2006 Academy Awards Best Picture: CRASH!

[Wycoff]

I don't like that they made being "politically controversial" a prereq to be nominated for "best picture" this year. For one thing, none of the topics were really that controversial: Ooh, a movie about race relations; ohh a movie featuring homosexuality; ohh a movie about violent anti-semitism... none of those themes have ever been done before! How controversial! Making theme based nominations cheapens the "best picture" award, because it artificially narrows the competition, preventing otherwise qualified movies from competing.

I thought that "New World" was overlooked. One stinking nomination for best cinematography. The girl who played Pocahontas (Q'orianka Kilcher) should have gotten a best actress nomination.

BTW, Walk the Line

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Grandpa Troll


QFT by Pekka

I didnt see it but this would seem rational

How do you know everything about the movie without seeing it?


Brokeback Mountain was excellent -- a movie without the usual stereotypical image of gay men. And the story itself is a moving story about unfulfilled love between two gay men who live in an alienating, close-minded society.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by monolith94
Crash was the worst movie I saw all year long, although unlike some people I don't go searching out movies to suffer. Yes, the dialogue is terrible, the direction is terrible, the acting, featuring such luminaries as Brendan Fraser, Ryan Phillipe, Tony Danza and Sandra Bullock, was all dull to middling at best. The themes are ham-handed.

Everything about the film was obnoxious and crassly manipulative, and at worst hypocritical. From the horrible new-agey soundtrack to the coincidence upon coincidence that had me rolling my eyes. I WALKED OUT on this embarassing piece of TRASH, which has NOTHING to offer its audience other than the simple idea that we are all inherently racist. I walked out when the Arab shot the little latino girl.

Furthermore, the artistry is simply bankrupt. The large ensemble thing has done better before in films like Magnolia. The shooting scene has a far better mirror in The House of Sand and Fog.

This is a dangerous film, because it reduces a complex situation into trite truisms that do nothing to advance our understanding. Simply horrible.

I disagree with you on this one.

But I'm just curious then . . . . . what movies do you think are good ones, that deal with racism and ethnocentrism?

[DaShi]

Originally posted by MrFun


I disagree with you on this one.

But I'm just curious then . . . . . what movies do you think are good ones, that deal with racism and ethnocentrism?

"Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle"

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Wycoff
Making theme based nominations cheapens the "best picture" award, because it artificially narrows the competition, preventing otherwise qualified movies from competing.

Oscars have ALWAYS rewarded movies that make a political statement. A lot of the Academy folk are old timers who think that movies are supposed to stand for something and make a point, ie, they are supposed to be an art.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Oscars have ALWAYS rewarded movies that make a political statement. A lot of the Academy folk are old timers who think that movies are supposed to stand for something and make a point, ie, they are supposed to be an art.

While that's true, it's usually treated as just one part of the overall movie. This is the first time that I remember that every movie nominated was overtly political. This show's explicit theme was the Academy's devotion to "progressive" social causes.

I have nothing against a movie making a political statement; a movie is that much better if it is thought provoking. However, I think that having a theme based prereq for a best picture nomination is too limiting. Most years there is a variety of different types of movies nominated for best picture; this year, only those movies pressing social issues were nominated. The "best picture" award should be open to any deserving movie released that year. Having a "message" helps, but it shouldn't have been the only criterion.

I'm also a bit confused as to why they treated the themes of these movies as being "maverick" and "controversial." Maybe they would have been had they been released in 1976 rather than 2006. Homosexuality, racism, and anti-semitism have been covered many, many times over the past 25 years. What makes the movies nominated for best picture so darn controversial? Am I missing something?

EDIT: My mistake, I thought Transamerica was nominated for best picture.

[Imran Siddiqui]

The fact is that there really weren't that many great movies that came out this year. They had to go with some of the smaller flicks, which tend to be more political, because of that. It really wasn't a great year for movies, both at the box office and in the filmmaking.

As for controversy. I think Crash (from what I've heard) was different because it focused on the theme that everyone is racist against someone, not just the whites against blacks. Brokeback, because, well, it DID cause an uproar in the religious conservative sections of society. Good Night and Good Luck in focusing on witchhunts and a journalist fighting against it has relevance today (and it is no surprised it was made in this after WoT period). Munich was more than about anti-Semitism but also how violence begets violence, which isn't all that new, but it is in this context (the Jews are necessarily the bright and shining heroes).

And I forget the last movie nominated.

[Wycoff]

I know what their themes were, but I just don't see them as being shockingly controversial and "maverick." They're topical, but hardly as groundbreaking as people and the Acadamy are making them out to be.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Wycoff
I know what their themes were, but I just don't see them as being shockingly controversial and "maverick." They're topical, but hardly as groundbreaking as people and the Acadamy are making them out to be.

I think they are fairly controversial and unique. The basic premises are about controversial issues, but not new themselves, but the different spin that is placed on the issues is 'maverick' at least in the mainstream, IMO.

[MrFun]

I agree with Imran -- look at the different spin that Brokeback Mountain took, for example -- of course, based on the short novelette.


It reminds me of how the movie, Making Love, was a remarkable movie for its time when it was out.

[Lorizael]

Though Brokeback Mountain was a very well done film, it was also enormously slow and in the end, very little of substance actually occurred. I think the fact that it was, when you get right down to it, a boring movie is one of the reasons it did not win.

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by MrFun
I agree with Imran -- look at the different spin that Brokeback Mountain took, for example --

That's my question: what different spin did Brokeback give? seems to me that it's been done before, only this time it got wider publicity...

[Imran Siddiqui]

MrFun will have to give you specifics, since I haven't seen Brokeback, but it seemed mixing the gay love theme with the forbidden love theme (complete with a family back home) was a bit different than usual. Like Romeo & Juliet with gay people .

[Asher]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
MrFun will have to give you specifics, since I haven't seen Brokeback, but it seemed mixing the gay love theme with the forbidden love theme (complete with a family back home) was a bit different than usual. Like Romeo & Juliet with gay people .

It's also been done many times before, but usually in indie films that don't get wide release. Most of those films are much more "real" in the sense that they also involve nudity, sex, and violence. Stuff that isn't palatable for stuff like the Oscars or mainstream releases.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Well yes... I guess MrFun and I were refering to something different in mainstream releases.