Oscars: How 'Black Panther' Can Win Best Picture

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Two black filmmakers — Steve McQueen ('12 Years a Slave') and Barry Jenkins ('Moonlight') — have won the Academy's top prize recently, and Ryan Coogler's Marvel superhero movie could make that three ... if the film plays its cards shrewdly and strategically.

Lost in the brouhaha that followed Moonlight's upset victory over La La Land at the 2017 Oscars was this simple fact: A movie from black writers, filmed by a black director and featuring a black cast had been named best picture for the second time in three years, joining 2014 winner 12 Years a Slave. Now, as a new awards season heats up, can a third black-themed picture — one with the added hurdle of being a superhero film, a genre the Academy rarely honors — do the same?

To go all the way, Panther needs to upstage not only such near-certain nominees as A Star Is Born, Roma and The Favourite, but also other contenders from nonwhite filmmakers, many of which engage with contemporary issues around race in a more direct way: Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman tells a story whose urgency is underscored by a Nov. 3 New York Times exposé outlining the FBI's failure to keep tabs on the growth of a violent supremacist movement. The Hate U Give and If Beale Street Could Talk, from Moonlight helmer Barry Jenkins, both amplify Black Lives Matter themes.

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