2012 Best Picture Oscar

As for some of the snubs here, the gritty, violent, and stylized Drive was beloved by so many film fans (including plenty of us MoFos), and it definitely had some of the year's most memorable scenes (have you been able to look at a hammer or strangers in elevators the same way since?). For whatever reasons, it didn't make the cut come Oscar time. Even though Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is dark and graphic and nihilistic and intense, certainly it might well have made the rolls for Best Picture. But it didn't. I know each installment of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings got a Picture nomination and the finale won a zillion awards, including Best Picture...but fantasy fanboys and girls, it does not then follow that every big series will replicate this success. So for those of you who love Harry Potter, it doesn't mean an Oscar nom was inevitable. The Lord of the Rings wasn't a pattern or a precedent for the genre, it was its own thing.

Since the recent expansion from five nominees, the frontrunner in the animated feature category has also been making an appearance here for Best Picture. Not this year, though it probably points to there being no one, clear favorite there (and conspicuously, no PIXAR or Adventures of Tintin). Hard to call that a snub, but it is a break in the recent pattern.


George Clooney's The Ides of March got a screenplay nod, but didn't have enough gas to break into Picture. Clint Eastwood's ambitious J. Edgar didn't seem to get much of a consensus among critics, audiences, or the Academy, so it fell by the wayside. Same thing for Cronenberg's Jung & Freud piece A Dangerous Method. Sadly Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy underperformed a bit, Polanski's Carnage was completely ignored, and the two indie faves that generated buzz during the summer months, Take Shelter and Martha Marcy May Marlene, may have simply peaked too early.

Lars Von Trier's Melancholia was one of my personal favorites of the year, but I certainly didn't expect it to get any Oscar attention. The one I really wish had made it was the aforementioned Take Shelter. Loved that movie, but other than the Independent Spirit Awards and a few critics prizes it was generally shut out this awards season. Its Oscar no-show was not unexpected, but it is too bad. Amazing flick.

Attachments

 

__________________
"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra

Rauldc, so far of those nine nominees, The Tree of Life, Moneyball, The Help and Midnight in Paris are currently available on DVD in the U.S.

And if you haven't seen it yet on TV or in the movie theater (it ran with the trailers I saw the other day), here's a cameo-laden promo for this year's Oscars...

The Screen Actors Guild Awards have all been handed out, and the award for Best Ensemble in a Motion Picture, which many like to think of as the SAG equivalent of Best Picture, went to the cast of The Help.


So...what does this mean in regards to the Oscar race for Best Picture? Not a whole lot, frankly. The media and some fans like to try and treat the SAG cast award as the Best Picture, but it simply isn't. For one thing, they've only been handing out the award for seventeen years now, and of the previous sixteen, only half of the time was the Best Ensemble winner the same as the eventual Best Picture at the Academy Awards. 50% is a horrible ratio, as awards predicting goes. Here are the eight who were not Oscar winners but did win from the Screen Actors Guild: Inglourious Basterds, Little Miss Sunshine, Sideways, Gosford Park, Traffic, The Full Monty, The Birdcage, and Apollo 13. No, your eyes did not deceive you, that did say The Birdcage, which of course was not even nominated for Oscar's Best Picture. The others were all at least nominees, but they lost to The Hurt Locker, The Departed, Million Dollar Baby, A Beautiful Mind, Gladiator, Titanic, The English Patient, and Braveheart come Oscar night.

Not to say it's impossible for The Help to win Best Picture. Obviously it's on the ballot, it could win. But as I detailed earlier, the much, much, much stronger historical indicator is that only once in the past seventy-eight years has there been - one time in that nearly eight decades of Oscar history - a Best Picture winner without its director even getting a nomination for Best Director.

So, if you love and are rooting for The Help to win and want to see this as a sign of an upset to come, you certainly may. But I wouldn't bet any actual money on it.


.
.
.

Attachments

 

For your consideration...

Mark Harris makes the case for and against The Artist: Oscarmetrics: The SAGtermath and the Case Against The Artist. Note some language.

All if this speculation is just that, speculation, but I really don't think the SAG Award for cast generally means all that much, and that it has only matched the Oscar winner half of the time speaks volumes. I don't think the actors, by in large, treat that vote as 'that was the best picture of the year', but rather, 'that movie had the best and most to do for all the actors involved', which is what the award is supposed to mean, on its face: "Outstanding Performance by the Cast of a Theatrical Motion Picture". Not that they can't evaluate their choice for Oscar's Best Picture in the same way if they want, but I think (and hope) that even the most actory of actors take into account, not just the performances, but the total sum of filmmaking and the effect it has on them as a viewer. That is why acting has four categories of its own, right? But treating the SAG cast award in the spirit in which one is supposed to is how you get a win for The Birdcage's cast, not because it was much of anybody on the planet's choice as "Best Picture" of that or any year, but because it had a cast mixed with veterans and newcomers, including Gene Hackman - not as well known for his comedic roles as his dramatic ones - having fun in a farce with Robin Williams. But it was The English Patient that won the Oscar for Best Picture that year.

The Artist is "light", I suppose, depending on your definition, but I think extrapolating that such a movie shouldn't, and can't, win Best Picture is silly. One of the most obvious corollaries for The Artist's content is Singin' in the Rain, and clearly that is one of the many classic films that was its inspiration and there are overlapping general plot points. Back at the 1953 Oscars, Singin' in the Rain did not win Best Picture. It wasn't even nominated, believe it or not. The film that did win, Cecil B. DeMille's The Greatest Show On Earth, is now widely considered one of the worst movies to ever win the Academy's top prize, while Singin' in the Rain is a timeless classic of the first order that is beloved by every new generation that sees it. My point being, I would hope that in the subsequent decades the Oscar voters now have enough perspective and sophistication to see that how light or serious a film may be in its intent, there is something to be said for the magic of cinema. To have an overriding bias to say movies like The Artist or Singin' in the Rain shouldn't win Best Picture is just plain not being much of a film fan. And don't you think that if they had a time machine they'd like to go back and warn their fellows that it's really OK to exalt a movie as wonderful and joyous as Singin' in the Rain? Time and movie history won't judge you poorly for voting for a movie that is warm and makes you smile. Quite the opposite, actually. The Greatest Show On Earth? Really?!?




Not that one has to be a fan of film to work in the industry or be an Academy Award voter.

But the backlash the frontrunner receives each year is always fun to me. Except in extremely rare cases, like Schindler's List, there's always seems to be this push for the frontrunner not to win, because how boring would it be if the movie that everyone had been saying for three or four or six months was going to win actually won? Of course the film that seems predestined to win in November doesn't always win in March, you need look no further than last year for that when The Social Network seemed to be a foregone conclusion until The King's Speech started winning everything. But much more often than not, as boring as it may be, that movie everyone expects to win, it wins. Will this be one of the exceptions, will The Descendants or The Help pull off the upset? Possible, of course, but not likely.

.
.

Attachments

 

Hey, I love Singin' in the Rain and I suspect that I'll love The Artist, but c'mon now, The Greatst Show on Earth is a perfect example of light entertainment, with a solid cast, suspense, comedy, F/X and "surprise guests". Whether you give it a legit or a camp rating is up to you, but give it a shot. I know that Holden gave it a shot, but I'm talking to others here (even if I doubt anyone is going to watch it).

Shut up, mark!

__________________
It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. - John Wooden
My IMDb page

Martin Scorcese has lost out so many times in his career, it's only fitting that Hugo cements itself in movie lore. Do we really need to go back to silent movies? Hugo all the way.

Suprised you didn't mention Hugo as a possible winner although I must say your opinion is rather astute.
Having said that, I would also like to add that it is of outmost importance to consider who is actually doing the voting:for the Golden Globes it's the Hollywood press, whose taste tends to be more international, the SAG - you got actors voting for other actors, which can be a good and a bad thing ( friendship, jealousy etc. ) but for the Oscars, all the members of the academy vote, which means all those varied that contribiute to the making of a movie i.e producers, directors, cinematographers, writers, actors etc.. so the voters overall tend to have a broader view and don't necessarily agree with Golden Globes and SAG. Of course that's not to say that politics have nothing to do with it, quite the opposite and since it is about money a movie like the Artist should really not be a front runner, because when you think about it a movie like Hugo can have more general and less select appeal, and therefore make more money.
But on a personal note, never mid the homage to movie roots, it's hard for me today to compare a slient movie with the modern talkie. Afterall, acting has evolved from mere posturing, and good diction is now paramount, as evidenced by the number one guy in the land.

Happily, the Academy voters are getting away from this mode of box office seeming to be an overriding criteria, if that was ever even a thing to begin with or just a perception and rationalization (I'm sure everybody remembers when Moonstruck and Fatal Attraction won over The Last Emperor). The prime example being two years ago when The Hurt Locker, which had made a relatively paltry $15-million at the U.S. box office and was not only long gone from the movie theater but had already been on DVD for over a month and thus could not benefit from a huge cash bump in being named Best Picture, that movie won over literally the most financially successful movie ever in Avatar. At the time during that awards season, it was just accepted as common knowledge and business sense by plenty of insiders and pundits that a movie that made as little money as The Hurt Locker couldn't possibly win Oscar's Best Picture. Within the past decade, Crash and No Country for Old Men both also won Best Picture, and both had grossed in the neighborhood of $70-million. This in an environment where Alvin and the Chimpmunks: Chipwrecked has made about $130-million, so far. The Hurt Locker is the Best Picture winner with BY FAR the smallest box office. Unless The Tree of Life manages to win, that record will not be broken this year.

I hope that quality will out when it comes to Academy voters taking their ballots somewhat seriously, but for doubters who suspect it's mostly about colder business decisions, it's a great sign that films with "small" box office returns both can and do win Best Picture. The Artist has "only" made about $19-million thus far in the U.S., though this weekend it has expanded to over a thousand screens for the first time in its platformed release. The presumed other favorite in the race, The Descendants, is currently sitting in the low $60-million range, which is more than Hugo has made, and of course Hugo was much more expensive a project than The Artist. Midnight in Paris is Woody's biggest film ever, box office wise, and it brought in "just" $56-million in the U.S. The Help is actually the blockbuster of the nine nominees, having taken in just under $170-million domestically (no pun intended).

I don't think The Help will be taking massive numbers of votes away from The Artist and The Descendants simply because it made more money. I'm sure of the six thousand some members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, there are probably a few who vote by box office. I'm sure there are members who only vote for their friends, only vote for the studio where they have their current project, who let their diva dogs fill out their ballots, and any other number of factors beyond the quality of each nominee. But I suspect such voters are the statistically irrelevant minority. Certainly hope so. If such voters weren't marginal and/or mythical, how would a movie like The Artist even get nominated in the first place?


.
.

Attachments

   

Nobody said anything about The Hunter

Nobody said who about the what, now?

Oh, you mean as in nobody mentioned The Hunter, like as a snub, as in it is obviously a great flick that surely should have been there as a Best Picture nominee? Well, it hasn't been theatrically released in America and thus wasn't even a possibility (full list of eligible films HERE).

But congrats, you made me look it up. Mission accomplished!


.
.

Attachments

 

I've put the picture later, when I found out how it's done. The movie was so beautifully filmed, and I think it was highly underrated, even if the story has some "voids" here and there.

Just got done watching The Artist. I still want The Descendants to pull off the upset, but The Artist wasn't too bad either. But I loved The Descendants.

I didn't knew that as I'm not from America nor Australia. I didn't assumed someone is a snub. If I would had thought that I would had said it explicitly , as I'm not ashamed to speak my mind openly.

No, clearly it was wishful thinking on my part to think you were somehow trying to make this related to the topic. And the statement, "Nobody said anything about The Hunter," is crystal clear, speaks volumes, and required no follow up. Thanks for sharing.



.
.

Attachments

 

If folks are letting their "diva-dogs" vote then that's just more proof that The Artist is a sure thing. I have to wonder though, that if there would have been a lot of diva dogs writing in Beginners and that way, actually hurting the chances somewhat for The Artist. Hmmm...

__________________
We are both the source of the problem and the solution, yet we do not see ourselves in this light...

I thought the strongest thing of The Artist was Bejo's performance. And that is the least of what is being talked about. Though perhaps her only getting a supporting nomination is the reason for that.