Why the Oscars are a Con

[Joe Hillshoist]

The Bridge over the River Kwai is a very different movie to Paths of Glory.

And in the context of Hollywood choosing it (I think BotRK won a Baafta over PoG too) over an obviously anti war film ...

i think it iullustrates Jacks point quite well:

Well we've gotten to what I thought the subject was when I first clicked on this thread.

Oh hell yeah. It's about politics, buzz, trends and market success as the Academy's downright embarrassing list of the greatest movies ever makes obvious - not that there aren't a few really good ones on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_Aw ... st_Picture

[Nordic]

Well another reason war movies are popular in Hollywood is because there are no "higher stakes" in a drama.

In this town, if you have any meetings over your screenplay, they always talk about "raising the stakes".

It must be very satisfying for these people to see a war movie, where the stakes are cranked up about as high as they can get.

"That movie must be good, the stakes were so high!"

[Cordelia]

I just remembered 'The Player', Robert Altman's 1992 dark comedy about the 'real Hollywood'. As a satire, it exposed and mocked the way films are made--it's been years since I saw it, but maybe it wasn't so outlandish after all. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwnhRRRQtaI

[elephant]

The Player is excellent. Written, by the way, by the same guy who made The Rapture.

Interesting how many of the greatest films investigate war. Favorite five (in no special order):

Grand Illusion
Paths of Glory
Apocalypse Now (the original)
Bridge Over River Kwai
Come and See

(last one is a Russian film from the 80's — check it out — fantastic)

[Cordelia]

Thanks for the list, Elephant. I've never heard of 'Come and See' -- it looks very interesting.

I preferred 'Apocalypse Now Redux' because of the inclusion of the scenes of the colonial French Plantation, the historical perspectives and the aesthetic relief it provided, (and for burying Tyrone). I hated the expanded T&A Playboy Bunny scenes, but that's just me; maybe a lot of guys liked it.

I started working from the bottom, at the site provided by JackRiddler (why are there 10, mostly bad, movies nominated for 2009?) choosing my picks, if any, for best picture and stopped at 2005 with 'Crash', which I thought was awful, but not as bad as 'Brokeback Mountain'. I chose 'Munich', which I've got a copy of because, I'm embarrased to admit, I think it's a really good film. It's at the top of my list of movies 'I hate to love'. I realize it's historically inaccurate and its bullshit based on lies. Really well made, artful propaganda, and I'm probably a case study for being sucked in, even if I don't believe it. I remember that summer of the Olympics, there was a lot going on in my life, so I'm easily drawn back to that era. It's a shamelessly entertaining film about ruthless killers who are also gourmets and enjoy cooking and eating together after they kill (the scene of when the trio sadistically kills the Dutch woman assassin, then cuts to the scene chopping vegetables, is especially memorable) and I was fascinated by the mysterious bourgeois French family that brokered names &death. I'm not a Spielberg fan--I've never liked his films, but I confess, and I'm still trying to figure out why, that one really drew me in.

What medium is more powerful, or manipulative, than film?

[JackRiddler]

What medium is more powerful, or manipulative, than film?

A casino to the gambling addict, certain drugs to their respective junkies, Internet to the porn junkie, prison environments, and war itself.

I think that's it. Film is king.

Cordelia, thanks for a good read!

[Nordic]

I just remembered 'The Player', Robert Altman's 1992 dark comedy about the 'real Hollywood'. As a satire, it exposed and mocked the way films are made--it's been years since I saw it, but maybe it wasn't so outlandish after all. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwnhRRRQtaI

No, it really wasn't terribly outlandish at all. Just good dark satirical storytelling about the film business.

[BOOGIE66]

The closing scene has the remainder of the victorious US platoon mopping up, marching with rifles still at the ready and singing the Disney Mouseketeers song. At the call of "Mickey Mouse," the response is not a defiant "Donald Duck" as in the orignal lyrics, but a repeated "Mickey Mouse!" Kubrick leaves no doubt about which side of the "American soul" he thinks came out on top.

'
I thought that it was supposed to be a commentary on how we sent a bunch of babies to bring the "American dream" (some dream - Mickey Mouse!) to those filthy commies in Vietnam.

[82_28]

5 Reasons The Oscars Matter Even Less Than You Thought

<snip> With their track record of fuck-uppery, you'd think Hollywood would take the Oscars with a grain of salt. When the barometer for artistic success in your industry doesn't even really care if you're all that good at what you do, then why should you? If you took such an innocent attitude into an Oscar race against the Weinsteins, you'd wake up the morning of the Oscars wearing a necklace made from the teeth of the Chinese dignitary whose murder they'd framed you for.

Throughout the 90s, Miramax's entire business plan was built around creating films specifically tailored to the Academy's delicate sensibilities, banking on the added exposure a win would bring. This plan was put to the test in 1998, when Miramax's Shakespeare in Love was nominated alongside Saving Private Ryan, which spent the summer making every war film that had ever won an Oscar look like a high school play. It was a foregone conclusion Saving Private Ryan would win. And then the campaign started.

The month leading up to the Academy Awards are like an especially petty high school election, if high school students had access to the money cannon that made Transformers 2 possible. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, "Miramax spent an estimated $16 million (about $2,700 for each academy member) on its Shakespeare (in Love) campaign." Miramax also leaned on journalists to criticize Private Ryan for being historically inaccurate, a ballsy maneuver when you consider that Ryan's storming of Normandy made veterans of that battle shit their theater seats, and Miramax's film turned Shakespeare's creative process into a gender bending romantic comedy.

Didn't matter. On the night of the Awards, Shakespeare in Love shocked everyone by winning Best Picture award out from under the Citizen Kane of modern war films.

Which brings us to the Citizen Kane of all films: Citizen Kane. Anyone who cares a little too much about movies swears Orson Wells's 1942 film is the best thing ever projected onto a silver screen. And it's not like people didn't realize it at the time: It was nominated for nine Academy Awards, and was widely expected to win most if not all of them. Then William Randolph Hearst, the publishing giant whose life Kane is loosely based on, started a smear campaign that focused on director Orson Wells's contempt for Hollywood. On the night of the Awards, the audience of Academy members actually booed every time Wells's name was mentioned. The most influential film of all time lost Best Picture to How Green Was My Valley, a film that archeological records indicate nobody gave a shit about even then.

The passage of time reveals a movie's true quality, not the number of gold statues it won. Citizen Kane didn't win the Best Picture, neither did Raging Bull, or Dr. Strangelove, or Rear Window or Star Wars. Keep that in mind while you're watching the circus, and you'll have a better time all around.

http://www.cracked.com/article_18460_5- ... ought.html

Whole article at link.

[vince]

Didn't "Taxi To The Dark Side" win an oscar?

[Cordelia]

Didn't "Taxi To The Dark Side" win an oscar?

It won for best documentary. I tried to watch it about a year ago but couldn't finish. Not because the film wasn't excellent, but because what the U.S. occupations are doing to human beings is so horrific, I just couldn't watch any more of it.

But hey, maybe 'The Hurt Locker' will win Best Picture this year, and everyone can continue to pretend, via Hollywood fiction.

[Nordic]

Well there ya go. "Hurt Locker" it is.

Haven't seen it, so I can't really say much about it.

But Bigelow's acceptance speech wasn't exactly .... uh ...... revealing of any anti-war sentiments on her part. "I'd like to thank all our men and women in uniform" or whatever.

Why? For being suckers? For being victims? For being gangsters for capitalism?

Or for giving her the subject matter for her career-rocketing film?

[smiths]

talking of the player reminded me of the very interesting Arlington Road

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlington_Road

[82_28]

Well there ya go. "Hurt Locker" it is.

Haven't seen it, so I can't really say much about it.

But Bigelow's acceptance speech wasn't exactly .... uh ...... revealing of any anti-war sentiments on her part. "I'd like to thank all our men and women in uniform" or whatever.

Why? For being suckers? For being victims? For being gangsters for capitalism?

Or for giving her the subject matter for her career-rocketing film?

Yeah. I launched into an "anti war" rant myself to my girlfriend. Key "cliche" issue. Oh you know, just simply Iraqi children and innocent people and such -- ah, that old cliche. It's awesome how getting worked up about such things warrants a mere roll of the eyes anymore.

I've never seen Hurt Locker either. But A) I already hate the name and B) Nothing that doesn't call out the scam this all is will ever do anything for me theatrically nor emotionally.

So buck up all! We're just witnessing "history"! What an awesome time to be alive!

[Simulist]

The Oscars are absolutely a con, but a chance to watch Sandra Bullock makes even that seem like time well spent.