The 83rd Golden Globe Awards were full of funny moments and surprises, but what the night, and indeed the days and weeks following, will be remembered for is not a funny moment, a surprise, or a meme, but passion and conviction. When Stellan Skarsgard appeared on stage to accept an award for Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture for his role in Joachim Trier‘s Sentimental Value, he gave a typical acceptance speech and made a statement about the future of film itself. Skarsgard is 74 years old.
As predicted, Skarsgård started off with the typical dark humor of Scandinavians—poking fun at his age and the fact that he was unprepared. But the mood suddenly changed as he ended with a statement that had the power to immediately cut through all the noise surrounding awards season: “In a cinema, where the lights go down, and eventually you share the pulse with other people, that is magic. Cinema should be seen in cinemas.” It wasn’t simply a case of a statement from a film star from a bygone era. Instead, in a world in which the currently dominant streaming giants continue to see the theatrical window shrink before them, it posed a warning.
An upset that portended a new era
Skarsgård’s triumph was in itself a message. In a category full of Tinseltown heavy hitters in Benicio Del Toro, Jacob Elordi, Paul Mescal, Sean Penn, and Adam Sandler, it was a welcome surprise to see him take home the award, which also marked a rare triumph for non-studio films that are neither English nor mainstream imports to the Golden Globes awards.
Skarsgard could have used the acceptance as an opportunity to thank agents, studios, or platforms, but instead, it took him several minutes to deliver a speech that seemed “defiant” to some audience members. He thanked his wife, Megan Everett-Skarsgård, for her “brutal support” and added, “what a bad father is,” which was a humorously accurate portrayal of his character as a flawed, emotionally aloof film director.
But when he turned to the topic of movie theaters, the tone turned serious. Skarsgård called cinemas “an extinct species,” speaking with the fervor of one observing the extinction of their chosen species in real time. He called not just upon audiences to see Sentimental Value, but to experience it together, speaking of the physical, communal act of the theater itself—the lights going down, the audience settling into their seats, their heartbeats beating in time in communal silence. “That,” he said, “is magic.”
The speech resonated so strongly because it spoke to a true fault line within the industry. While there are signs of stabilization, the box office is still far from the heights it had reached in 2019, and independent and arthouse cinemas are going out of business at an alarming rate. Yet it is the upscale offerings, such as IMAX and Dolby, that are booming, indicating that consumers crave a movie-going experience but only if it is a must-see.
Skarsgård’s plea came against a background of rising concerns about “Netflix-ization.” The actor’s Oscar victory, an award for a low-key, human-scale drama, proved that cinematic release can bring even small films into the global limelight if they get the opportunity. In the end, Skarsgård did something more than accept an award. He gave a rallying cry. In an awards show tradition that is so often criticized for its irrelevance, his message reminded the industry just why film is important in the first place—not as content, but as communion.
