Author Topic: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!  (Read 8827 times)

Offline dly64

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BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« on: September 07, 2006, 12:02:41 pm »
Maybe this is a loaded topic since there are many people who are still livid about BBM not winning the Best Picture Oscar. And yes … this is months down the road, but my mind keeps going back to the controversy. I decided to do some delving into the Academy’s track record for Best Picture winners …. not always so great. Some of the winners are:

The Broadway Melody
Cimarron
Cavalcade
Hamlet (1948)
An American in Paris
The Greatest Show on Earth
Marty
Around the World in Eighty Days
Tom Jones
A Man for All Seasons
Chariots of Fire
Gladiator

I am not saying these films aren’t good (I’m not even saying they aren’t great). But how many people actually remember a lot of these films? Now, think of the following films that didn’t win:

King Kong (1933)
The Wizard of Oz
The Grapes of Wrath
Citizen Kane
It’s A Wonderful Life
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Sunset Boulevard
A Streetcar Named Desire
Singin’ in the Rain
High Noon
Shane
Rear Window
Rebel without a Cause
Giant
Vertigo
Some Like it Hot
Psycho (1960)
To Kill a Mockingbird
Dr Strangelove: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
Bonnie and Clyde
The Graduate
2001: A Space Odyssey
Network (which lost to Rocky!!)
Apocalypse Now (which lost to Kramer vs. Kramer)
Fargo (which lost to The English Patient)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (which lost to Gladiator!)
Brokeback Mountain (which lost to Crash)


I can tell you that the latter list has many more memorable and enduring films than does the previous (“winner”) list. 

In short … we need not despair. The true test of greatness will be time. IMO, BBM will weather it … Crash will not.

Diane

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Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #1 on: September 07, 2006, 12:20:31 pm »
I can tell you that the latter list has many more memorable and enduring films than does the previous (“winner”) list. 

Oooo, you'll get arguments on that one! I'm not going to argue, merely state that in my opinion, Tom Jones and A Man for All Seasons are completely deserving of their wins (the Tom Jones being the original one, with Albert Finney, of course).

This is all highly subjective, of course.
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Offline dly64

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #2 on: September 07, 2006, 12:53:00 pm »
Oooo, you'll get arguments on that one! I'm not going to argue, merely state that in my opinion, Tom Jones and A Man for All Seasons are completely deserving of their wins (the Tom Jones being the original one, with Albert Finney, of course).

This is all highly subjective, of course.

You can argue with me ... that's fine. I am not saying that "Tom Jones" or "A Man for All Seasons" aren't great films. They most certainly are. What I am saying is that they are not as universally memorable as, let’s say, “The Birds” (which wasn’t even nominated)  or “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” If we completed a poll … I would venture to guess that darn few people have ever heard about either Oscar winner. Maybe I’m wrong! (Which is a complete possibility).

Additional Edit: I am also not saying "Crash" wasn't a great picture and didn't deserve to win. On the contrary ... it's a fabulous film. However, I don't see "Crash" standing the test of time, IMO.
« Last Edit: September 07, 2006, 12:56:31 pm by dly64 »
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Offline Meryl

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #3 on: September 07, 2006, 01:03:11 pm »
I want to echo wholeheartedly Jeff's singling out of Tom Jones, one of my favorite films ever, as belonging in that winner's category, and A Man for All Seasons is a beautifully acted, intelligent and moving film.  I remember seeing 8 of those 12 films listed, being an old sod, and some of them do deserve to be there.  :)

I will never really forgive the Academy members who, for obtuse, prejudiced or self-serving reasons, chose not to honor what was clearly the best film of 2005.  It is a real blot on the Oscars and should be a wake-up call to their leadership that something is wrong when such a film as Crash can be hyped into a victory over other, more worthy films.  Brokeback Mountain was the most obvious loser, but all the other nominated films were better than the one that actually won.  >:(
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Offline dly64

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #4 on: September 07, 2006, 01:12:57 pm »
I will never really forgive the Academy members who, for obtuse, prejudiced or self-serving reasons, chose not to honor what was clearly the best film of 2005.  It is a real blot on the Oscars and should be a wake-up call to their leadership that something is wrong when such a film as Crash can be hyped into a victory over other, more worthy films.  Brokeback Mountain was the most obvious loser, but all the other nominated films were better than the one that actually won.  >:(

As Jeff has said ... this is completely subjective. I wanted BBM to win, no doubt about it. But, in all honesty, I wasn't shocked that it didn't. All of the films nominated this year were all considered controversial. Every single one. “Crash” is not a safe choice. It’s really not. To tell the truth, I think the producers and marketers behind “Crash” were more dogged in their approach as compared to BBM. I also read (albeit I have no “proof”) that much of the BBM information that went out to the academy downplayed the gay relationship and tried to build up Heath and Michelle’s relationship. If, indeed, this is true …. shame on them! I will do some research and I will see if I can find the source of that information.
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Offline nakymaton

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #5 on: September 07, 2006, 01:26:09 pm »
I don't think the last ten years have been very impressive for the Oscars. I mean, look at the list:

1995 Braveheart
1996 The English Patient
1997 Titanic
1998 Shakespeare in Love
1999 American Beauty
2000 Gladiator
2001 A Beautiful Mind
2002 Chicago
2003 Return of the King
2004 Million Dollar Baby
2005 Crash

I confess that I haven't seen The English Patient or Titanic. (Both movies looked too sappily romantic for me.) Oh, and I refuse to see Crash. Out of the rest, well, I'm a die-hard Tolkien fan, so I'm happy that the Lord of the Rings movies were recognized, even if Fellowship of the Ring is (arguably) the best of the three. But as for the others:

Braveheart isn't that great of a movie, besides being anti-gay and revisionist history and all that. Gladiator is maybe better as an action/period piece, but still not a classic. Shakespeare in Love was very entertaining, at least, but I liked Elizabeth (not Saving Private Ryan, actually) better. American Beauty was... hmmm. A good movie, I guess, but such a bleak view of human nature. Chicago was just another musical, not particularly great stacked up against the classic musicals of a generation or more ago. A Beautiful Mind and Million Dollar Baby were hideous, emotionally manipulative pieces of crap that might have seemed moving at first viewing, but which left a really bad taste in my mouth. (And I wouldn't have seen Crash simply because it was written and directed by Paul Haggis, and I didn't like the writing in Million Dollar Baby. So it isn't just sour grapes.)

So in my opinion, in the last ten years the Academy has made one good choice (RotK), two choices that I'm not sure about (but Titanic is movie history from the shear amount of money it made, I guess, so at least it's memorable in that respect), a bunch that are watchable but probably not classics, and a couple real stinkers.

Honestly, given the Academy's recent record, I'm not going to pay much attention to their choices in the future.
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Offline dly64

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #6 on: September 07, 2006, 02:10:40 pm »
Honestly, given the Academy's recent record, I'm not going to pay much attention to their choices in the future.

You are cracking me up, Mel. And just as Jeff has said, this is all subjective. But where I can follow your logic is the whole idea that the Oscars haven't necessarily had the greatest track record. There are usually some specific patterns: more dramas win than any other genre. The academy usually loves high budget, over-long epics (although 2005 had nothing that would fit that “category”).

Here is a link that you might find humorous … “The Worst of the Academy Awards.”

http://www.filmsite.org/worstoscars.html

I can’t agree with all of their “worst of the worst,” but it’s rather funny to read it anyway.

« Last Edit: September 07, 2006, 02:31:12 pm by dly64 »
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Offline ednbarby

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #7 on: September 07, 2006, 02:27:11 pm »
Ooh, DOGGIE!  That list of the last ten years' winners is quite telling.  And lest we forget that in 1994, "The Shawshank Redemption," still one of the best damned movies I've ever seen, lost to FORREST F***ING GUMP!!!!!  GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!  (Sorry.)

Oh, and that my husband's favorite movie, "Snow Falling on Cedars," WASN'T EVEN NOMINATED for Best Picture for 1999.  (I still get an earful every now and then from him on that, and by the way, that's when he stopped watching the Oscars, so he totally felt my pain when BBM lost.)
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Offline dly64

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #8 on: September 07, 2006, 02:50:57 pm »
Oh, and that my husband's favorite movie, "Snow Falling on Cedars," WASN'T EVEN NOMINATED for Best Picture for 1999.  (I still get an earful every now and then from him on that, and by the way, that's when he stopped watching the Oscars, so he totally felt my pain when BBM lost.)

There's a whole new thread in that comment ... think of the great films that were never even nominated!

"Rear Window"!!!! (One of my all time favorites)
"North by Northwest"
"The Third Man" and "Asphalt Jungle" (and yet they nominated "Born Yesterday", "Father of the Bride", and "King Solomon's Mines")

I could go on and on. Not a particularly high percentage of Oscar winners are considered the "Greatest Films of All Time."
Diane

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Offline CD_one

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Re: BBM didn't win Best Picture Oscar - but not to fret!
« Reply #9 on: September 17, 2006, 11:11:29 pm »
dly64 - I LOVED Rear Window, Vertigo, North by North West, and Bell Book and Candle.

Seriously though, BBM has to be in the top ten movies of all time. I only saw it recently and have been powerfully moved by it.  It's on my wish list for my birthday coming up in October. In my first viewing I got a bit annoyed as I couldn't understand a lot of what was being said, but hey, it gave me a reason to watch it again (and again!).

I think that great movies are a combintation of powerful scenery, powerful actors and performances and plots mixed with sub-plots and even more plots, allowing for a variety of interpretations to be placed on various scenes and lines, again and again. You get something new everytime you watch it and that, my friends, is what good moviemaking is all about!