MahlerIsGod

Greetings All,
I had an interesting conversation with my father. He hadn't seen LOTR - ROTK yet but now that it had won so many Oscars, "it must be worth seeing." I think it goes without saying that winning an Oscar means nothing concerning a movies quality. I brought up to him some of Oscar's greatest screwups and I thought I would share. Those are the people who should have won but didn't:

1) Samuel Jackson: nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Pulp Fiction

2)Quiz Show/Shawshank Redemption/Pulp Fiction: nominated for Best Picture (there really should have been a three way tie, certainly not Forrest Gump)

3)Kenneth Branagh: nominated for Best Actor for Henry V

4) Peter O'Toole: nominated for Best Actor for Lawerence Of Arabia

The grand-daddy of them all:
5)Star Wars: nominated for Best Picture

Those are just of a few of my sorer points towards Oscar.

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BulletCatcher

How about Shakespeare in Love beating out Saving Private Ryan for Best Picture in 1998.

Lasereth

Neither Matrix sequel getting a nomination for visual effects.

-Lasereth

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Tophat665

It looksas though you have a point, but for me to really hold an opinion, you need to let us know who was chosen over them. The analagous situation in the Grammy's was Jethro Tull (one of my top three favorite bands ever) beating out Metallica for the first ever Metal grammy. That was a travesty. If these are on that order, fine. If not, then you're being naive. There's no way to tell without the winners, and I am far too drunk and lazy to look them up.

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Fremen

You won't let that go, will you?


What about Hitchcock getting continuously passed over by the Academy?
A tragedy, I tell you.

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MahlerIsGod

Unfortunately BulletCatcher, I am complete agreement with the Academy on that one. THe first half of the movie = brilliant. Second half of the movie = WWII A-Team/MacGyver. For me that ruined the movie. IMHO

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"But a work of art is a conscious human effort that has to do with communication. It is that or its nothing. When an accident is applauded as a work of art, when a cult grows up around the deliciousness of inadvertent beauty, we are in the presence of the greatest decadence the West has known in its history."

Plan9Senior

These awards are all driven by money and box office totals unfortunatley.

Derwood

Well, I wouldn't say that. They are biased though. The Academy is made up of actors, directors, producers, etc. from the industry, so certain films can win based on popularity among the industry.

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Batman976

I always thought Kramer vs. Kramer beating Apocalypse Now for Best Picture was one of the worst.

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brianna

Gwyneth Paltrow getting the best actress award for "Shakespeare in Love" over Cate Blanchet in "Elizabeth" is the Oscar moment that made me forever doubt their judgement.

the_marq

I hear this same argument every year come Oscar time. In my circle of friends we refer to it as a "Marissa Tomei."

Regardless of who wins, anyone who takes the Oscars so seriously needs to consider the source. I mean, it's about movie people getting awards from other movie people.

What's the alternative:

**voting by the people, the common movie goer?
Well so far the People's Choice awards havn't really been a big hit. What happened to the Blockbuster awards anyway?
**voting by the movie critics?
Who watched the Golden Globes or the BAFTA awards? Not me.

It's unfair to say that big money makers win all the awards. Sure, ROTK swept this year, but I've yet to hear a credible argument as why is should not have. It was a great movie and series of movies. Don't forget that Lost in Translation won an award as did Mystic River and Monster. All three of these movies put together didn't earn the money ROTK made in it's opening weekend.

Point is; the Oscars are movie industry back-slapping and dick sucking. Don't let yourself get too excited about who wins these things, it's not like Carrot Top is getting nominated....yet.

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#3 in a series

FleaCircus

The Academy Awards are for a particular film, not a series of films or a body of work. All the awards this year were for ROTK, and the first two installments of the trilogy should not have played into the voting process at all. The impression that I get, though, was that the Best Director and Best Picture awards were more for a "body of work" than for ROTK specifically.

I've got no complaints with ROTK winning any of the other awards that it did, just those top two.

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KellyC

Biggest error according to me:
8 Mile - best soundtrack. How the hell?.....

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Derwood

Best Supporting Actor - Cuba Gooding Jr. Auuugggghhh!

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Charlatan

It's all just opinion of course... one person's Cuba is another Tomei...

The thing is not to think too much about it.

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PulpMind

I was deeply saddened that Triplettes of Belleville did not get more recognition this last year.. no nominatino for "foreign film" and only really nominated for "best animation" - which it should of won (a seperate "best cgi" should of been created years ago)..

oh well... this is why I stopped paying attention to the oscars, and most other pop media awards, yeeeaaars ago..

bundy

although i find it hard to agree with most of the suggestions here, i agree with this.
This Oscar win is without a doubt the dodgiest sham ever.

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HunterDevourer

The habit of continually passing over any of Stanley Kubrick's films when they were released. Few remember those that did win in the same year as a Kubrick film, but plenty more remember Stanley's works.
Similarly, Scoresese/DeNiro didn't receive much recognition for their earlier teamups.

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Kostya

1976 - Rocky gets Best Picture over Scorsese's masterpiece Taxi Driver...

I'd like to Thank the Academy for fucking nothing...

Kramer Vs Kramer's another fucking travesty....

Gladiator - Piece of forgettable crap.

frankgrimes

worst error ever: titanic winning anything, let alone 11 0scars including best picture.

mattevil

Who could forget classics like Raging Bull,E.T., and Citizen Kane? The Academy that's who!They all lost yet Out of Africa won!
/this rant was somewhat plagiarized from the Critic

JoeyB

Most supporting Actors and Actresses....


Mira Sorvino
Marisa Tomei
Cuba

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KnifeMissile

The Oscars are far more political than, perhaps, you realize. For instance, why did Al Pacino win best actor for his mediocre performance in Scent of a Woman? It's because he was nominated for best actor twelve times before this and hadn't even won once. So, they decided, out of fairness, to give it to him, that year, despite better performances by others...

Redjake

nah, I think Al Pacino's performance in that movie was spectacular.

if my memory serves me correct, Bill Murray got shit out of an Oscar just a couple of weeks ago I'm all for some Mystic River and Sean Penn though. They were both equally excellent performances. But Bill Murray definitely didn't get it. And he probably won't have another role that good as long as he lives (he is old as hell now, it's crazy).

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balderdash111

Ack, twice in the same sentence!

It's "should have". I know we all pronounce it "should of" but what we're really saying is "should've."

Sorry to be grammar cop, but, as noted in another thread, this is a grammatical pet peeve of mine.

choskins

No question! He beat out Ed Norton that year from Primal Fear. That was a travesty.

Fremen

That's who beat Ed Nortons' spectacular Primal Fear performance!?!??! Cuba Gooding, Jr.?!?!


fuck me....

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Speed_Gibson

two of the big ones - Neither the Marx Brothers or Bob Hope ever winning an oscar.

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Confederate

like it really matters, we all understood the sentence and the point that came across.

grammar nazis are my pet peeve

Mr.Deflok

Shrek winning best animated feature over Monsters Inc. Shrek. I mean... Shrek. Fucking Jesus.

Mr.Deflok

Oh my God! No capitals! No fullstops! Can't. Understand. A. Word!

yournamehere

Old as hell? He's 54, for chrissakes!

Meh . . . I suppose everything is relative.

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notthebeachball

Shakespeare in Love beating Saving Private Ryan for best picture in 98 was an absolute tragedy (ironic considering it was a film about the master of tragedy, William Shakespeare)

The Oscars and Grammy's piss me off.

Radiohead's OK Computer losing to Bob Dylan in 98 was a complete joke.

MahlerIsGod

Actually, the fact that Spielberg won for Best Director is the tragedy I feel. Everything about Shakespeare was masterfully done. Spielberg hasn't done a good movie since............Indiana Jones? Almost forgot about Schnidler's List but excepting that....Indiana Jones.

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"But a work of art is a conscious human effort that has to do with communication. It is that or its nothing. When an accident is applauded as a work of art, when a cult grows up around the deliciousness of inadvertent beauty, we are in the presence of the greatest decadence the West has known in its history."

Kostya

Dear Academy:

Fuck you you fucking fucks. Now, I'm sure you're all sitting around in your penthouses snorting coke off high class hookers' gentalia and feeling indignant that the average film nerd dares to challenge your illusion of legitimacy, but if you'd actually climbed off your 50 million dollar yacht to watch the movies you gave awards to maybe you'd understand my RAGE. You have no balls, (metaphorically speaking) for shame. Let's take for example your spectacular failure in the 70's, is there a toss up between Rocky and Taxi Driver? Fuck no you morons, one's a shitty movie written by a semi literate assclown, and the other is a classic piece of cinema. Could we give the Best Movie award to an actual good movie? No let's give it to the demotic piece of celluloid shit because it's so popular. You fuckers! I can't believe an institution which is supposed to be recognising achievment in an art form gave an award to ROCKY over Taxi Driver. Rocky is such a bullshit reaffirmation of the American dream, it's so fucking ridiculous, if slightly enjoyable in a guilty way (like masterbation). If Rocky was actually a good movie, Rocky would have died in the gutter and nobody would have cared, none of this land of opportunity crap. What, Rocky's great cause it tells kids that anyone can succeed, even inarticulate burnt out street scum can through ridiculous luck and by running around a lot and standing on suitably patriotic locations and jumping. Great symbolism Mr Stallone, why didn't you just smother me with the Stars and Stripes? What a totally forgettable piece of shite, I could have made this movie, at the expense of my self respect, but still, the film is mediocre at best, the acting is shit, direction standard and boring, music, kind of cool, but all in all, nothing worth remembering. Where Rocky is Nixon's version of the American wet dream, Taxi Driver is the American nightmare, a movie tha ruthlessly tears the ass out of the shitty myth Rocky is based on. Travis Bickel's not living in the Land of Opportunity, he's living in a squalid shithole, and he's not about to get a phone call that will change his life, he's going to live and die in the same shithole. It's brilliant, it's harsh, it's confronting, it's as relevent now as it was then. Yet no, the Academy gave the Best Film Award instead to the safe movie, the nice family film that gives us all a warm fuzzy feeling inside when Adrian joins Rocky ringside at the end... Ohhhhhhhh, I'm filled warm fuzzy RAGE! Basically they gave the Best Film award to the cinematic equivilent of masterbation over Taxi Driver, I hope they crash their Mercedes, into Sylvester Stallone's face. Not to mention, Kramer Vs Kramer over Apocalypse now, Shakespeare in Love? I hope you're all happy now. If you get the Best Film award from now on, it means 'Most popular and safe film we could find' bullshit. The Academy's biggest mistake was existing.

Sure, maybe the members of the Academy aren't rich coke heads, but I like to demonise the subjects of my rants, it makes it easier to dislike them...

Ace_O_Spades

How about:

Best Actor: Denzel Washington
Best Actress: Halle Berry

in the same year... it was a brutal duet of bad judgement

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Feh.

notthebeachball

hahaha...awesome, Kostya.

trickyy

waking life should have at least been nominated

i thought the animation was quite good

Kostya

The Academy strikes again! Fucking tools. Yes, Denzel, you're a brilliant actor, but lets ignore your work in Malcom X and The Hurricane, but give you an insulting pity Oscar for your far inferior role in Training Day, gee thanks you wankers...

Ace_O_Spades

and not to mention Halle Berry's softcore porn gimme oscar

that was brutal

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Feh.