OSCAR is out of touch

[wilebill]

I never have been able to figure out why people get their panties in a wad over what they see as injustices and conspiracy theories in Oscar nominations and winners/losers. Oscars are chosen by the people who are members of the Academy - the people who work in the industry - not by the end users. Industry people see these movies in an entirely different light than the regular viewer does. And hey, they're all artists and artists usually look at the world differently than non-artists. That's why they're artists.

Take any profession. Let's take teaching for an example. A teacher may or may not be popular with their students and may or may not win some sort of an award, for instance most popular teacher. However, the professional organization that the teacher belongs to may see that teacher in an entirely different light. A teacher may win some sort of accolade from their profession but not be that popular with their students. However, sometimes the 2 coincide, but not always.

If you want to base how good a movie is on viewership, then only pay attention to the Golden Globes.

[wilebill]

But a major flaw in your logic is that *winning* an Academy Award is almost always used to promote a film, an actor, a director, etc., to the general public.

Everybody does it. Car makers are always saying what awards a particular model has garnered, but it usually is not the most popular among buyers.

I fail to understand why people put so much emphasis on the Oscars anyway.

My point exactly.

My point was to further illustrate how out of touch the Academy (and Hollywood) is with the rest of the civilized world.

The members choose the awards, I guess they can give it to whomever gets the most votes from the members. My point is that when choosing, their criteria is going to be different, in a lot of cases, than the average viewer. But that's their prerogative, it's their assn and their award. I'm sure all the reasons you're giving is why the Golden Globes came into being.

In terms of the teacher example, it sounds good in theory, but effective teachers are almost ALWAYS popular with their students because effective teacher breed success, which is the number one motivator for any student K-12. In my 10 years working as a consultant in the schools, and my 12 years as a student in the schools, I cannot recall one instance where a teacher group gave an *outstanding teacher award* to a teacher that was disliked by a majority of his/her students.

But a better example would be do all popular teachers win an award? Would the professional teacher assn be out of touch if they didn't agree with the students? And I didn't say "disliked by a majority" I said "may not be that popular" and should have emphasized that.

[iheartellisons]

...The five nominees for Best Picture and their grosses (as of today):

Crash - $53.4 million
Brokeback Mountain - $51 million
Munich - $40.6 million
Good Night and Good Luck - $25.1 million
Capote - $15.3 million

wow:smt119 ive only heard of one of those movies! and i consider myself a movie fanatic...very interesting

[fuzzis]

wow:smt119 ive only heard of one of those movies! and i consider myself a movie fanatic...very interesting

Good Nigh and Good Luck was an excellent movie...about Edward R. Murrow and the media's response to the government's red scare. Black and white. It was very intense watching it in the theater. As they were making decisions and waiting for the consequenes, I found I was tense and holding my breath along with the characters on screen.

fuzzis

[spoon]

Half of Hollywood is gay so why not vote for their buddies?

[wilebill]

Half of Hollywood is gay so why not vote for their buddies?
And the other half isn't so why not vote for theirs? :smt102 For some reason I missed something there.

[itzme]

Half of Hollywood is gay so why not vote for their buddies?

This is tooooo funny. How do you know? Have you lived there or have you slept with that half. Where do you get this? Please becareful in not saying a thought as if it were a fact.

The reason that most of us in our area have not heard of or seen these movies is because with a large target market like Atlanta, Knoxville ect.

From the friends I have in that industry (guess what . . none are gay) The movies that are conservative and religious are not movies that have big numbers in the box office BUT have large numbers in DVD sales.
and . . . . winners are based on marketing strategies. That's why some very good movies are never recognized.

So when these actors, producers ect win, it's normally because they new how to market.

[ynotme297]

Half of Hollywood is gay so why not vote for their buddies? the way you seperate the men from the boys in hollywood is with a PRY BAR.:smt038:smt038:smt038:smt038

[Tully Mars]

The movies that are conservative and religious are not movies that have big numbers in the box office BUT have large numbers in DVD sales.


Then how does that explain this:

2005

#1 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - $879 Million worldwide
#2 Star Wars III - $848 Million worldwide
#3 The Chronicles of Narnia - $634 Million worldwide - Far as I know it is not out on DVD yet so this is just box office

2004

#1 Shrek 2 - $910 Million worldwide
#2 Harry Potter - $789 Million worldwide
#3 Spiderman 2 - $784 Million worldwide
#4 The Incredibles - $631 Million worldwide
#5 The Passion - $611 Million worldwide

That's two years in a row with conservative, religious movies in the top five worldwide. It appears to me that conservative and religious movies are doing quite well at the box office. :smt102

[Tully Mars]

And many forget that Tolkien said his LTR trilogy was based on a vision he felt came from God that was similar to battle in the book of the Revelation, though I think that won't be much of a battle personally. But to ignore the clear Christian typeology in LTR is to miss a major theme of the films.

Dang, I forgot LTR. How about this:

2001

#1 Harry Potter (again) - $976 million worldwide
#2 The Lord of The Rings: Fellowship of the Ring - $870 million worldwide

[mccole79]

Munich was a great movie, IMO.

[wusmmik]

wow, folks I hate to break up the party..but Hollywood isn't to blame for those movies..most of those movies are actually made outside of Hollywood by independent investors or small studios (like Good Machine for Ang Lee and James Schamus who also made "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon").

Hollywood movies unfortunately are the pablum that are in theatres now like "Big Momma's House 2". So, before you go counting the grosses on these small films, take their budgets into account first:

Munich $70,000,000
Brokeback Mountain $13,000,000
Capote $7,500,000
Good Night and Good Luck $7,000,000
Crash $6,000,000

Munich was a huge gamble for Spielberg, he resisted any big buildup of commercial and chose to go low-key and release it in theatres slowly, but given the budget it's still a big budget picture..

Brokeback Mountain was produced by a Canadian group and then picked up by Universal's specialty division, Focus Features.

Capote is a result of Phillip Seymour Hoffman's friendship with the director Bennett Miller. If you watched "Judging Amy", Amy's brother Vincent, is the screenplay's writer and a producer. Hoffman is a producer as well.

Good Night and Good Luck is produced by George Clooney and Steven Soderbergh..a couple of guys who likely live in Hollywood, but work far outside of the norm (witness Soderbergh's latest "Bubble" being released to theatres and on DVD simultaneously) By the way, had Clooney not written himself out being a producer, he would nominated for 4 Oscars.

Crash is produced by its writers Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco and Don Cheadle even threw in some money for the production. Once it was completely and the buzz started around it, Lions Gate (the same company that released "The Passion of The Christ") bought it and released it.

So, yes, Hollywood is out of touch with the American film consumer. But these films were low budget and therefore small releases because of promotion and the manufacturing of prints, etc. Only now that they have Oscar nominations, will some theatres begin to book these films..and because January and February are the time of year that Hollywood burns off chaff like ("Big Momma's House 2", "Underworld:Evolution", "Annapolis" and the list goes on and on)

Now as for the criticism of no nominations for "Narnia", the Academy regularly honors films like these in technical categories. It's not that they have anything against big-budget wonders, it's not that they don't pay attention to grosses (just look at the fact that "King Kong" received no major nominations nor did "Cinderella Man" because they underperformed). It's just that these filmmakers,actors, artisans etc. are the ones who judge these films. 5,700 is the most accurate estimate.

Finally, thanks to DVDs Academy members from all over the country can watch these films, but not to burst the bubble about 80% of all filmmakers and crews live around Los Angeles.

I hope this is helpful, I'm not trying to hit anyone over the head with these figures...just look beyond the grosses..seriously, "The Dukes of Hazzard" made Warner Bros. $100 million dollars last year..we all know that's an awful movie...an awful Hollywood movie.