The Artist got best picture. I refuse to say ‘won’. What win ?. You don’t win a vote you count it. Anywhos, enough of Vincent attempting to be a grammarian. Now there’s a laugh in itself.
You’d have to say that an entire industry has decided that it’s output for the last twenty years was rubbish. And in recognition, they decided to re-boot the entire system and go right back to the silent era of the 1920s. Fair enough one might say. A bit of iconoclasm is a very creative force
But heck who believes that will happen.
The title of this post is the result of a musing that foresaw a plethora of silent copy-cat productions.
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Haven’t seen The Artist yet. I like your take on the affair though
I am happy our Canadian, Christopher Plummer got best supp. actor at 82. Hurrah!
And I’m happy Meryl Streep got best actress. She almost always is anyway, whether or not she is awarded for it.
I watched half the Oscars with the kids before I bailed and watched the final episode of the season of Downton Abbey. There’s only so much awards show type entertainment I can take.
As Billy Crystal said, ‘who can stick watching a bunch of millionaires giving gold statues to each other for very long’.
Most years I haven’t even see the majority of the films nominated and this year was no exception. I rarely see a film in the theatre, preferring to wait for it on Netflix. Then you don’t feel as bad if it’s crappy and you don’t finish watching it.
Oh me neither. And we don’t have netflix. Leastwise I don’t believe we have.
And I expect that the film is OK. But it will drag a trailer load of horse dropping after it for certain.
I don’t think there has been a memorable film since Schindler’s List. That’s my tuppence-worth.
I was just having this exact same conversation wtih someone today. I haven’t seen The Artist, but I have a suspicion that, even though it might be great, it won because of the novelty of the flick. I’m not much for award shows, but I can handle the SAGs or the GG because they are short and to the point. The Oscars just drag on and on, so I didn’t even bother last night. I was pleased that Meryl Streep won because I did see Iron Lady, and she was spot on with the part. I still think Leo D. was robbed with his lack of acknowledgement for J. Edgar. Hugo (which seemed to take the categories that The Artist didn’t) is on my list as “The Invention of Hugo Cabret” is one of my favorite young reader books of all time.
Schindler’s List was an extraordinary movie, but I haven’t been able to see it since seeing it for the first time in the theatre. It was so emotionally taxing – I spent most of it hanging over the seat in front of me, weeping.
But isn’t that what a film is supposed to do, tax you that is. If it’s worth anything at all it has to cause engagement in you. Be that engagement laughing, crying or turning you on and off like a tap. A film needs to do one of those well. A great film needs to be lots of things, but one of them isn’t cleverness. That’s the abiding notion with this one.
For what it’s worth, I think the Best Picture is where the entire industry attempts to prove they are artists. And there should be a box to tick that says ‘None, this year is good enough’.
It’s up to them to stop producing schlock.
Oh for sure! It was so well done, the slumping and crying was proof! The picks this year were all kind of meh. There are also always rumors that certain filmmakers (directors, producers, writers, actors) are given nods one year because they were left out in a previous year. So movies that may have deserved it are left out. Which is a shame, but just like anything else, politics works its way into just about everything doesn’t it.
I was looking back over the winners since the 80s. Most I couldn’t remember. But one of the losers would be memorable most years but there was sections in the 90s and 00s that are just sinkholes.
My feeling about the Academy Awards is that Hollywood won’t consider a movie unless it has some preachy theme or is self-consciously “artsy.” So much for actual entertainment. You can tell where you’re headed if the director refers to the production as “a film” v. “a movie.” The latter are fun; the former depressing, usually or horribly pretentious. I go to movies to escape and be entertained, not to be reminded how much life can suck.
Cheers.
A bit like a good painting, you don’t need to be told a film/movie/picture is a good one. It will give off an energy all of its own.
The Greeks had a way of nailing this without going all aesthetic theory on its ass. They simply wrote ‘Nico made me’.
Oh, I would add The Mission if for no other reason that the track [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q4KXdxnYIU&w=560&h=315%5D
Very clever post here, Vince.
The title especially. I am very easily entertained which can be good and also sometimes bad. Suffice it to say I really enjoyed The Artist. I felt inspired and moved more than I thought I could with voices blaring in my ears and color burning my retinas. 
Why thank you kind lady. I worked hard on that title.
And I’m not saying that the film is a bad one only that it’s gimmicky. A bit like the CGI used to add crowds in the early – ten years ago- films but now costs more than it would to HAVE the actual people there for the day. This will draw all sorts of rubbishy doppelgänger’s out of the woodwork.
I used to dismiss the Academy Awards until I got Netflix and they had a nifty feature where you could search for the winners of various categories and add them to your list. I started going back to past award winning movies that I didn’t think interested me (because it didn’t cost me an arm or a leg to see them in a theater) and surprisingly, almost all of them I have thoroughly enjoyed. So now, if they are nominated for best picture, it is on my list and I will eventually watch it.
By the way, excellent Academy Award winning movies after Schindler’s List (’94) are Forrest Gump (’95), Braveheart (’96), Million Dollar Baby (05’), Crash (’06), No Country for Old Men (’08) and Slubdog Millionaire (‘09).
But isn’t that a rather different scenario. With such sites it’s a bit like owning you own video store. But if you had to simply pick from memory what would you have. Yes, you remember them while you are reading them.
Put it this way, pick a Dickens novel. And you’ll have five from the top of your head. This whether you’ve read them or not.
My feeling is this won’t even be an also-ran.
P.S; Forest Gump was OK. Braveheart, adequate. MDB, better than it should have been. Crash, what’s this. Ditto ’08 and ’09.
You are correct about the memory thing in that I would have forgotten a few of those things. However, my point is that the majority of the time when the Academy gives an Oscar to a film for best picture, I have never seen it and wonder from the previews how it won. It is only after viewing all the films in the category much later on down the road that I usually understand why it won best picture and was glad to have seen it. I’m guessing this year with The Artist, which I haven’t seen and which the previews look terrible to me, will be no different. Later this year after I’ve seen all the nominees, I will most likely be agreeing that The Artist was indeed the deserved winner and will be glad that I watched it.
It’s a curious choice, not that I’ve seen it (or ever will). What with that, and later the almost JL’o nipple flash, can life get anymore newsworthy?
Didn’t see the JL bit of nipple. But frankly what’s the fuss. Ditto the Janet Jacko display.