Newsweek: ‘Sinners’ Would’ve Won More Oscars If Trump Weren’t President

It was Donald Trump’s fault. Yes, the president is lord overseer of the Oscars. My head hurts thinking about it. I can’t imagine someone actually thinking that played a role in what happened on Oscar night. And, of course, there was a screed about how black voices and creative minds are not recognized or something (via Newsweek):

Newsweek. 🤣 pic.twitter.com/zzp9270K8F

— Tom Bevan (@TomBevanRCP) March 18, 2026

I have loved movies of all kinds since I was a child. I know the difference between a great film and a good film, the gaps between a timeless landmark and something that is simply of the now. When Sinners was nominated for a record-breaking 16 Academy Awards out of a possible 17, I was overcome with emotions. That is because I know the long sojourn of Black-centered films in the American cinematic saga, and I also know the gut-churning racism of Black character depictions in most movies not made by us.  

So, I went into my annual viewing of the Oscars with muted expectations. I, we, have been deeply disappointed so many times before. Yet I held out hope because Sinners, which my wife and I saw three times, is truly a groundbreaking work of art. Sinners is for movies what, say, Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life is for music: a once-in-countless-generations classic that transcends people and time and space and universes. Indeed, Sinners is a film that explores, brilliantly and in unparalleled ways, race and identity in America through the lens of the horror genre; through the use of the blues, through a rainbow coalition of Black, White, Indigenous, Asian, Irish, and Jewish personas unlike anything, frankly, we’ve ever seen in all of filmmaking. 

But in this era of President Donald J. Trump, and some of the most obscene divisions we’ve ever endured in America—and certainly unlike anything I have ever witnessed on this grand of scale in my lifetime—I believe, deep in my bones, the level of hatred and ignorance out here not only undermined what should have been a record-breaking victory lap for Sinners but also turned, instead, into a coronation of an equally controversial but very different film, Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another. 

[…] 

Moreover, if we are honest, Hollywood has always had a hard time acknowledging Black films by Black creatives that center Black characters in ways that present us as the whole human beings we are, while also unapologetically examining the American racism of any era. Think Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing, think the body of work of Black auteurs like Julie Dash or Charles Burnett. While a genuine effort to try to make sense of the madness of oppression and alienation, One Battle After Another still landed, with very uncomfortable bumps, into some very stereotypical tropes about race, about Black women and sexuality, even about the mythologies of Black activism.

Oh my God, shut up—the movie you really liked didn’t win enough stuff. Move on, man. It happens. Martin Scorsese should have more awards in directing, Leonard DiCaprio should’ve won more awards too, and yes, I’ll concede that Do the Right Thing should have won Best Picture as opposed to Driving Miss Daisy. Daisey but this isn’t about Trump. The Academy isn’t some bastion of conservatism, so I get that ‘America is racist’ is the only avenue, which leads into the anti-Trump nonsense.  

But the headline and the article itself is parody. I thought it was a Babylon Bee piece. 

Not everything is an inflection point or some affront to humanity. For liberals, however, that’s their mindset, which is why they’re all nutcases.