Gold Bugged

MovieBob

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Gold Bugged

MovieBob takes a look at the good, the bad and the ugly of this year's Academy Awards nominations.

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Safaia

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I said it on your blog and I will say it again; at least ParaNorman got a best animated feature nomination (that it won't win).
 

Sixcess

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MovieBob said:
Still, not only would I say a nomination would be utterly deserved, it would've been of tremendous historical note as Lana Wachowski would've become the first transgendered Oscar nominee.
I can't shake the ugly suspicion that this is at least part of why Cloud Atlas has been so thoroughly snubbed. Oh, the Wachowskis have enough clout in Hollywood that noone in the business is going to say it to her face, but I'm sure there there are some amongst the older and/or more conservative elements of the Academy who don't want to give 'that sort of person' the recognition of even a nomination.
 

hentropy

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In some ways I agree with the Academy when it comes to Cloud Atlas and makeup/effects. Maybe it deserved a nod over Hitchcock (lol), but the makeup was really, really, REALLY obvious and it broke immersion. Saying it's "part of the message/artistic delivery" is a cheap and lazy cop-out, as anyone can make up any message to Cloud Atlas they want. Something tells me it would have been a much better movie had they just nixed the gimmick of using the same actors in every story, putting them in cross-racial makeup that looked weird and non-human and expected no one to have a problem with it. It was a bad idea that dragged the movie down and injected completely predictable controversy. In any case, The Hobbit deserves it more than Cloud Atlas and will win. Every other nominee this year for Best Costume Design actually had a lot better costumes, and the visual effects felt flat and uninspired at times, the only memorable effects being the cafe in the Neo-Seoul. It did deserve a nod for editing, though. I did really like Cloud Atlas but there is a difference between true artistry and pretentiousness.

I don't think Zero Dark Thirty or Chastain are really out of the picture due to the controversy, though. I think the Academy was mostly just punishing Bigelow over, once again, injecting needless controversy into the film. It's trumped up, perhaps, but there's evidence to believe that either the CIA lied or the filmmakers lied, and I don't think they want to be giving her an Oscar as the scandal continues to unfold. I don't think they'll block Chastain or the movie as a whole from winning anything, though, especially since Chastain was leagues ahead of all the other nominees.

I think the love for Silver Linings Playbook is mostly a misguided attempt at trying to become relevant to younger audiences who didn't see/care about any of the other historical movies. It won't win anything big.
 

Hitchmeister

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It says a lot for inertia that the Oscars are still taken seriously at all. It seems every other awards show is either of trivial niche interest or a farcical waste of time. Yet people still spend a couple months every year discussing the Oscars, even if it's just to complain about how out of touch with mainstream movie audiences they are.
 

Rainboq

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Sixcess said:
MovieBob said:
Still, not only would I say a nomination would be utterly deserved, it would've been of tremendous historical note as Lana Wachowski would've become the first transgendered Oscar nominee.
I can't shake the ugly suspicion that this is at least part of why Cloud Atlas has been so thoroughly snubbed. Oh, the Wachowskis have enough clout in Hollywood that noone in the business is going to say it to her face, but I'm sure there there are some amongst the older and/or more conservative elements of the Academy who don't want to give 'that sort of person' the recognition of even a nomination.
This, oh so very much this.

OT: I honestly stopped paying attention to the Oscar's a long time ago, they tend to give a lot of (often unmerited awards) to thin and shallow attempts at pandering to them. Its kind of sad, really.
 

Varya

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Nov 23, 2009
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I'm not surprised or even upset that the Hobbit hasn't gotten as many nominations as previous (obviously it was never gonna come close to RotK's record) but not even a nomination for costumes? Come on!
 

Hitchmeister

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hentropy said:
I think the love for Silver Linings Playbook is mostly a misguided attempt at trying to become relevant to younger audiences who didn't see/care about any of the other historical movies. It won't win anything big.
Did those audiences care anything about THAT movie?
 

coheedswicked

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I am baffled by the lack of Cloud Atlas, especially for make-up/ effects. Maybe they just didn't watch the movie?
 

PunkRex

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Safaia said:
I said it on your blog and I will say it again; at least ParaNorman got a best animated feature nomination (that it won't win).
And there I was about to make a standard 'Don't want to/havn't seen any of these' comment (except for Django but thats not out in the UK till next week) when you tell me they actually reckonised that amazing film!

Whats it up against:
Brave
Wreck-It Ralph
Frankenweenie
ParaNorman
The Pirates! Band of Misfits.

...hrrrm, 'Wreck-It Ralph' is STILL not out here in the UK and 'Frankenweenie' was out for all of one week so I missed it *annoyed mumbling*, id like to think the academy better then to just go for Pixar what with it being the safe option as 'Brave' had alot of issues but still... ParaNorman was freaking amazing.
 

hentropy

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Hitchmeister said:
hentropy said:
I think the love for Silver Linings Playbook is mostly a misguided attempt at trying to become relevant to younger audiences who didn't see/care about any of the other historical movies. It won't win anything big.
Did those audiences care anything about THAT movie?
It doesn't matter if the Academy believes they did. I mean, it did make 48 mil at the box office, and the only people I can imagine who saw it were young hip couples.

coheedswicked said:
I am baffled by the lack of Cloud Atlas, especially for make-up/ effects. Maybe they just didn't watch the movie?
In film school we were taught that things like makeup should be unnoticeable/realistic/believable looking if they're meant to be human. Did anyone with makeup on in Cloud Atlas look like it could actually be a human being? There's you answer. It should have been snubbed and it was snubbed.
 

Froggy Slayer

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Sixcess said:
MovieBob said:
Still, not only would I say a nomination would be utterly deserved, it would've been of tremendous historical note as Lana Wachowski would've become the first transgendered Oscar nominee.
I can't shake the ugly suspicion that this is at least part of why Cloud Atlas has been so thoroughly snubbed. Oh, the Wachowskis have enough clout in Hollywood that noone in the business is going to say it to her face, but I'm sure there there are some amongst the older and/or more conservative elements of the Academy who don't want to give 'that sort of person' the recognition of even a nomination.
The thought that the Academy, who are still kind of looked up to as the authority on film would be THAT out of touch with society is a worrying sentiment.
 

RJ Dalton

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Just another reason for me not to give a shit about the Academy Awards.

I think I may have said the same thing last year, too.
 

BrotherRool

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I've suddenly become unable to stand the snarky asides, why now? Okay maybe it was a little bit poor to make the age reference twice in the same article, or to combine a snarky aside about age along with pointing out that a beloved one dying of a stroke might be relevant to old people. And then your also snarking films I liked in that assuming 'we' . I'm sorry I guess I'm being worse by making these comments, but still, normally I'd just go away and stop reading your stuff, but you are for me the most interesting opinion writer on the Escapist and I enjoy your stuff the most so I don't want to stop reading it. Ultimately you've got a large fanbase and yourself to please and my opinion isn't representative, but I don't want to be quiet either in case you decide to look at yourself and maybe you'll agree with me (Or maybe you won't =D)
 

NinjaDeathSlap

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Well, if nothing else, we can hope that what usually happens when the Academy makes a bunch of stupid decisions will happen again, and all the mediocrity that they chose to shower with rewards will be forgotten about by next year, and the stuff they snubbed will end up still being fondly remembered 2 decades from now.
 

rayen020

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No cloud Atlas, No avengers, No Hobbit, No Dark knight... I'm wondering since the Academy keeps not inducting young people if it will eventually just die out? Are they all old or are the younger voters not picking good Blockbusters because "they're not suppose to"?

incidentally as Bob said alcohol will be needed for the night of the 24th. Has anyone drawn up a drinking game for this year's awards? usually some are made after nominations have been released.
 

PunkRex

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RJ Dalton said:
Just another reason for me not to give a shit about the Academy Awards.

I think I may have said the same thing last year, too.
Did you have the same avatar last year? Because I think I remember you saying that...
 

an annoyed writer

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Sixcess said:
MovieBob said:
Still, not only would I say a nomination would be utterly deserved, it would've been of tremendous historical note as Lana Wachowski would've become the first transgendered Oscar nominee.
I can't shake the ugly suspicion that this is at least part of why Cloud Atlas has been so thoroughly snubbed. Oh, the Wachowskis have enough clout in Hollywood that noone in the business is going to say it to her face, but I'm sure there there are some amongst the older and/or more conservative elements of the Academy who don't want to give 'that sort of person' the recognition of even a nomination.
You would not believe how much it pisses some of us transgendered folk off. As much as I love film, the Academy is one of those things that really needs a modernization. They're just barely gripping the idea that women can direct good movies and the like. I think that the thought of giving Lana any awards made some of their heads explode.