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Common attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Karolina Kurkova attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Jamie Chung attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Patricia Arquette attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Michael Strahan attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Michael Buckner—WireImage/Getty Images  Mario Lopez attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Ryan Seacrest attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Will i Am attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Kelly Osbourne attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Miles Teller attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Felicity Jones attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  John Stamos attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Naomi Watts attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Marion Cotillard attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Alejandro G. Inarritu attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Genesis Rodriguez attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Frazer Harrison—Getty Images  Laura Dern attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Questlove attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Chrissy Teigen attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Faith Hill and Tim McGraw attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jeff Kravitz—FilmMagic/Getty Images  John Legend attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Rita Ora attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Chloe Grace Moretz attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Viola Davis attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Chiwetel Ejiofor attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Kerry Washington attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Sienna Miller attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Ansel Elgort attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Ed Norton and Shauna Robertson attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Channing Tatum attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Keira Knightley attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Justin Theroux and Jennifer Aniston attend the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Steve Granitz—WireImage/Getty Images  Chris Evans attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Felicity Jones attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Frazer Harrison—Getty Images  Lady Gaga attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Kevin Mazur—WireImage/Getty Images  Jennifer Lopez attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. Jason Merritt—Getty Images  Solange Knowles attends the 87th Annual Academy Awards on Feb. 22, 2015 in Hollywood, Calif. 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