Spamlet on 7/3/2006 at 02:59
I dunno, a case could definitely be made: John Wayne's real first name was Marion and as exhibited in "The Birdcage", his walk was extremely effeminate.
Stitch is right, btw. PSH is one of our finest actors but playing Truman Capote is almost too easy and wasn't his best work by a longshot (his co-star Clifton Collins Jr. definitely gives the standout performance of the film). Ledger's utterly transformative inhabitation of Ennis in "Brokeback" was nearly "Slingblade" like in its restraint, shattering all conventional performance rules and was cumulatively all the more powerful for it.
StD,
I realized that too last night and that's all the more reason I was disappointed. It looked they were finally going to give the best picture award to the best film for once.
Looking back at just the beginning years of this new century here's my list of injustices:
BTW, Last night any and every one of those other nominees would have been more deserving than "Crash".
2005- "Mllion Dollar Baby" beating what I felt was pretty damn near a perfect film: "Sideways". Also effin' brilliant "Eternal Sunshine" is not even nominated and loses what should be the best actress win. Carry giving his best ever performance isn't recognized at all. "Closer" and "Garden State" are likewise about as good as it gets. Portman (who coincidentally graced both) really should've won supporting actress; despite Blanchett's status as one of my favorites and for the same reasons as PSH.
2004- "Return of the King" (not a bad flick but not the best of the series either) I would have definitely given it to "Master and Commander" but am eternally grateful that at least they didn't give it to the obvious, melodramatic and overblown "Mystic River".
2003- "Chicago" somehow wins over one of my favorite American films of all time: a devastating adaption of the Pulitzer prize winning novel "The Hours" so stunning that I went back to see it three times in one week. I won't even go into why in God's name wasn't our finest living actress Streep (doing some of her most haunting work ever) nominated?
2002- The insulting, pandering whitewash "A Beautiful Mind" wins over the exquisite, chilling and subtle "In the Bedroom" (everything the similar "Mystic River" failed at being).
2001- The best films of the year aren't even nominated: "Wonder Boys", "Requiem for a Dream" and "You Can Count on Me". Of those that are, "Chocolat" is still far greater than the appalling winner: "Gladiator". Usually stellar Ridley Scott has a great, veteran cast on his hands but the insipid script isn't worthy of any of those involved.
2000- In a thrilling movie year that gave us subversive masterpieces like "Fight Club", "Magnolia","Being John Malkovich","The Insider" and "Boys Don't Cry": "American Beauty" an ok, yet extraordinarily overrated movie that purports to be about the shallowness of modern life while itself shallowly stealing wholesale from vastly superior films like Ang Lee's "The Ice Storm" and Wilder's "Sunset Boulevard" is our winner? Its screenwriter Alan Ball thankfully went on to explore life in staggering depth by creating one of the best shows in the history of television "Six Feet Under", yet back when he wrote this he was writing sitcoms and the sterotypical, one dimensional characters and an overcrowded with incident, extremely convoluted climax reflect that mindset.
1999- Actually I disagree completely with Scots. "Shakespeare in Love" was in every way a better film than the mediocre "Saving Private Ryan" which today, aside from its fantastic opening D-Day sequence and about 15 other culled minutes sprinkled here and there is rightly regarded as cliche ridden and just not all that good. "The Thin Red Line" also nominated that year is the true WWII masterpiece but unfortunately it never would've won in a million years.
As for "Titanic", the best film that year hands down was Atom Egoyan's beautiful and unforgettable effigy "The Sweet Hereafter".
Gotta disagree with you on "The English Patient" too. I really hated its silly, bodice ripper romanticism other than Thomas' nude scene and the only love story I liked was that of the Indian and Binoche. "Secrets and Lies" was a much better movie, IMO.
I take a lot of heat for it, but I feel "Schindler's List" is a deeply flawed film for numerous reasons and I'm likely in the minority, but honestly "The Remains of the Day" moved me more that year.
Scots Taffer on 7/3/2006 at 04:13
I actually haven't seen Shakespeare in Love but going by the wider consensus it was the lesser film, although I lately took a gander at Rotten Tomatoes and it's a very close shave - 94% against 97%.
I'm not a massive fan of Saving Private Ryan although it was an effective enough movie, I'd just been turned off Shakespeare in Love from the start.
And on Garden State: it was a terrible movie. It worked as a random sequence of quirk, oddity and weird oddballness if that had been what it was, unfortunately it tried to be a coherent movie on top of this. Zach Braff will achieve better in the future, of that I have no doubt, because he had the eye for what worked in many ways but was mired in his inability to decide between a humourous and touching semi-biopic or a scattered quirky comedy.
Oneiroscope on 7/3/2006 at 05:00
I gave up on the Academy Awards a long time ago, I'm afraid. Just seemed like the most idiotic bullshit session imaginable. The academy doesn't give a rats posterior what the best film/performance is. What exactly they do care about I have no idea, but it sure as shit isn't merit.
Nicker on 7/3/2006 at 05:11
Quote Posted by Spamlet
1999 - (snip!)
[rant]
1999! The year the Oscars breathed their last for me.
Cate Blanchett was robbed. Her amazing and complex portrayal of Elizabeth the First was miles above Gwyneth Paltrow’s ditsy, smitten teen. And to add insult to injury, Judy Dench got best supporting actress for her miniscule, phoned in performance of the elderly Liz 1, in Shakespeare in Love, while the year before she was passed over for her stellar Queen Victoria in Mrs. Smith.
Maw! Git mah gun!
[/rant]
Aja on 7/3/2006 at 05:33
I just saw 'Broken Flowers' (Bill Murray) the other day, and really enjoyed it. I don't think it was nominated for anything, but Murray should've been. I never saw Lost in Translation, though I want to now - there's this quality to his acting that is entirely unique, and an absolute pleasure to watch.
In fact, after Life Aquatic, Broken Flowers, Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day, Scrooged, Stripes, and all the rest, I think I'd better go out and just buy everything he's ever starred in. There are still a few (Rushmore) supposedly good ones that I haven't seen yet.
Scots Taffer on 7/3/2006 at 05:47
Rushmore is perhaps the best of the lot he's starred in.
Scots Taffer on 7/3/2006 at 06:04
I'm tempted to reply with an excellent Jessica Alba pic but I'll let you win this one.
Spamlet on 7/3/2006 at 06:07
Hmm. I found G.S. to be the former, with the provision that clearly the place and people he'd left were quirky. Since (as one of my favorite writers, Anton Chekhov also astutely observed) that blend exists seemlessly side by side in everyday life, I felt that ultimately made it all the more profound (in much the same vein as Miranda July's more willfully weird but beautiful recent film "Me and You and Everyone We Know".
I haven't seen "Broken Flowers" yet but have to say I finally saw "Life Aquatic" last week and it struck me in a way I definitely wasn't prepared for. It was surprisingly poignant, much moreso than anything else by Anderson, even though I like all his previous films tremendously. A big part of that was probably the way the underlying insecurity beneath all the pomp of those dazzling early Bowie tunes was laid bare on the soundtrack.
