The Observer view on the Oscars: a night of toe-curling embarassment awaits | Observer editorial

At such a juncture of history, Hollywood must deliver its best: melodrama, conspiracy, dreams - not to mention the films

There is a common complaint among film buffs that cinema, dominated by superhero fantasies and blockbuster franchises, isn't what it used to be. They look back misty-eyed to the 1940s heyday of the studio system or to the 1970s rise of the counterculture auteurs as celluloid golden ages that are destined never to be repeated.

It is, then, a rebuke to the naysayers that the 97th Academy Awards boasts a full array of compelling genres: steamy melodrama, political conspiracy thriller, science-fiction action and disaster epic.