Oscars 2016

[AndyDursin]

Quick thoughts:

-Looks like THE REVENANT or SPOTLIGHT for Best Picture, odds on the latter (REVENANT too brutal? Plus Innaritu won a year ago). Overall a weak year though in this category from the ones I've seen.

-DiCaprio shoo-in for Best Actor

-Actress categories up in the air; CAROL not getting major award consideration for Picture, etc. kind of puts a damper on those noms for Blanchett and Mara, but who knows. Did anyone see ROOM?

-LOL at EX MACHINA earning an Original Screenplay nomination

-Morricone going to get a glorified lifetime achievement Oscar for HATEFUL EIGHT? Probably. Yes I know he's actually won a "lifetime achievement" but my guess is these 30 minutes of original music will net him his first "true" Oscar

-Really, the main thing I care about is Stallone being nominated for CREED

Nominations List:

BEST PICTURE

The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight

BEST ACTOR

Bryan Cranston, Trumbo
Matt Damon, The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio, The Revenant
Michael Fassbender, Steve Jobs
Eddie Redmayne, The Danish Girl

BEST ACTRESS

Cate Blanchett, Carol
Brie Larson, Room
Jennifer Lawrence, Joy
Charlotte Rampling, 45 Years
Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Christian Bale, The Big Short
Tom Hardy, The Revenant
Mark Ruffalo, Spotlight
Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies
Sylvester Stallone, Creed

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Hateful Eight
Rooney Mara, Carol
Rachel McAdams, Spotlight
Alicia Vikander, The Danish Girl
Kate Winslet, Steve Jobs

DIRECTING

Adam McKay - The Big Short
George Miller - Mad Max: Fury Road
Alejandro G. Iñárritu - The Revenant
Lenny Abrahamson - Room
Tom McCarthy - Spotlight

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM

Anomalisa
Boy and the World
Inside Out
Shaun the Sheep Movie
When Marnie Was There

COSTUME DESIGN

Carol
Cinderella
The Danish Girl
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Revenant

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

Amy
Cartel Land
The Look of Silence
What Happened, Miss Simone?
Winter on Fire

DOCUMENTARY SHORT

Body Team
Chau, Beyond the Lines
Claude Lanzmann
A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness
Last Day of Freedom

MAKEUP AND HAIR STYLING

Mad Max: Fury Road
The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared
The Revenant

ORIGINAL SONG

"Earned It" - Fifty Shades of Grey
"Manta Ray" - Racing Extinction
"Simple Song #3" - Youth
"Til It Happens to You" - The Hunting Ground
"Writing's on the Wall" - Spectre

ANIMATED SHORT

Bear Story
Prologue
Sanjay's Super Team
We Can't Live Without Cosmos
World of Tomorrow

SOUND EDITING

Mad Max: Fury Road
Sicario
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
The Martian
The Revenant

FILM EDITING

The Big Short
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Revenant
Spotlight
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

Embrace of the Serpent
Mustang
Son of Saul
Theeb
A War

ORIGINAL SCORE

Bridge of Spies
Carol
The Hateful Eight
Sicario
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

PRODUCTION DESIGN

Bridge of Spies
The Danish Girl
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant

VISUAL EFFECTS

Ex Machina
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Star Wars: The Force Awakens

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

The Big Short
Brooklyn
Carol
The Martian
Room

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Bridge of Spies
Ex Machina
Inside Out
Spotlight
Straight Outta Compton

[sprocket]

The only film I'm interested in searching for out of the best picture list is Brooklyn.

Fury Road is a great film, but mainly because of the imagination that went into creating the 'Mad Max' world - is there an Oscar for best world-building?

Nice to see Jennifer Jason Leigh in there.

Another thumbs up for Stallone - wish him all the best.

[Paul MacLean]

The Martian gets nominated for Best Picture but not Best Director? Every director in Hollywood rips-off Ridley Scott's style, but they'll never give him an award.

Glad to see John Williams nominated. It would be great if they gave the Oscar to him, as it would make for a nice "full circle".

I'm surprised Morricone got nominated, seeing as The Hateful Eight is also full of Tarantino's usual "needle drops", but you may be right Andy about the voters deciding it's "his turn".

[DavidBanner]

Ridley Scott has been nominated for Oscars three times - Thelma & Louise, Gladiator and Blackhawk Down. He also now has a producer nomination for The Martian, although he won't win there either.
Given his age, it's not likely he'll win an Oscar, but I have a feeling he'll be thrown a lifetime achievement award within the next five years. (He didn't start making feature films until he was nearly 40 years old, and he's been at it for nearly 40 years...)

The nominations this year look like they break out this way:

Best Score - I agree it's probably a nod to Morricone. And not for that memorable of a score - for a truly awful movie.

Best Foreign Film - Son of Saul should walk away with this.

Best Animated Film - This could be Anomalisa. If not that, then Inside Out. Just depends on how adventurous Academy voters wish to be.

Best VFX - Could be The Martian, or maybe they throw it to the new JJ Star Wars, as a nod toward the originals. Of all the movies on the list, The Martian still stands out as the most interesting and the most likely to get it.

Best Production Design - Likely between Mad Max and The Martian. Kind of a car crash category this year.

Best Makeup - Should be The Revenant in a walk.

Best Costume Design - Another car crash category, but probably between Cinderella and The Danish Girl.

Best Sound Mixing - Again likely between Mad Max and The Martian.

Best Sound Effects Editing - This is where The Revenant may pick up an award, if for nothing more than its intense atmosphere, much of which was built from the sound effects editing.

Best Cinematography - This is looking like a lock for Chivo, who may well pull a hat trick of three of these Oscars in a row. The Revenant is admired mostly for its photography, given that the movie was mostly shot at "magic hour" with available light.

Best Editing - This will likely be a showdown between Spotlight and The Big Short, which may reveal more about who will really pull out the Best Picture race this year.

Best Adapted Screenplay - When you winnow this one down, you wind up with The Big Short, which was an inventive adaptation of difficult material. Brooklyn is a fine film, but most viewers and voters were bored by it, sadly. Room is a good film, but admirers of the book really disliked the direction it took. Carol didn't catch fire with viewers, and The Martian is unlikely to actually win a screenwriting award. So I'd go with The Big Short, which may top out with this award, or it may go higher.

Best Original Screenplay - Should be Spotlight in a walk. It's frankly the only real contender in the bunch. People enjoyed the snap that the Coen Brothers brought to the script, but its cleverness is unlikely to top the effect of the material in Spotlight.

Best Director - Another showdown between Spotlight and The Big Short. Let's be serious - Mad Max isn't going to win Best Director. Neither will Room, although it's a powerful movie. And it's unlikely that Inarritu will somehow win back to back director Oscars. Those voters are too choosy for that. That leaves Adam McKay and Tom McCarthy. I'd give the edge to McKay, but McCarthy's work is excellent as well. I believe it likely that the winning movie here will also take Best Picture.

Best Supporting Actress - looks like Alicia Vikander for The Danish Girl. She's been getting universally praised, and it's an easy nod to that movie.

Best Supporting Actor - Most people really liked Mark Rylance in Bridge of Spies and he could squeak this one out. But I'd watch out for Tom Hardy from The Revenant - that was a scary, and scary good performance. Both Ruffalo and Bale's performances are simply too technical to carry them over the finish line. And I'd be incredibly surprised to see Stallone win a new award for playing the same part for the 7th time. It's nice that they nominated Stallone, but I wouldn't expect anything further.

Best Actress - Feels like this goes to Brie Larson, who will get the only Oscar to land with Room. And she was excellent in the movie. Saoirse Ronan was great, but it's not likely she'll be getting a statuette here. Jennifer Lawrence's nomination is frankly a surprise in itself - she was good but not great, and she never really embodied the saleswoman's powerhouse that is Joy Mangano. Charlotte Rampling is getting a career recognition nomination, and it's unlikely that the Academy is planning to give Cate Blanchett a second Oscar within three years. Which again leaves Larson, who delivers a ragged performance of difficult material. Room is not an easy movie to watch, and Larson doesn't give the viewer any easy outs from the gut punches.

Best Actor - I'm not sure that DiCaprio gets this. He might. But it could go to Eddie Redmayne, winning a back-to-back for difficult performances of wildly different material within two years. (This happened with Tom Hanks in 93 and 94, you never know - and these performances are a jump away from Blanchett's and a different world from Inarritu's directing) Matt Damon won't win this, and neither will Michael Fassbender. Bryan Cranston is a different story, but Trumbo was a sadly disappointing film and even Cranston couldn't make it even a memorable one. So I'd put it between DiCaprio and Redmayne, depending on the mood of the Academy voters.

Best Picture - We can dismiss a few of the obvious ones here. Bridge of Spies won't be getting this. Nor will The Martian or Mad Max. (Although it would be memorable to hear that "Best Picture is Mad Max Fury Road!") And Room won't be getting this prize either. Nor will Brooklyn. That leaves three real contenders. The Revenant, which I tend to doubt will impress Academy voters with more than its length. Or The Big Short and Spotlight in their biggest confrontation of the evening. And this is where the rubber hits the road. My instincts lead me to Spotlight, but I personally liked The Big Short better. We'll just have to see what the Academy voters really think.


We'll know a little more after the SAG awards, and potentially the DGA awards as well. But I'm thinking that The Revenant comes away with far less than it would initially appear, that Mad Max and The Martian content themselves with technical nods, the acting categories split in multiple directions, and the chief back and forth of the night is between two movies about recent events.

[AndyDursin]

I'm not sure that DiCaprio gets this. He might. But it could go to Eddie Redmayne, winning a back-to-back for difficult performances of wildly different material within two years. (This happened with Tom Hanks in 93 and 94, you never know - and these performances are a jump away from Blanchett's and a different world from Inarritu's directing)

I was thinking about this same thing, and there is a huge distinction between FORREST GUMP and THE DANISH GIRL: one movie was a wildly successful and acclaimed film with a performance unanimously singled out as making the film work.

THE DANISH GIRL has gotten a lot of mixed reviews -- some of them downright negative -- and hasn't made a dime, which I think takes Redmayne out of the running this time. One thing in my mind is certain: if Redmayne does win, it would primarily be because the Oscar voters want to make a social point in this "let's celebrate trannies" year of Caitlyn Jenner and "Transparent". Besides, I've read far more people talking about who he's playing, as opposed to Redmayne's actual performance.

Hanks' wins were unique but I can't see that scenario being repeated here. To a fair degree there were social dynamics at play in enabling Hanks to win a pair of Oscars back to back (he's okay in PHILADELPHIA but I always felt he primarily received that first Academy Award simply because he was playing a gay man afflicted with AIDS, in a very overrated film whose message was more praiseworthy than its actual cinematic value IMO). Maybe they repeat that scenario with Redmayne, but I highly doubt it. The massive popularity of FORREST GUMP and acclaim for Hanks' performance -- which carried that movie -- essentially backed the Academy into handing him back-to-back Oscars...there's no such love for THE DANISH GIRL itself.

I think giving DiCaprio a deserved Oscar (for a performance that's physically demanding and carries the film) will also be a way of them spreading some love over to THE REVENANT -- which after seeing it last night, isn't going to win Best Picture, because I think they'll give it to SPOTLIGHT instead. A brutal straight ahead revenge picture (albeit incredibly well made) versus a film about noble Boston Globe reporters exposing corruption in the Catholic Church? No question which direction, to me, they're going to go in that category if past history is kept in mind.

REVENANT does deserve to clean up with technical awards, from cinematography to sound design and the like, and I'd expect to see that happen. But Best Picture? I watched three women get up and walk out of the film 30 minutes in and not return. I personally found it highly effective for what it is, and I expect DiCaprio to win, but I'd be very surprised if the movie won Best Picture. It's certainly not a movie for the squeamish, and that in itself is going to turn off a wide swath of Oscar voters.

It's nice that they nominated Stallone, but I wouldn't expect anything further.

I think he's got a good shot. At least, I think he has a far, far better chance than Tom Hardy does. Sentimental and/or unconventional "wildcard" wins also have more of a shot in the Supporting category based on historical precedent. And frankly, the bottom line is Stallone deserves it in my mind.

Hardy does little in THE REVENANT except growl and act nasty. Countless other actors could have delivered the same performance, I didn't feel Hardy himself added much of anything unique or vital to the film (not really a knock on him, it's more the scope of the character is limited). Compared to what Stallone brings to CREED, they're not even comparable IMO.

[DavidBanner]

You may well be correct about how the Academy plays this with Eddie Redmayne. We'll have to see. I completely agree that this will be a political call for Danish Girl. Yes - it just happens to explore trans issues at the same time that somehow everyone wants to make that movie or TV show. It's one of the reasons I thought they'd go for him.

We should remember that Tom Hanks was incredibly popular in the early 90s, much more so than now. He rode a wave of that from A League of Their Own through Sleepless in Seattle into Philadelphia and Forrest Gump, and then continued that into Apollo 13. That last one gave him enough traction that he was able to get a directing gig, and HBO allowed him to produce the From The Earth to the Moon miniseries. I'd say he had a great run in the 90s, which continued up into the top of the 2000s before essentially petering out. He's still popular now, but nowhere near where he was about 20 years ago. Mostly because he's always been a likable, affable performer, without any of the baggage of scandal that so many other modern stars seem to have. He's always been the safe choice - his generation's Ron Howard. I'd argue that Philadelphia really showed him reaching as an actor, regardless of the quality of the film. (And I remember a scathing LA Weekly review at the time that called the movie an afterschool special about AIDS) I agree his performance in Forrest Gump was quite good, and that his popularity actually put that movie over the top. But let's not forget that FG also represented Robert Zemeckis at the top of his game, making an epic presentation out of what is essentially a very small story. Everyone knew that Forrest Gump was going to sweep a bunch of Oscars in 1994, and I don't think it surprised anyone when Hanks pulled off the back-to-back.

Eddie Redmayne is a different story - he's a young British actor who is making intelligent choices in his role selections, and that seems to be paying off for him. He's not Tom Hanks, nor is he Spencer Tracy. But people are talking about his performances, and The Danish Girl has picked up attention for that. Given the attention to the subject matter, and the attention the actor has received, I'd say he's got a good shot.

DiCaprio also has a shot, but he's been trying so hard to get the Oscar that one has to wonder if he's going to burst a blood vessel doing so. And I don't know that this role required more from him as an actor than to be gruff and rough in mountain man conditions. Granted, the working conditions were brutal on The Revenant - not just for him but for the whole crew, by the way. But that's not a reason to give a Best Actor Oscar to someone. There's also been a bit of a backlash against The Revenant, for many of the reasons you've eloquently stated. It's an overblown simple revenge picture - one that did not need to run nearly 3 hours. The movie could have come in at 2 hours and told the same story a lot more effectively. But it is an undeniably visceral experience. Which is why I believe it will pick up the obvious technical wins that it deserves. Best Actor? Not sure. Best Supporting Actor? A lot more possible. Particularly given that Tom Hardy's performance is a lot more nuanced than simply growling and snarling. I grant you, he's pretty scary in the movie - but he's a lot better here than just being a snarling villain. In the hands of, say, Ryan Reynolds or Tobey Maguire that's probably what we'd have got, but Hardy did a lot more with the material in hand.

Again, it's very possible that DiCaprio will get to have his Oscar moment this year - you may well be right. I just think that the road there isn't as much of a straight line just yet. We'll have to see how things shake out over the next month with perceptions of The Revenant. Wouldn't be the first time that a movie that looked to go all the way really suffered when people gave it a long second look.

I agree also that Spotlight has a strong shot to pick up some major awards this year - it's one of the best movies of 2015. But it will have a major thorn in its side from The Big Short, which is also an excellent film, and also covers a major recent scandal. The battle between these movies will be very interesting to watch play out.

As for Stallone, the only issue here is that his career has primarily consisted of pretty bad action movies. He's only occasionally done something interesting as an actor - most recently for me in the excellent Cop Land. His nomination here is a absolutely a bit of sentimentality, and it will be nice to see Stallone get to be at the ceremony in his tuxedo for the first time in an eon. But I don't expect him to win. Usually when the sentimental favorite gets the Oscar, there's a pretty big groundswell for it. And this year, we have two other performances that have been getting stronger buzz. This isn't a car crash scenario like 2012, where DeNiro, Jones and Arkin tied up enough votes for Waltz to run up the middle and take the award. This time, I think it's possible for Mark Rylance to be rewarded for a fun performance in Bridge of Spies (which would likely be the only award going to that movie) or for Hardy to be recognized for his work on The Revenant. I think it's also possible for both DiCaprio and Hardy to win for The Revenant as a package. Stallone's award, to my mind, came with this nomination. Not a knock on Creed - just that I don't know that Academy voters really take him that seriously as an actor. Remember that he was nominated by the Academy actors - the rest of the Academy will have to vote for him to win. (I note that the SAG Nominating Committee members pointedly did NOT nominate him). He gave a nice performance, as he will in the upcoming Creed sequels, and it's nice to see the Academy throw him a nice gesture. But I have a feeling this will be similar to 1977, when Burgess Meredith watched the Oscar go to Jason Robards, as part of Robards back-to-back wins at that time.

[AndyDursin]

Not a knock on Creed - just that I don't know that Academy voters really take him that seriously as an actor

I agree Stallone has "baggage" from being a "movie star" -- but to turn it around, do Academy voters take Adam McKay seriously as a director? His entire directorial career consists of helming Will Ferrell comedies, several of them quite awful.

In my mind Stallone deserves the Oscar. Whether gets it or not, we'll see...but I'd put a bet on him.

Best Actor? Not sure. Best Supporting Actor? A lot more possible. Particularly given that Tom Hardy's performance is a lot more nuanced than simply growling and snarling. I grant you, he's pretty scary in the movie - but he's a lot better here than just being a snarling villain. In the hands of, say, Ryan Reynolds or Tobey Maguire that's probably what we'd have got, but Hardy did a lot more with the material in hand.

I definitely part company with you here. I like Hardy quite a bit, the role is written so he's not entirely a stock, sadistic bad guy -- but not by a whole lot. For me most of his performance WAS snarling and growling with the exception of one or two scenes. I just can't see him winning for that particular role...unless the film proves big with the voters and carries his performance along with it. I suppose that's possible, but I'm surprised he was even nominated.

Again, it's very possible that DiCaprio will get to have his Oscar moment this year - you may well be right. I just think that the road there isn't as much of a straight line just yet. We'll have to see how things shake out over the next month with perceptions of The Revenant. Wouldn't be the first time that a movie that looked to go all the way really suffered when people gave it a long second look.

I don't think it's "going all the way" for reasons I outlined before, but it certainly appears to be the breakout box-office performer of all of these late-year Oscar contenders -- and just had a bigger 3-day weekend than the cumulative grosses of many of these films. Granted that's seldom an indicator of what's to come (and the failure to generate an audience didn't hurt BIRDMAN at all), but I think the film is being embraced commercially and DiCaprio's performance is key in that regard. In other words, it's "peaking at the right time" so to speak for him.

The way things are shaking down, it will be a major upset if he doesn't win, all the indicators are heading in his direction this time. Redmayne's "buzz" has passed and the film didn't do anything. I also think the fact he just won will also impact him in a negative way (and you're quite right, Tom Hanks was Tom Hanks and a massively popular star at the time...Redmayne is not Tom Hanks).

[DavidBanner]

You make a very good point about Adam McKay. He's made some really bad Will Ferrell movies, and his career is geared toward comedy. It's very possible that the wider Academy membership will pass over him here for that reason, and you're right to point that out. But I should note that he's made an excellent movie here - The Big Short is not a third iteration of Ron Burgundy by any means. And we've seen lower end comedy directors graduate to drama before. Woody Allen's first movies were considered comedy throwaways before Annie Hall. Ron Howard's earliest and best films were small comedies, and people still think of him as Opie. So it's really a matter of how the Academy voters respond to the movie. In this case with The Big Short, I believe we're looking at a reaction that may give McKay a second look from this crowd.

And I don't mean to say that Sylvester Stallone did not do fine work in Creed. He did - but the trick here is that he's playing the same part he's essayed for the past nearly 40 years, and for which he was previously nominated for Best Actor back in 1977. You may well be correct that he'll get this award as a kind of Elder Statesman thing - the acknowledgement I believe he really wanted for Cop Land 20 years ago. But that baggage does play a part. It's not just that he's been a movie star, per se. It's that his stardom has usually depended on him playing predictably lunkheaded action roles requiring nothing more than brawn and a clipped one-liner every few scenes. Many Academy voters wrote him off after the really bad movies he did in the 80s and 90s, and they tend to have really long memories - particularly when the actor/director has consistently been making millions off dreck like The Expendables series. I hope you're right, that they'll look past that and throw the guy a bone now. But if they don't, I could easily see Mark Rylance picking up this award. Let's see if sentiment carries the day here.

In thinking about it, you're convincing me that Hardy may not be able to pull off the Supporting Actor Oscar. I very much liked his performance, finding it stronger than many of the roles I've seen him in over the past decade plus, but I realize that it may not carry him all the way here. Which would take us to the very nice work of Rylance. I'd be very happy to see Rylance get it - that will be a test of the finicky Academy voters. They could well give it to Rylance, as they famously gave it to Linda Hunt in 1983. We'll just have to see how they play this out.

I'm frankly surprised that The Revenant is doing much at the box office. I think you're right that the key is DiCaprio being there. Not necessarily whether his performance is great - more that a lot of people are talking about it. I agree with you that the movie is peaking at the right time for DiCaprio's shot here. The trick is whether the Academy voters react badly overall to the movie - for all the reasons we've both discussed. We both agree about the movie's qualities, and about the disconnect between box office and Academy voting. My instincts say that by the time the Academy members submit their votes, they'll likely have decided to just recognize the technical achievements in The Revenant, and distribute the higher end Oscars to films more to their liking. We both agree that they'll naturally turn to Spotlight. I have to add Big Short to that as well, based on the high quality of the movie itself. I may well be proven wrong on this - but the signs point to a showdown between those two movies for the higher end Oscars.

You're absolutely right that Redmayne is no Tom Hanks. The real question there is whether the Academy voters, who appear almost certain to give Supporting Actress to Alicia Vikander, will ignore the primary role in the same movie. It's absolutely possible - we could see the acting awards split out four ways here. You may well be correct about DiCaprio for Best Actor, with Larson for Best Actress, Rylance or Stallone for Supporting Actor, and Vikander for Supporting Actress. This will be an interesting contest to watch, no doubt.

[Paul MacLean]

We'll watch. Some of our predictions will be correct. But we'll all forget who the winners were, because so many movies (and most all Oscar-nominees) have been completely forgettable for the past fifteen years.

I don't even remember what won last year. In any category. I could tell you who won best score for nearly every year from 1960 until about 2001. But I couldn't tell you who won last year, or the year before. (Was it Desplat?)

[AndyDursin]

Can't say I'm surprised by the "boycott the white Oscar" movement now on-going. Part of it is the Academy's own fault for opening up the Best Picture category to more than a half dozen films -- when a "film of color" is now left out, the outcry will be that much louder as it is this year.

I do have an issue also with the people doing the yelling. Jada Pinkett Smith is basically part of the studio system -- doesn't she and Will Smith produce their own movies through their production company? They're the ones turning out junk like KARATE KID and ANNIE. Is this all about Will not getting a nomination for CONCUSSION? Last I checked the movie got loads of bad reviews.

As for Spike Lee, his last watchable film was back in the '90s.

[Monterey Jack]

Is this all about Will not getting a nomination for CONCUSSION? Last I checked the movie got loads of bad reviews.

Exactly...the Oscars ostensibly should be about honoring what are legitimately the BEST films of the year, not just checking off obligatory "token" nominations. If there aren't enough good performances by black/Latino/Asian actors, should they nominate a handful of minority actors just so they don't piss anyone off? Too often you see RIDICULOUSLY poor choices in the acting categories, just because an actor is "due", or to push a current political agenda, or both. Remember, Halle Berry's EMBARASSING "Make me feel GOOD!" performance in Monster's Ball and Denzel Washington's charisma-autopilot turn in Training Day (a grossly overrated movie fuelled by absurd plot coincidences) both won Oscars...the very same year that Sidney Poitier won a lifetime achievement award. How very convenient.

[mkaroly]

Can't say I'm surprised by the "boycott the white Oscar" movement now on-going. Part of it is the Academy's own fault for opening up the Best Picture category to more than a half dozen films -- when a "film of color" is now left out, the outcry will be that much louder as it is this year.

I do have an issue also with the people doing the yelling. Jada Pinkett Smith is basically part of the studio system -- doesn't she and Will Smith produce their own movies through their production company? They're the ones turning out junk like KARATE KID and ANNIE. Is this all about Will not getting a nomination for CONCUSSION? Last I checked the movie got loads of bad reviews.

As for Spike Lee, his last watchable film was back in the '90s.

Spike Lee has been irrelevant to film for a long time, and all he's doing is keeping himself in the public consciousness in trying to be relevant. He is a blow-hard that doesn't deserve the press he tries to get, and frankly I find him to be boring and irrelevant to popular culture as well. He should just keep his mouth shut and try to direct a decent movie.

Will Smith, to be honest, is nothing like he used to be. And I for one am glad the Academy is not going to "reward" him for an Oscar Bait performance ("Tell thee truth....tell thee truth!") that is beyond pretentious (IMO). And just because there are "films of color" made does not automatically mean one or two of them HAVE to get nominated by anyone for anything. It's ridiculous and silly.

[Monterey Jack]

Spike Lee has been irrelevant to film for a long time, and all he's doing is keeping himself in the public consciousness in trying to be relevant. He is a blow-hard that doesn't deserve the press he tries to get, and frankly I find him to be boring and irrelevant to popular culture as well. He should just keep his mouth shut and try to direct a decent movie.

This is why Inside Man was his best and most entertaining film in years...he had no real political or social axe to grind in that (aside from a few asides), he was just out to make a really entertaining heist/hostage movie, and delivered in spades. I still remember hearing people muttering, "What...?" in the theater around me when "A Spike Lee Joint" came up at the beginning.

[AndyDursin]

The Academy is instituting its own kind of Affirmative Action:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/a ... ote-858386

Will this mean Will Smith will get his Oscar nomination for SUICIDE SQUAD next year? (lol). So this way, blacks can vote for blacks, Hispanics for Hispanics, because we all know white people only vote for white people (right??).

The amazing thing is the complaints keep saying "the Oscars aren't representative of society." Yet Blacks make up 13% of the population, and over the last 15 years, have won Oscars roughly the same percentage of the time...so how ISN'T it representative? And didn't Spike Lee win an honorary Oscar a YEAR ago??

Again, I think most of this was all because Will Smith was pissed CONCUSSION didn't get a nomination...


Meanwhile, nominee Charlotte Rampling weighs in:

“It is racist to whites,” she said, according to The Guardian‘s translation. “One can never really know, but perhaps the black actors did not deserve to make the final list.”

“Why classify people? These days everyone is more or less accepted,” the first-time Academy Award nominee said. “People will always say: ‘Him, he’s less handsome’; ‘Him, he’s too black’; ‘He is too white’ … someone will always be saying ‘You are too’ (this or that) … But do we have to take from this that there should be lots of minorities everywhere?”

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/charl ... 201686158/

[mkaroly]

What a joke. This is just another example of why the Oscars are a huge joke and why I have nothing to do with them.