Oxford spelling, en-GB-oxendict, is a nice halfway house - it uses the same -ize spellings (where etymologically correct) as American English, but doesn't have the simplifications (eg. colour->color).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_spelling

It's often preferred by academic journals, which might be why the original commenter sees it as "academic".

It's also the official spelling used by the United Nations.