How anyone thought a movie that shows how Hollywood literally saved the lives of Americans trapped in Iran would not win best picture needs to take a meeting with themselves.
Well yes, it is in line with the circle jerk mentality that has long (always?) been a part of the Oscars.
I wonder if I've ever cared less about Hollywood than I do right about now, and have for a spell. I think at some point when "indie films" (much like "indie" music) crossed over in a significant way the Oscars became very clearly irrelevant as an artistic award. So while prior to that point afficionados of film no doubt had their complaints, for the most part they were a smaller group (again this follows the music analogy). But after this point the nature was more apparent to more people. Perhaps 1994?
I think the Indie music / film analogy probably holds up pretty well. Having not thought about it, I can say "Sundance" and "SXSW" and think of a time when those words meant truly indie culture, and I believe (although I have no real idea, having never been to either) that money and big studios/labels have long since wormed their way into their core. Or maybe think of artists like Ben Affleck or Arcade Fire, winning awards as true indies, then becoming major industry components -- does that track? EDIT: Although, as I re-read that, perhaps in music there is still the Internet -- which can be argued has provided the space once occupied by indie labels. And perhaps allows for even greater freedom and exposure. Not sure that can be said for film.
Some of their most embarrassing snubs date back much earlier though. Welles never winning best director. Kubrick never winning best director. Hitch never winning best director. Scorsese only winning several decades after he did his best work, for what was one of his poorest movies.
I think you are talking about the banalisation of the medium combined with the Academy crawling further up their own arse as a reaction to it?
Think, though, of how there used to be one arthouse cinema in town and now there are dedicated "indie"-type multiplexes, 21-plexes with several indie films, etc. And then with dvd's and the internet, access to a wider range of films is easier than before, even if it still costs a shit-ton to make a movie. Word of mouth spreads more quickly, too.
Argo was a very good film for the first two thirds. Why is it that people expect that Zero Dark Thirty should be accurate, while Argo is allowed to make up huge historical whoppers, present them as real life, and that's all dandy? Seth McFarlane was fine. Good looking feller who can sing and dance. The jokes were tamer than advertised, nothing to get worked up about. My goodness, it's not as if he did a James Franco.
I only recently read the rumors that Franco behaved that way because he was tired of how Hathaway had been acting in the lead-up to the show.
There is something very off-looking about Seth McFarlane. He honestly looks like a woman who has had reconstructive surgery to look like a man -- and I don't mean that in necessarily pejorative way. He just looks like that's not the way he should look. Credit for a shockingly good voice. No credit for being pretty darn unfunny, at least for the few bits I saw.
The only thing that was supposed not historically accurate in Argo was they were not chased at the end when the plane took off.
I never liked that kind of humor McFarland did on that show when Don Rickles did it and Rickles did it better.
Was basically satisfied with last night's results. Thank heavens DeNiro didn't win. Get out of the profession, hack! A real actor got the award. Thrilled Quentin won for his writing. Someone who actually takes the screenplay seriously and won't let actors jerk off all over it. Happy with Suger Man for best doc, too. Entertaining, and not some sententious BS that all the rest in the category seemed to be. Michelle Obama was a great move. Apparently, Harvey Weinstein got the idea and worked it out.
OK, I thought I had never seen a Jennifer Lawrence film, but a quick Wiki-check reveals she was in the latest X-Men, which I saw most of in a hotel and I guess she was fine in that. But, based on this alone (especially after the first few questions), I am now officially a fan:
She seems very authentic. I read an article about her where someone went an interviewed her and she had them meet her somewhere hiking and she just went and squated behind a tree to take a piss.
Re Argo, here's a ten minute segment from the terrific BBC series "Witness" where they interview some key figure in an event, in this case the Canadian ambassador in Tehran at the time.
I actually went the other way. I now start to doubt how much of this is genuine and how much of it is a shtick. There seems to be a bit of a Hathaway backlash for "wanting" her Oscar too much. But I don't believe too much in people who have been pressed up against the industry's bosom and still pretend not to be part of the machine. Lawrence is a talented actress (lightyears ahead of other actresses of her generation à la Kristen Stewart) but I don't believe the authenticity of her public persona any more or less than of any other actor/actress.
Eye of the beholder. For me, I have gone from really liking Hathaway on-screen to becoming incredibly annoyed at her public persona, based on her (in my humble view) faux sincerity at awards shows. Last night's seemingly private aside of "...it came true..." for example seemed so pre-thought-out. Just grab it and yell it to the audience. Yes, My Dream Came True. That's something to be proud of. Not whispery cutesy about. But, seriously, little could be less important.