Oscars 2010

[Ben]

Well, I think ten nominations has proved that the arty movies still get the votes (and so they always will, for being brave enough to make those films and for voters to support what they probably wish they could make more of themselves) but that all opening it up did was to let in a bunch of not very good movies and making the list/Oscar telecast that much longer.

As for the animation rules...good! As I just mentioned elsewhere, Tangled's no-show looks to have been a catalyst and it's very likely possible the Academy has added this clause precisely because many felt that film should have been nominated. That alone means Tangled has received due (if late) recognition and has actually affected some change for the good.

[EricJ]

Well, I think ten nominations has proved that the arty movies still get the votes (and so they always will, for being brave enough to make those films and for voters to support what they probably wish they could make more of themselves)

No, it's because since the Academy stripped the committee of the time to think and talk about what movies they liked, the list now validates the conversations regular moviegoers have every November when they can't think of anything:
"What do you think's going to be nominated this year?"
"Well, I bet Black Swan gets in, the trailer looked good....I read that 127 Hours got a lotsa awards; they'll probably get True Grit, 'cause the Coens did it, and Inception's going to sweep it, they always give it to Leo!"

...C'mon. That's for Oscar-buzz fanboys, not registered voters who actually work in their chosen field. Even worse, that's for the sickeningly celeb-drooling Golden Globes, given by nobody-knows-who.
We want awards that shame the Globes with their lack of West-coast shallowness, and challenge the fanboys to think of other movies besides the Coens and Christopher Nolan--And yet take back good old-fashioned Yankee cinema populism from the militant snootiness of the National Board of Review, who's still paranoid enough to think we WOULD have given it to Avatar, and makes a great deliberate show of praising "A Serious Man" instead.

[Ben]

As someone who hangs out with a fair number of the kind of people who actually do vote in these things, it does bring a smile to my face when I hear you sprouting such inaccuracies based on...well, whatever it is you base them on!

[EricJ]

Well, I was imitating the watercooler conversations WE have, and then hinting at the unsettling coincidences to nominations #7-10 on the ten-lists:

Christoph Waltz certainly deserved his BSA for "Inglorious Basterds", but anybody who actually put that up for Best Picture could only have been either
A) a name-director fanboy,
B) picking popular titles out of whatever had gotten good RottenTomatoes scores,
C) still going on what was "buzzed" before it opened because they hadn't seen it yet either, or
D) just couldn't think of anything that hadn't opened in the mainstream theaters.
(And "District 9" didn't even have any Acting performances to fall back on.)

The voters aren't there to GUESS at what should get Best Picture. That's after the noms come out.

[Dacey]

Or...it could've just been because "Inglorious Basterds" was a really good movie.

[Bill1978]

That's great news about the Animation Feature category. Great to see it will be a guaranteed category for the foreseeable future. And great to see the re-adjustment of how many movies can qualify based upon the output. I too view it as recoginising that Tangled should have been nominated in a field that was large enough to justify 4 nominations. Just a pity that the voters couldn't reward Tangled in the one category it got nominated in. (And Eric I know why it lost, so no need to get all high and almighty and sarcastic about TS3's win in Original Song).

I am not happy about the change to the Best Film category. I hate the concept as it is applied to the Original Song category and I hate it hear. The way I've read the press release is that with the expansion to 10 movies, the Acadamy feels that unworthy movies have be christened as a Best Picture nominee forever. Which is a shame really, if they can live with Norbit being an Oscar nominated film without tweaking that category, why tweak this one now.

Plus I admit, I find it frustrating that rather than sitting down and predicting what 10 films (or 5 films) will be Best Picture nommed, the critics and predictors have to sit around and play a guessing game to show how knowledgable they. I'm already dredding the phrase 'If the Academy decides to go with 10...' that I will be reading from November-January. Personally, I think the Academy should just go back to having 5 films. Extending it hasn't forced a change in voting patterns, all it has done it caused more people to whinge when the blockbuster doesn't beat the arty film as opposed to just whinging that the blockbuster didn't get nominated.

[EricJ]

The way I've read the press release is that with the expansion to 10 movies, the Acadamy feels that unworthy movies have be christened as a Best Picture nominee forever.
Plus I admit, I find it frustrating that rather than sitting down and predicting what 10 films (or 5 films) will be Best Picture nommed, the critics and predictors have to sit around and play a guessing game to show how knowledgable they. I'm already dredding the phrase 'If the Academy decides to go with 10...' that I will be reading from November-January

Again--Toy Story 3 didn't get it, but at least it was CONSIDERED seriously enough, even for people who thought Up wasn't going to make it. We had even regular people saying "TS3 would have made the cut even with 5 nominations."
Which is what the adult-inner-child West Coast Pixar-istas wanted. Well, they wanted it to win--or something to avenge TS2 and Wall-E--but at least they don't have to lose sleep at nights anymore wondering how to leave a door open for Pixar. It's happened twice now, people think it's "common" for a Pixar to make it into the Picture lists, so the more diehard activists can sit back, say "Our job is done...For now.", and wait for something worthy to show up.

The committee should still consider putting the March extra "breathing room" month back in to get some thought and quality back into the nominations, and make them feel less like "everybody else's lists"--
But for now, they don't have to waste "immortality" on four other unworthy films (which would normally be patted off with just Best Screenplay and a Supporting) just to protect Pixar's table-reservation.

[Ben]

After just two titles, it's "common"? After two? Really, Eric?

[EricJ]

Well, after two in a ROW, yes:
If it'd happened only once, as with (ahem) the Disney animated films, we might, oh, think there was some special magical aura about the one that did get nominated, and wonder what classic status or hypnotic hold "Up" had over the public for its carving into immortality...
But by the time TS3 was considered the front runner, the mindset was "Well...yeah, you GOTTA nominate a Pixar, duh!"
Sort of like the second time the Red Sox won the World Series in three years--After that, we just sort of expected it.

(Now, if only we had a second Disney film nominated, so we could stop pretending the first one was good... )

[Ben]

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight...

[Bill1978]

And here I was thinking that the expansion to 10 was to allow the blockbuster like The Dark Knight and Inception and Avatar to get a nod and bring in the mass audience to view the show, as there might be a chance the movie the mass public adored would win over those stupid silly arty film. Silly me. It was and will always be about Pixar winning Best Picture.

I know you hate Beauty And The beast Eric and believe that anybody who likes it (like me) are just brainwashed into liking (far from the truth) and can't possibly think for themselves (I personally think it is the best movie I have ever seen animated or not). What I would like to know, is what Disney animated film do you think should have been nominated AFTER BatB so people would think BatB achievement was nothing special?

Part of the problem with Animated films (in the US at least) is that they are considered children films (and I do believe Pixar films are still considered that as a whole). The Acadmey has developed into a group where I believe they think children films cannot possibly ever be considered for Best Picture - as they aren't deep or symbolic or God knows what. So when one does 'sneak' in like BatB or Babe, a lot of fuss is made over it. Most likely because it is so rare that a film that can be viewed by the whole family is nominated and people think that is kind of a neat scenario if it wins. They do have a point because the last G rated film to win was Oliver!

The only way the Oscars can return to its glory days, is if the public and the studios start seeing films the same way. For some reason blockbuster means turn your brains off entertainment. But when you look at the list of nominess pre-2000 - there are a lot of boxoffice hits that got nominated. Hollywood at the moment is too driven by quick money to care about allowing a film to find its feet.

[Ben]

Personally, I think Hunchback and Tarzan might have been worthy nominations as examples of animated films breaking through, in terms of Disney. I was surprised when Toy Story 2 didn't get that kind of attention.

The "problem" really with animated films and the Academy is not that they're kids product or G-rated, it's that the actors and technicians are "afraid" that if they get too popular they'll all be out of a job! Animation, you see, is this weird little thing that happens in a closed off office block, where thousands of geeks doing technical things and moving characters come out that sound like Robin Williams and Tom Hanks. There's always going to be this off feeling from them than "animation" is not "real" and so shouldn't be counted.

As for "glory days", I don't think it's the Oscars that have dumbed down, it's the filmmakers. Back when big films won big awards they were winning them because the films were actually worthy of that recognition. The King's Speech is actually a good case in point: they let it out there and left it to find its legs. Buzz started to surround it but it was already a sizable hit before the Oscars got near it. Sure, it's not a $300m action adventure with tons of CGI but no-one said an award worthy film had to be those things. TKS is actually one of the more crossover audience/critic friendly films in quite a while.

[EricJ]

What I would like to know, is what Disney animated film do you think should have been nominated AFTER BatB so people would think BatB achievement was nothing special?

Well, if you're talking "All-time", blindly going for "Aladdin" the next year (as some West coasters wanted to) wouldn't have been too out of place. I draw the line at the big West coast mania for Lion King, however.
And TS2 was still seen as "Disney" at the time, and that was the whole touchpoint of the campaign to begin with...If anybody should've been up there.

If you mean current, if You-Know-Who hadn't been there, think "Tangled" probably would have been touted for an audience-favorite fifth-vote on sentimental populist adult-inner-child validation--Ie., the voters don't want to admit they got all gushy over what they grew up thinking in the 80's was a "kiddy" film, unless, of it was a VERY SPECIAL KIDDY FILM THAT TRANSCENDED BOUNDARIES, AND THAT ADULTS COULD BE SEEN LIKING!
Which was a big, big part of the reason for B&B, a year after they knew they missed their chances with Mermaid (it wasn't "okay" back when Mermaid opened, as no one suspected it had Changed any Industries yet, and thought it was a fluke), and, as noted, is a big part of the Pixar mania too.
(The closest we got with the 90's was having the Disney animateds run off with Song/Score every year, because the Committee didn't want to bother with the whole Picture mess again.)

But, in this case it was TS3's year, and all the embarrassed adults wanted to validate their sniffling over the big furnace scene, instead.

But when you look at the list of nominess pre-2000 - there are a lot of boxoffice hits that got nominated. Hollywood at the moment is too driven by quick money to care about allowing a film to find its feet.

As good as King's Speech was, we don't want King's Speech to be a Best Picture*--We want another Amadeus, or Terms of Endearment, or Return of the King.
Nowadays, the only time we do see a box-office hit up for Best Picture is when they blindly crib off whatever box-office celebrities the Golden Globes kissed up to, because they didn't have time to think of their own:
Inception for Best Picture? Oscar "buzz" for Johnny Depp and Alice? As Ben says, "Rii(x17)ight..."

The voters need to take time to start WATCHING movies again, and letting them affect us on a populist audience level, before we can nominate them. That's what we surgically removed, for fear of keeping the Weinsteins out.
Take a look at when you think the nominations first started to become "boring", and let me make a psychic guess: 2004-5? Guess what happened that year.

----
(* - And no, I haven't rented King's Speech yet, but likely next week--Although I will say I liked it better when it was called "The Madness of King George" )

[Bill1978]

I agree with you Ben, about Hunchback being the other potential nominee for a Disney film. That one blew me away on first viewing.

I also agree and sorry if I confused you, that it is not the Oscars that have been dumbed down but the studios. The King's Speech is evidence that you can still make a 'smart' movie that appeals to the masses. I think the big issue is the concept that only movies released in November are worthy of Oscars. The marketplace gets too crowded with limited releases and buzz worthy films that often they all get overlooked by the public and appear to flop. It would be nice if the emphasis was on the movie not the time it was released. I still get gobsmacked at the idea that The Silence Of The Lambs was released in March (I think) and full year before it got the Oscar for Best Picture.

And yes Eric, moving the Oscars back to March may help the overall concept. But the bigger problem is that these days everybody feels the need to not only have awards BUT to also have their awards televised, so you get overkill. As a child, I only ever remember the Golden Globes being the precursor to the Oscars. With all the awards, many winners are fore gone conclusions, which is sad when you consider that even the who cares categories like Costume and Art Direction can be picked by a non-fan just by looking at the Guild Awards.

[EricJ]

And here I was thinking that the expansion to 10 was to allow the blockbuster like The Dark Knight and Inception and Avatar to get a nod and bring in the mass audience to view the show, as there might be a chance the movie the mass public adored would win over those stupid silly arty film. Silly me. It was and will always be about Pixar winning Best Picture.

Well...yeah. (Or wait, were you being ironic? )

Let's run down a few of the last Oscar "changes" that voters kept rallying and pestering the committee for, to "modernize" the Oscars--
- 2000: Best Animated Feature category, to recognize movies like Chicken Run, and um...TS2.
- 2007; Insistence that the Academy declare whether an Actor can be nominated on the basis of an animated voice performance. (Patton Oswalt in "Ratatouille" that year was often cited as an....example.)
- 2009: Nominations increased to ten, to "Allow more mainstream hits to compete" (And bet you can't guess what "mainstream hit" they had in mind...)
- 2010: Article in the trade journals: "Is the Best Animated category obsolete?--Should it be eliminated to help animated films compete in serious competition with main categories?"

...You get the freakin' picture.
Yes, everyone thought the post-'04 nominations were "boring", and finally figured out that was what was lowering the TV ratings, but you could tell what was first on their agendas.

It would be nice if the emphasis was on the movie not the time it was released. I still get gobsmacked at the idea that The Silence Of The Lambs was released in March (I think) and full year before it got the Oscar for Best Picture.

A lot of folks were gobsmacked that the Committee "remembered" it from spring--
Never mind that it'd gotten on a fair number of 10 Best critics' lists and eventually made it onto the AFI 100, Everyone Knew what Everyone Knew about how the Committee thinks, so sorry, it's an established fact that Silence will never, ever be nominated, ever...Next?
It was partly frustration over what they thought would be "forgotten", that pundits searched to see what other hi-profile festival-screened/BO-grossing movie they thought would the favorite for '91...Oo, you'll never guess the one they thought would!