Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences

Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences
Categories: Cinema, Art Galleries
Neighborhood: Beverly Hills
Update - 1/13/2012
It looks like will be the black Oscars again this year: Oprah Winfrey (humanitarian), James Earl Jones (honorary lifetime achievement), Viola Davis, and Octavia Spencer.

Meanwhile, the Academy has nominated for only the third time in its entire 88-year history a French film, "The Artist." The only other times were in 1969 for "Z" and in 1933 for "Grand Illusion" while the it has nominated truckloads of domestic drek ("Dr. Dolittle," "Awakenings," etc). This to the nation that practically invented the cinema (the Lumiere Brothers...).

If "The Artist" wins, it will be the first foreign film to win the Best Picture Oscar ever.

Unfortunately, the Iranian "Separation," with a 100 rating on Metacritic, was relegated, as is usually the case with non-English-speaking films, to the Best Foreign Language Film" ghetto.

(Curiously, though, this year many of the other top contenders have a "French connection": "Hugo," "Midnight in Paris," "Tintin.").

"Beauty and the Beast," "Children of Paradise," "Grand Illusion" and other classics went unrecognized. Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardieu have been nominated only once in their entire careers.

To date, only 11 films exclusively financed outside the United States have won Best Picture (all by the U.K): Hamlet, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, Tom Jones, A Man for All Seasons, Oliver!, Chariots of Fire, Gandhi, The Last Emperor, Slumdog Millionaire and The King's Speech.

This year the Academy nominated another moth-ball-worn, maudlin but popular film about black folk sitting at the back of the bus (joining a long list that stretches back half a century continuing through "The Blind Side" (2009) and "The Help."

You have to push just the right buttons with the Academy, which has a serious case of liberal-white guilt, and it obviously isn't THAT hard.

And Viola Davis in her pre-Oscar wins is already shamelessly re-channeling Halle Berry (and a dozen others) with her spiel: "This is a heartfelt tribute to all the women, my mother, grandmother and great grand-mother, who could not dare imagine having dreams of their own, much less realizing them. When an African-American actress is nominated in any year, she has to be grateful for the recognition."

How believable is it that the self-effacing, stoic, soulful black maid of the film could disappear totally, to be replaced a few years later by a termagant? Didn't we already see the same "help" in "Benjamin Buttons, "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" and other films)?

And isn't Ms. Davis doing the same character she did in "Doubt"?

Actually the savvy actress is already campaigning directly to the Academy in media releases and "lesser awards" ceremonies. "She's working the town, sending hand-written notes to journalists" notes one observer.

All this for a supporting role in a clearly ensemble film. She and Octavia Spencer should BOTH be competing in the supporting category, but that, then, would split the votes.

If Ms. Davis doesn't get the Oscar, she can always say: "Well, it's back to the bus again for us African-American actresses. One Halle Berry, and the Academy is, like, saying 'Nuf is enough. Know your place, don't get uppity, O.K.?'

"Bitter? No...I'm thankful to the Academy, really...the way my character in 'Help' is. There's such a dearth of roles available to us black women. So we have to be content with a bone [a nomination] tossed to us. Despite Obama, Jim Crow days are still here."

If she doesn't win, imagine the following scenario:

Hollywood producer says, What about Viola in the lead of "The Rosa Parks Story"? Same character, different film. But this time she'll really be able to 'break out' of her chains!" Oscar slam-dunk.

She'll be the second black person to win Best Actress in just a decade (three African-Americans have won Best Actor in the same period).

In the past 10 years, 40 Oscars have been given for acting, of which 7 have gone to African Americans -- Denzel Washington, Jamie Foxx, Forrest Whitaker, Morgan Freeman, Halle Berry, Jennifer Hudson and Mo'Nique. 7 of 40 is 17.5%.

Since Blacks are 12% of the total U.S. population, itt's hard to same see how they have the right to portray the other 88%).

By contrast, Jean Dujardin,of "The Artist," is the 4th Frenchman in 85 years to ever receive an acting nomination.

During the past decade, Asian-Americans have been relegated to roles as exotic "foreigners" and Hispanics as hired help, with one nomination, no award to Asians, two nominations, one Oscar to a Hispanic. one nomination, no win, to a gay actor. Who has really not been coming to dinner?

But everyone knows what the Academy Award really means: PC + a successful P.R. campaign.

What about the other minorities? Hispanics, Asian-Americans, Native Americans, Gays, all of whom have never won an acting Oscar.

Practice what you preach, Academy: Equality.
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5/21/2010
The world is a global village, but you would hardly know it from the Oscars. This year was no exception (Jeff Bridges, Sandra Bullock, M'onique, etc.).

For serious cinephiles and the most adventurous movie-goer, the Cannes Film Festival beats the Oscars hands down. Despite the glamor, hype, and star adulation (Tim Burton is the president of the jury this year), Cannes--and Venice, Berlin, Seattle (!), etc.--are nowhere as parochial as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Cannes offers a level playing field for all countries. (The Oscars do not, despite the occasional award doled out to an international box-office success like "Slumdog Millionaire" or "Crouching Dragon, Hidden Tiger"--hardly art films).

This year the Thai film "Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives" (which would provoke laughter if not downright derision in Hollywood) won the Palme d'or at Cannes.

http://www.nytime...

And is unafraid of tackling serious subjects in favor of the strictly commercial, artistically "soft" fare of Hollywood. Its top prizes (Palme d'or and Grand Prix) have gone to Romanian, Austrian, British, French, Danish, American, Chinese, and South Korean films in the past decade.

http://www.infopl...

Unfortunately, Oscar still has too many wannabes (Golden Horses, Golden Roosters, you get the idea...).

Move over, Oscar.

It's about time.

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3/4/2010
Whatever the actual bricks-and-mortar presence in Los Angeles of the Academy Awards is is overshadowed by the the huge hoopla surrounding the televised ceremony being broadcast all over the world and seen by over a billion people.

(I wonder how many Academy members really care about Kurosawa or Fellini or have actually seen any of their films*). Or how many ordinary Americans actually go the "museum" in Beverly Hills--judging from the number of reviews, very few, I would presume.

The Academy in all its wisdom decided to have a slate of TEN (10) candidates for its top honor, "Best Picture," which is a slap in the face to all the Best Pictures nominees of the past half century. This was done, presumably, to enhance the television ratings for the show (which has been dropping for years).

It also cheapens the category of Best Picture. Whereas a film had to be in a select group of the top five to be nominated, now it can be anywhere in the top ten.

Four years ago, a scandal erupted when it was revealed by Nikki Finke of the LA Weekly and others that many Academy voters, who are (voting) members for life--including those living in a coma in a hospital-- had publicly declared that would never for the life of them see one of the Best Picture nominees because of its subject matter.

This badge-of-shame and other controversies--such as the over-the-top advertising campaigns of the Hollywood studios--are the issues that the Academy should be addressing, not about how to draw even more viewers into an interminably long spectacle of navel-gazing, one that has less to do with the merits of films than politics, inside(r) ("industry") and national.

And don't get me started on the dire (and often daffy) outfits and unearned cleavage, all in over-abundance each year.

And when did the "Best Sound" Oscar subdivide, amoeba-style, into two Oscars, "Best Sound Mixing" and "Best Sound Editing"? And who in the Academy knows the difference--or cares?

So I am staying away from the show this year, as I've told myself time and time before I would do. This time for real!

$ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $
Does the Academy really honor artistic merit--or actually undermine it?
$ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $

See http://roomfordeb...

and http://www.nytime...

* To my knowledge only four (4) films in a language other than English have ever been nominated--in the 82-year history of the Academy Awards--for Best Picture: "Cries and Whispers" (1974), "Il Postino" (1994), "Life is Beautiful"(1997) and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" (2001).

No chauvinism at work here, really.

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