Oscars 2022: Will Smith Punches Chris Rock, Goes Nuts Before Winning Best Actor

[AndyDursin]

I won't be tuning in -- I didn't watch last year either -- but I feel obligated to make a post nevertheless. At least three movies I'd scarcely say were better than mediocre are on this Best Picture list -- making it look like an even worse roster than a year ago if possible. And DON'T LOOK UP is a piece of garbage, outright garbage.

Good news: Tony Hawk and Shaun White are presenters! Maybe they wandered in from the wrong awards show...

Nominee list for those interested:
https://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/2022

Best Picture

Nightmare Alley
Bradley Cooper, Guillermo del Toro, J. Miles Dale

Don't Look Up
Adam McKay, Kevin J. Messick

Dune
Denis Villeneuve, Mary Parent, Cale Boyter

Drive My Car
Teruhisa Yamamoto

Belfast
Kenneth Branagh, Tamar Thomas, Laura Berwick, ...

Licorice Pizza
Paul Thomas Anderson, Adam Somner, Sara Murphy

The Power of the Dog
Jane Campion, Roger Frappier, Emile Sherman, ...

West Side Story (2021)
Steven Spielberg, Kristie Macosko Krieger

King Richard
Will Smith, Trevor White, Tim White

CODA
Philippe Rousselet, Patrick Wachsberger, Fabrice Gianfermi

[mkaroly]

I will put in my yearly "Who cares?" comment and move on...lol...

[AndyDursin]

More so than ever this year!

[Monterey Jack]

It still rankles me that they're not going to be showing such "unimportant" tech categories like Editing and Cinematography (you know, the two most essential building blocks of what movies are) live in order to "streamline" the presentation, yet they have time to feature a performance of a song from Encanto that isn't even nominated.

[AndyDursin]

With no movies a wide audience cares about, they're left here attempting -- pathetically -- to create an "entertainment show", in light of the struggling theatrical marketplace of the last few years. Yet, you take out the technical awards, and what is there? This is supposed to be an awards show for movies and obviously the people who make them. I dont care about documentary shorts -- I've always felt that was an area that often didnt even belong on the same stage -- but moving editing and score off the prime time podium seems like a really curious, ill-founded move.

I don't know who the show is designed for, but it's like watching the last gasp of a dying institution fading away in front of us, trying to remain "relevant".

[Monterey Jack]

[AndyDursin]

Whoa. Well that's one way to get people talking.

This is what went out over ABC:

[AndyDursin]

Unedited version from Japanese TV:

[AndyDursin]

This too.

[AndyDursin]

My take: terribly tasteless and inappropriate joke. But not a reason to physically assault a comic on stage. For a public figure something is obviously wrong with the guy.

Smith just won Best Actor and is giving a bizzarely rambling speech about being called by God. He apologized to his fellow nominees without stating what it was he did. A stronger apology might have done him well there but he didn't go all the way with it. Plus the whole relationship he has with his wife, who allegedly and reportedly been fooling around recently...I mean you punch a comic telling a joke?

That was unfathomably bizarre. And so is he.

[AndyDursin]

[Monterey Jack]

Wow, seeing that unedited moment... I was only half-sure it was a for-real assault, but now, that's seriously uncool.

[AndyDursin]

Yeah me too. That unedited section makes it clear that was no staged gag. Denzel Washington said something to Smith which he alluded to, but I'm not quite sure, based on his overall acceptance speech, Smith really understood it.

Anyway I guess it's time to actually watch CODA lol

[Monterey Jack]

Also, a Disney-owned TV network making a crack about Fox Orphan The Last Duel being a movie that no one has seen...classy. Would they have made the same joke about Nightmare Alley were it not up for Best Picture and a handful of tech awards?

[mkaroly]

That's one way to get people talking about a show that has barely any ratings at all!