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Oscar Wrapup (American Beauty and The Matrix win)
RobertPearse noted that
the winners are on CNN. No surprise that American Beauty cleaned up (I watched it again on saturday: Wow). But The Matrix took Editing, Sound and FX (Edging out Phantom Menace). Sleepy Hollow took Art Direction. Update by nik: "Not a lot of people know that" many of the effects for The Matrix were generated on FreeBSD systems.
What didn't I like about it? I thought that explored well trodden ground, ripped off little bits of other movies/stories, and didn't offer anything new.
So, it was well made, had some funny parts, but it took no risks, and wound up saying nothing. Yes, I know, you think it was risky, but that's because it expressed some of your own biases and you like to feel you are daring: that's called adolescence, retarded in some cases (as in means "delayed").
THE OSCARS RUN LINUX DOOD! YOU DUMBASS!
It depends upon your intentions. We watched, but we MST3K'd it. :)
WWJD? JWRTFM!!!
From what I saw on the "making of" section on the DVD the flips were assisted by harnesses but were "real". The CGI used for those would have been the removal of wires.
That's actually one of the more impressive things about the matrix for me, the things in it that were NOT CGI. The actors did a LOT of training to get "realistic" fighting moves, and the fights they had were for the most part "real".
my $0.02CND
Actually, I thought it was a very good movie, and I thought Angelina Jolie did a very good job for the part. It's one of the few "chick flicks" I'd recommend anybody to go and see. Quite good.
The puke bag is called "submit story." If you would like to see other [interesting] news, make sure there's some to post.
IIRC, that was the way it was supposed to happen in the original 1977 version. The effects at the time just didn't quite show it.
-Stu
- let them be self important. we know the truth.
- actors affiliate themselves with pet causes because it attracts attention to the cause and to the actor. it's a win/win situation. Yes it's a sad state of affairs when we don't notice "great causes" unless a shining smile/body/face is attached to them, but can you really blame us? It's an information glut...
- sometimes it's easy to get jaded, but it's important to remember that WE are the reason hollywood is an empire. intellectual property isn't going to save them in the long term - you don't make that much money off of re-runs. It's up to us if we want to watch shlock movies.
if there's something to get jaded about, it's about wide spread cynicism, double standards and attention deficit in the general populace.
-Stu
sorry folks, but I don't buy the "Star wars' CGI was same-old, same-old" argument. It was ground breaking work, and was BY FAR the most visually extraordinary movie of the year. ILM pulled off major innovations in order to get Phantom Menace out the door, and deserved the oscar.
The academy most likely wanted to give Lucas the finger. Which is somewhat understandable.
-Stu
I actually liked his speech.
The drooling masses who watch any shlock hollywood throws at them do suck.
at the same time, the prententious art folk who watch obscure indie films just because it's "hard to understand" also suck.
the name of the game is "straddling the line" between art & sensibility. which is hard to do.
-Stu
But the point is that real character interacting with animated characters that were added later has already been done.
Like I said above, the Jar Jar character was very well animated, but the actual part of adding him to the scene wasn't anything special.
Sure, wasn't the same type of thing done in both B5 and Voyager, though to a lesser extent, with some of the aliens that they were fighting (the Borg killers in Voyager).
T.
By ridley scotts own admission, for the first hour of "Alien", nothing happens, still I was riveted to my seat.
Agreed, but that was more of a nothing that in American Beauty. In Alien, you are constantly expecting something to jump out from around the next corner, or something. The psychology of the film is completely different.
T.
Not really. What's the difference between putting in a CGI character, and drawing in a character. We all remember 'Who Frames Rodger Rabbit', don't we.
No, Jar Jar was hardly ground breaking. Very well done as a character though(even if he was annoying).
T.
And finally there is the fact that the kid who has the camera, the one who films everything, find beauty everwhere, but only throught the lens of a camera. Gee, more Hollywood self validation.
I thought that he was capturing the beauty so that it could be viewed again, not that he only saw such beauty through a camera lens.
Anyway, as for the film itself, I didn't like it. I nearly fell asleep during it. This could be for a few reasons, though:
- I'm Irish, and have no real interest in American Surburban life, which is mainly what this film was about.
- I was told the film was a comedy, and as such I was expecting it to be one. After 30 minutes, there wasn't much laughter, and I was really disappointed.
- I was also told that the film doesn't really take off until about 30 minutes into it as the characters and stuff need to be setup in order for the rest of the film to be better. After 45 minutes, I was so bored I must have missed the changeover, and kept missing it until the end.
I will agree that the end was a bit of a surprise. I know he tells us that he will be dead by the end of the film, but you don't know how until the end of the film. And by the time you know how, you don't know who, and then it's a shock 'cos it's not who you thought it would be.
There were some good bits in the film alright, but on the whole, I didn't enjoy it.
I never walk out of films, no matter how bad. However, this was one that I was almost going to walk out of.
Sixth Sense, on the other hand, was excellent. I would have liked to have seen it get the oscar.
Kudos to The Matrix. It deserved what it got, and more.
T.
While I would disagree with an excellence rating on any other element of TPM, I do think they win the Oscar for "Best fight choreography of all time". If nothing else.
I wish I had a nickel for every time someone said "Information wants to be free".
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
nah, Saving Private Ryan was too "Braveheart" derivitive for my tastes.
I wish I had a nickel for every time someone said "Information wants to be free".
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
This assessment is correct.
The winners only went to the stage after hesitating, and finally seeing that others were helping the handicapped artist.
--
--
Marc A. Lepage
Software Developer
Another often overlooked film in the sci-fi "nature of reality" subgenre is Dark City.
I hate to sound so jaded, but I am.
The Academy Awards has become just blip in an ever increasing glut of televised shows where viewers can ogle celebrities and the industry can pat itself on the back. Perhaps Warhol was wrong. Not everyone will be famous for 15 minutes, but at the rate things are going, everyone who is famous will receive an award for fame every 15 minutes.
The entertainment industry is so awash in self-importance that it sickens me. Actors affiliate themselves with trendy pet causes to compensate for the fact that they are wealthy for being people they aren't. I'm tired of celebrities telling me what I should look like, what I should buy, what I should donate money to, how I should vote.
I'm tired of a business where the only way to derive respect is to be as offensive as possible. I can't stand the fawning entertainment press that can't help but describe this stench as anything other than "bold" and "intelligent."
I'm offended the entertainment industry's attitude that portrays itself as a victim of censorship while at the same time trying to eradicate any expression on the net that may undermine its empire.
I will not shut up and sit on the couch!!!
-- P.J.
They did the same thing with Fight Club. It's just a big marketing ploy. Still enjoyed them both though
Braveheart had tons o' violence and swept that year. Same goes for Dances With Wolves. (Don't get me wrong, I loved both of those movies).
I don't think there's a direct correlation between amount of violence and chances of getting Oscars.
[puts on square spectacles and London accent] "Oi, not a lot of people know that".
eXistenZ was one of the best movies of the year. Much better than the matrix, and along similar lines.
Pi was good also, as was Fight Club. the oscars are a joke.
American Beauty wasn't so great at all, I thought.
support gun control: take guns from cops
Personally I prefer ExistenZ's coverage of reality vs. perception to that of The Matrix, and I think it gets less wrapped up in glamour (i.e., Keanu, guns and tiles).
However, The Matrix also covers the theme of fate, and covers it well, IMHO.
As for Pi, I thought it was crap. Which just goes to show there's no accounting for taste. I haven't seen 'The Cube'.
Hamish
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato
First off I think it was spelled eXistenZ not ExistenZ. They made a strong point of that in the movie. But, now I'm just being picky.
(Warning Spoilers)
Secondly, yes it was a good movie but, anyone who has ever read quite a bit of scifi could have told you that it would end with a game within a game plot. IMHO the only thing really new it brought to the table was the bio weapons spin.
The Matrix on the other hand had everyone going into the movie wondering if this film was going to live up to the hype and allow them to suspend disbelief. Like, in the previews the characters could in fact leap across buildings.
Plus, The Matrix's storyline seems a bit more tightly woven then eXistenZ. Lets not forget to mention the new cool special effects in the movie and music to help boost the whole film. In short The Matrix had more to offer the viewer.
As for the movie "The Cube". I agree with the others that it really should have been an outer limits show instead of a movie. I mean who really didn't know that the cubes were moving once they saw the grid on the outside of the cube. It just looked too much like a rubics cube for anyone to resist writting that into the plot.
The movie Pi was actually really good. There's not really much more to say about it. The film speaks for itself.
And finally the movie Dark City. This is one of those movies were you start to watch thinking it might be worth your time, but they drag the suspense on for so long that you begin wondering why and the hell you care anyhow. And once the end comes it didn't deliver the thill you expected.
Part of what made The Matrix so cool was that throughout the previews and the beginning of the movie they had already told you enough for you to put it together. But, something about didn't allow your brain to make the connection. And once you sat down and watched the film they didn't spend 2 and a 1/2 hours telling you it's all in a computer and leaving the film ten minutes afterward.
My 2 cents
Topsy Turvy was a very excellent movie about Gilbert and Sullivan. It mainly revolved around the production of the Mikado, but explored a lot of other issues as well. One of the best of the year. It won in makeup because it was the only 'legitimate' movie in the catagory.
In the words of Gene Siskel; "..."
No, the movie industry doesn't call sequels versions. That is a programmer slipping up.
But they might as well for the lack of originality generally shown.
Cheers,
Ben
PS Don't trust the fortunes to be very accurate. The fortune as I am posting this is Wad some power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us. -- R. Browning I happen to know that this is due to Robbie Burns. Which makes me wonder about others out there that I don't know about...
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
I have to diagree. Some of the effects used in the Matrix were completely new, (bullet time, and at least one other that I can't remember,) and there were many instances of older effects being used in unique ways, (this goes back to the directors' background in comic books.) The Matrix was an eye opener, filled with "wow" effects that caused the jaw to drop.
Save for the AMAZING light saber battle in the end of TFM, there was nothing truly spectacular about the movie's effects. Everything had been done before, and nothing old was put ot a new use. The awards for best fx, sound fx, and editing usually go to the pioneers; the ones that break the rules in bold new ways. TFM, while at least moderately impressive, was really just a rehashing of old-school effects. I was not impressed.
George Lucas, and ILM to a lesser extent, deserves not only the slap in the face that he/they got, but a good swift kick to the head. TFM had ONE cool thing in it, the light saber fight. Everything else was stupid, lame, and altogether CRAPPY. Gone were the witticisms of the original trilogy ("What an incredible smell you've discovered.") They've been replaced with fart jokes, stepping in poop, and stupid sophomoric humor. The lame american-style announcer during the pod race was also too much, as were lame little pit droids getting sucked into combustion chambers, or jar jar getting his lips numbed off. Lame.
So no, Star wars gets no awards because it was stupid, the effects were pretty much recycled crap, and george lucas can suck it.
-- Minds are like parachutes... they work best when open.
He's dead Jim.
You don't exist. Go away. --SysVinit Halt
The ending to sixth sense made me think exactly one thing -- "remake of Jacob's Ladder - foo!".
There is no boy. We don't see the boy until afterdoc is shot. The entire movie from the shooting forward is doc's hallucination. There is no boy! So it's impossible for it to be "inconsistent". They could have put the entire "mission to mars" movie in the middle of "Sixth Sense" and it still would have been "consistent". It's a nearly-dead-man's deathbed dream, just like "Jacob's Ladder".
I don't see why everyone likes this movie, or wants it to be consistent or inconsistent. <sigh>
I want to know why it is imperative that if a movie wins best picture of the year then Best Director and Actor awards are a given? The lead actor from the Best Picture and the Director from the best picture are going to win. Am I the only one who notices this nonsense?
I remember the year that Forrest Gump won everything. God, I got so tired of seeing Tom Hanks I could have puked.
The Matrix and Star Wars Episode I were good flicks and the Matrix was very entertaining. Yet, does anyone remember Blade Runner? That was an incredible deep movie that happened to be in the Sci-Fi genre. That was one that should have won a butt load of awards.
ACK
All about my mother.
Pedro Almodovar is The One.
You really should see Boy's Don't Cry.
- Ain't she pretty?
- Yeah if you like trash.
It's called new wave but it's just the same.
Agreed. The Cube sucked sooo much balls that the only redeming qualtity was the actors obesession with shoes. "Okay, you can go. BUT LEAVE YOUR SHOES" I think all the actors just had a very unnatural foot fetish.
"However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
Besides the Cube sucking (Thats not the nature of my post, but I had to throw it in). A documentary won that hasn't even been released yet. In the acceptance speech the director (I think the documentary was One Day In September) admited that the film was yet to be release ANYWHERE in the world. I guess only the academy saw it. (or maybe they didn't. I wouldn't put it past them to award a movie that no one has seen, including themselves)
"However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
Pish is an expression.
"pish tosh!"
It is generally assumed to be reserved for stuck up nobility who would look down on the lower classes and say "pish". It is an insult where you impy that the ideas of the lower classes are nonsense.
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
I was seriously bored halfway thru Matrix. I admit , PM was not the greatest move out there but at least was not boring.
The Economist has an interesting article: When Life is More Interesting than Art about American Beauty, Hollywood, and the suburbs.
Perhaps if you released your movies on DVD like the Wachowski brothers, people would remember them well enough to give you Oscars for their technical merit.
--The Academy
... worst male actor of the Century: Sylvester Stallone - and worst female actor of the Century: Madonna.
or so some claim to say.
Maybe it is just me, but I thought that American Beauty was NOT about life in Suburbia. It is about the life of a bunch of people who happen to live in the suburbs (they honestly could have lived in the city, same story would have worked with a couple of small tweaks, like change the occupation of the wife).
More than that it is about how everybody goes through life oblivious to the magic and beauty that is in front of our eyes every day. That is what the whole end monologue by Spacey is about. That is what that kid who films everything is in there for, to show everyone what they are ignoring.
But that is just my opinion...
Q.
Pi, I just didn't like. I assumed it was the first part of a two part story. the second part being called 'sh'.
And The Cube I haven't seen, but isn't it a Twilight Zone knock-off?
Uhh.. did anyone that voted actually see Girl, Interrupted? I didn't think so. Man, the movie itself was a turdball, and Jolie's performance was certainly nothing special. That is quite the ridiculous pick.. I see how the thought process goes like I am looking at a thought bubble Uhh.. don't know her.. don't know her.. oh.. she.. she is that one guys daughter. Just another reason to hate the Oscars I guess.
www.jackasscritics.com
many winner's careers tank afterwards.
George Lee
I'll host it if you want, I'm on a DS3 and have a celeron 400 with 128 megs of ram, should be sufficient. Just email me with all the details if you're interested.
I had it on my server before, but at the request of my employer moved it to a different location due to the high bandwidth usage. You can get it at ftp://198.22.19.4/pub/incoming/canada.rm
No kidding!!!!! it was a german movie though...
Hey, me too, man. That includes having my say and sharing my ideas. Only you can judge what they are worth to you. I'm not slamming anyone for liking The Matrix (well, maybe a little), just offering a two-bit opinion. I don't believe in censoring anyone, or in keeping you from seeing whatever you want. I'm just hoping we can all learn to like better things by really looking at them and thinking about them, instead of having them merely wash over us passive zombies like a tide of sewage.
In fact, the one part of The Matrix that really did work for me was the idea that we are all only semi-concious, afloat in a world of comfortable sensation and illusion. When it plays with that feeling, it is eerily effective. I just found the core idea so technically bogus that I couldn't swallow it. I found the plot resolution ridiculous (Gawd! I am sooooo tired of "chosen one" plots! What a dramatic cop out! God/Jesus/Keanu? Come on!) If you can't find a way for a human being to do, think, change, grow into a man capable of solving the hero's problem, then maybe the hero has an insoluable problem. To me this is nothing but hackneyed writing: Paint the hero into a corner and then, bam! Magic bails him out! He is, after all, the chosen one! Crap.
Sorry, I didn't really mean to rant on, but the slavish adoration of this film is really getting to me. It's old wine in a really pretty new bottle, folks.
In any case, my real point is that I waste time on Slashdot because it affords me a chance from time to time to say things that matter to me and read things I hadn't thought of before. Those chances are rare, but I enjoy having them. I hope you enjoy whatever you do too. There's lots of room out here.
>Now, he's been "chosen" because of his skills. Because he is smart, because he is smarter than most, right? Well then how come he doesn't know what an EMP is?
Oh, come on. There are a number of problems with that statement, but the big one is the old assumption that "smart" == "knows everything".
Bullshit.
"Smart" does not mean you know everything. Smart means you have a greater capacity for understanding, for absorbing new information. Specifically, and most importantly (especially in the context of this movie), it means an ability to look at things in a new light, to fire different neurons along different paths, and from the same base facts, make different connections, and draw new, different and wonderous conclusions.
That is what "smart" means, and that especially is what being "the One" means. It has nothing whatsoever to do with how much you know. There is no basis whatsoever for the assertion that he must have been "smart" therefore he had to know everything, therefore he had to know what an EMP was. That's a completely different (and unrealistic) quality.
Argh.
*gets off soapbox*
--
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think you just crossed it.
- Sean
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think I just crossed it.
- Sean
not only is the universe stranger than you imagine,
it's stranger than you are capable of imagining
not only is the universe stranger than you imagine,
it's stranger than you are capable of imagining
This is the only movie I've ever hated with a passion. Other movies you ignore because they suck, and you go on your way. This one just leaves you feeling utterly ripped off and angry that you spent the time watching it.
The plot was completely predictable, and other than that, there's nothing left in the movie. Matrix, with a typical plot, at least, had cool effects and fights. Existenz, with a so-so plot, had nothing else.
A warning to ANYONE who is thinking of watching this movie. I saw a review of it on Reel and IMDB so I went out and rented it with great hopes, thinking it was an "intellectual matrix". I've never been so angry about renting a movie before.
really, I've never been so vocal about bad movies, but this one really made me feel like I got ripped off. So if you go and rent it, go ahead, but don't say you weren't warned.
to those who did enjoy it, I don't mean to insult you... I guess we're just different types of personalities. I'm not much of an "Art House" geek.
The Razzies awards go to the worst of hollywood,
I don't remember what was the worst movie diz year, but I know that Jar-Jar got the "worst
2nd role" prize.
Jar jar must die.
For those of you who don't know the plot, eXistenZ is about a future videogame designer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who is being hunted by the "Realists" (something like that) - people who feel that the sophisticated videogames of the movie's future are morally wrong. The Realists muck up the only copy of her next masterpiece, a game called eXistenZ. Because she's a programmer she can fix it, but only by going "into" the game.
eXistenZ puts a lot of people off because it does not deliver pleasure in the way you expect from a movie. I would be put off too, if not for the quite important fact that Cronenberg's movies all end up being precisely about pleasure, and the ways people have come to expect it - from games, cars, videotapes, taboo fantasies - and from movies. He does not give you exactly what you want when you want it, which can make for thought-provoking, if occasionally uncomfortable, viewing.
Everything about the Matrix is what you'd expect from a movie made in 1999 about an elaborate simulation of reality - hard, shiny, urban setting, black sunglasses, martial arts, the power of love, etc. It's what you expect, and it's exactly what you get. It's not suprising that the movie did so well - it takes classic hollywood themes and slaps them together with what have become the canonical trappings of cyberpunk. And of course the obligatory 15 million rounds of ammo.
There is precious little ammo in eXistenZ. Precious few pairs of black sunglasses. And the whole movie takes place in the countryside. What you expect? No. But eXistenZ provokes questions that the Wachowski brothers might ask if they ever bothered reading the post-structuralist theory they littered the set of the Matrix with. Like: to what extent do we fetishize the physical manifestation of information (bioports)? Or: if I am placed in a radically different context, do I remain consistent with myself, or am I someone else, with different desires?
My point: eXistenZ is by far the more imaginative movie. Course it didn't even get nominated for anything, but that won't stop me from complainin'.
p.s. I really want Motorola to make Jude Law's "pink phone"... way cooler than the little slidey StarTacs in the Matrix...
+++ Chromalon.
ExistenZ was OK, but you could see the ending coming pretty early... and all the wierd bio weapons and stuff like they belonged in an old Dr. Who episode.
And speaking of old Dr. Who episodes, as soon as I heard that background noise in "The Cube", I knew what was going on - thanks to watching "The Horns Of Nimon", a key to time episode of Dr. Who. I liked the Cube, but agree that it really closer to an Outer Limits episode than a movie.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
While I like The Matrix more then I liked Fight Club, I'd have to say fight club Looked Nicer. It was only nominated for Sound effects editing, and I think it should at least have been nominated for visual editing as well, if not taken the prize.
The Matrix was a great movie, but Fight club was really origional (At least, I'd never seen anything quite like it). And they actualy used editing in new and artistic ways, as opposed to just spliceing a story together well, like The Matrix.
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Wtf is 'Pish'?
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
He was screenwriter of the PEANUTS feature films.
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Chris Crosby
Your Pal,
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All puns intentionally implied.
You think so? I thought Robin Williams did a poor job of singing it. I expected him to use his voice talent in his rendition, but he ended up just shouting the song with very little inflection. The dance sequence was very good, however.
This has been done to death, I know, but I've come to the conclusion that "Blame Canada" was not the best choice for a nomination. Most South Park fans would agree that it was not the best song, but it also had a very poor chance to win because it was essentially a "marching song". It seems Oscars for best song usually go to something "softer", in which case I would say "Up There" conforms more closely. Taken out of context, it has the longing and determination typical of Disney fare, which seems to dominate this category.
'cause it's a book
--
+&x
Fight Club started out o.k, but degenerated quickly. The camera pans of Ed's apt are roughly similar to (and probably inspried by) the clothing descriptions in American Psycho, soon to be a very disturbing major motion picture in a theatre near you.
Being John Malkovich was a bit on the long side, but had some great moments (Malkovich as the puppet, M in his own head)
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+&x
It's unfortunate that you missed the point of American Beauty, because you missed one of the most joyous, uplifting, life-changing experiences ever to come from a movie. Maybe you could see it again. The closest thing to this movie is Billy Wilder's movie, The Apartment, which both Spacey and Mendes have mentioned in tribute.
Here is what American Beauty is not:
American Beauty is about the main character, Lester Burnham, and the journey he takes in discovering the secret of his own life, and his own happiness. And, it is about discovering the beauty in our lives, and the world around us, regardless of the turmoil and the tragedies that might occur.
As the movie starts, Lester is a normal shmuck, like any of us, but his life has gone horribly wrong. His job is unfulfilling and somewhat dishonest, his wife is an artificial persona with no passion, his marriage is empty, and so on. Of course, he's only dimly aware of this, because he is living by habit, or as he puts it, it's like he is in a coma.
Lester is jarred out of this routine by a spark, in the form of his daughter's friend, an apparent vixen. Now the teen lust is not the important issue here. What matters is that it awakens in Lester a feeling that he has not had in years. He starts to see just how bad his life has become, so he decides he's going to break out -- he's going to find the thing that he has lost, the happiness he knew in his younger days. Note that "decides" is not really the right word -- Lester has no idea what exactly it is that he has lost, in fact he didn't know it when he had it, and he has no idea how to find it again.
So, acting purely on instinct, Lester breaks out, and tries to find what he is missing.
He quits his job, and rather than playing the meek little good boy, as he has always done, he plays it their way for once, taking what he can get, and "blackmailing" his boss for a big severance check. Aha, payback! It provides a momentary sense of satisfaction, freedom, and power, but it doesn't make him happy.
In response to the lies and hypocrisy, he tries brutal honesty, which provides for some moments of humour and satifaction, but doesn't really change his life.
He tries to recapture his youth. He takes a job at a fast food joint, he exercises, he smokes pot, listens to rock music, and buys his dream car. All of these things make him feel more free, at least for a short time, but he still hasn't found the secret. He still has no direction, no passion for anything, no relationship with his wife or his daughter, etc. Though he's closer, and he wouldn't go back, he's still not there yet.
Meanwhile, there remains one more thing to shoot for, the thing that reignited the spark in him in the first place, the fantasy and his lust for the young Angela. Had that fantasy remained unfulfilled, he might never have finished his journey, and discovered the secret, but by chance, he gets the opportunity to fulfill his fantasy.
And at that point, the bubble bursts. He's been chasing an illusion -- Angela is not the experienced vixen he believed. Faced with the truth, he chooses to do the right thing, and stops. In doing so, he discovers that he's actually decent guy, and he's not the loser he believed himself to be.
This triggers in him a wholescale rethinking of his life. He realizes that while he's been totally focussed on chasing the things he didn't have, or was supposed to have, meanwhile, the things that made him happy were right there in front of him. It's so simple. He's actually had a good life, not the least of which, before he lost sight of it, was the love he felt for his wife, and the joy of his daughter.
Of course, the movie is not making a simple shallow statement (like "love is the answer" -- blech). Lester's answers are not necessarily the same as yours. The question is: What makes you happy, and are you doing the right things to achieve it, or are you caught up chasing an empty dream? Lester discovers his answers too late, but, as he says in the narration at the beginning, it's not too late for you.
They had a long segment in last year's oscars for Kubrick, he died a few weeks before that show. .^
^.
I am surely surprised by this one -- nobody has mentioned the first national TV nipple. Yup, the Spanish guy is accepting his award for "Best Foriegn Language Film" and his wife is waggling around and clapping -- and there it is as her dress comes open.
Atop a 34B cup breast is one very erect and very pink nipple standing at attention for all American viewers to see. There was no mistaking it -- and the network had no other options to cover it up with another shot.
Go back and look at the tapes, guys. It's a nipple!
Of all the nipples I thought I'd see that night -- and it's the Spanish guy's wife! God Bless Foriegn Films!
The effects in TPM may have been state-of-the-art as far as computer generated stuff goes, but for my money there was only one scene - the pod race - in which they actually *worked* for the movie. IMO Phantom Menace was a bad movie precisely *because* of the special effects - it relied on them totally to the exclusion of any real story or character development. It left me stone cold.
The Matrix, OTOH, was a great movie! The effects were technically impressive and ground-breaking, but much more importantly they worked in the context of the film, and added to it rather than detracting from it.
I think it would be mangingless if awards were given to special effects in movies that were overall bad, since bottom line is that this is all about movie making, not technical wizardry.
At first I thought that was Roberto Begnini having another of his moments.
I mean c'mon guys...powering the alien civilization with electrochemical brainwave energy? Really? They can create hyperrealistic virtual environments, but they can't figure out how to get hydrogen nuclei to fuse?
I think that it might have been more i interesting if instead of using human body heat and brainwaves as a power plant, if the brains were tremendous parallel processing plant for the AI to live on.
Now that would be a beowulf cluster worth seeing....
What I primarily objected to with the Special Edition was the alteration of many scenes by adding pedestrian CGI effects that had no positive impact on the storytelling. In one case, (Greedo shooting Han first) altering the scene had a major impact on the story, for the worst.
In light of The Matrix winning all four of the major technical Oscars last night, perhaps George Lucas should give up on his crusade to digitize every last aspect of movie making, as least until the tech gets up to snuff so it's not so obvious. Lucas may now be in the same phase of his career as Stan Lee, much revered father of Marvel comics. Now is the time to enjoy your legendary status, but don't do anything to screw it up. George did a hatchet job on his own classics with that "Special Edition" stunt and then turned in a lame excuse for a prequel with Phantom Menace. It is obvious from fan reaction that the future lies with efforts like The Matrix and that George's days of glory are over. Same applies to Stan Lee. Have you seen his latest effort over at shockwave.com? It takes a big man to know when to quit.
ILM's contribution to Phantom Menace was less than groundbreaking. They were doing straightforward CGI, just on a massive scale. Is adding scalability a groundbreaking achievement? Perhaps, but under that logic, Windows2000 is a groundbreaking operating system...
Well, the theme from Shaft censored itself. That's part of the comedy. Those lines are in the original song.
But Shaft does rule. My favorite line:
Where you goin' Shaft?
To get laid. where the hell you goin'?
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
TPM the most visually stunning move in history? You smoking something? "Visually Stunning" is a lot broader than "Special Effects".
Have you ever watched "Koyaanisqatsi"? How about "2001" (which was slow, but VISUALLY stunning), how about (if you want great visuals) "Out of Africa" (Date Movie, but amazing camera work)
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
Since everyone in the film was portrayed as a wack-o, I believe that your facts are correct
but your conclusions are not. You should see the film before you make judgements like this.
Hmmm.... the Cube...
was a bunch of crap! (said with an appropriate Scottish accent)
Really though, aside from the fact that it did make you think a little bit, there wasn't enough substance in there at all...
Pi was better, but..... I dunno.... not a great movie. Haven't seen ExistenZ - maybe I'll check it out and flame you later 8^)
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
I liked ExistenZ, but I thought the "are we back in reality yet?" theme had been done even more than some themes in The Matrix. ExistenZ didn't have any of the Oscar qualities that Matrix did, such as outstanding sound and visual effects. Maybe if they had a Best Sci-Fi category...
Can anyone else think of a movie besides The Matrix with good amounts of gratuitous violence that also got an academy award?
--
Win98 sux without these 1337 toolz !!
Just wondering if Stanley Kubrik was mentioned in the "In memory of...", though I can't remember if he died in 1999 or 2000. Anyone know?
Cheers,
Slak
Worth watching, and has some nice dialogue in the middle. The ending is pretty crap though.
Original in general, but there's a few plot twists that are signposted. Worth watching if you've nothing better to do and are bored of the usual style Hollywodd films.
But then, as the producers of American Beauty reminded us, Alan Ball's screenplay contained the line "there's so much beauty in it I have trouble coping" (or something like that) and, given what happens in the movie, the fact that you can still see that character making that claim and knowing what he meant shows you how well-crafted it was.
Bah! Phil Collins? PHIL COLLINS? The Academy inevitably awards the blandest songs. Not that "Blame Canada" was the best of the South Park songs, but it still kicked ass on Phil Collins' ... hell, Aimee Mann's song kicked ass on Phil Collins' ...
I suppose the (relatively) splashy production for "Blame Canada" was as close as they were going to get to giving it some recognition.
"Oh, I hope he doesn't give us halyatchkies," said Heinrich.
Dunno if cinematography counts, but in the more "technical" categories, nominations are decided by experts; these are the people who really know how good things in their field are.
Granted, the Matrix was visually stunning, and had a nice atmosphere, but I think those aspects of the movie were amply recognized by the awards it *did* win.
"Oh, I hope he doesn't give us halyatchkies," said Heinrich.
It's about Gilbert and Sullivan ... directed by Mike Leigh (of "Naked" and "Secrets and Lies" and lots of other depressing British movies fame). It made a lot of critics' "top 10" lists, so there was probably something to it. I don't know that "Sweet and Lowdown" was released in the area where I live at all, although I had heard of it before.
"Oh, I hope he doesn't give us halyatchkies," said Heinrich.
no.
"Oh, I hope he doesn't give us halyatchkies," said Heinrich.
"I will take the Ring," he said, "though I do not know the way."
One thing I have loved about this effect is the ethereal quality it gives everything - especially when the entire shot is "frozen" (by essentially taking the same shot from all the cameras along the track at the same instant). Bright light seems to "fog", falling water seems as if it is made of diamond. Things "hang" in midair - like magic.
These effects are truely amazing - even more amazing when one considers the early motion photographer Edward Muybridge almost discovered it himself...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I'm sorry but that movie was horrible. Good idea, but it would have made a much better Outer Limits episode than a movie.
God Fucking Damnit
OK I cant resist..
<soapbox>
If you are alluding that the movie is so depressing it makes any problems you may have seem petty, I disagree. A movie that fits that bill much much better is called Happiness by Todd Solondz. American Beauty is about finding happiness and beauty in the world rather than drudging through it with no meaning or significance. Sure he allows all the things that "mean something" in societies eyes to fall apart but he doesn't care! He's doing the things that make him happy and thats what counts in the end. Which is why I find American Beauty a "feel good" movie in the truest sense. It gives me hope.
<soapbox>
God Fucking Damnit
I just bought it on DVD. I had seen it on video a while back but after watching it recently I realized how similar the lighting and things are between Dark City and Matrix. The movies have quite a bit in common, but I still have to say Matrix is a better movie overall.. Dark City just moves a little too slowly at times.
God Fucking Damnit
All right. There be spoilers ahead! But anyhow. I loved the Sixth Sense. Great movie. But I figured out he was dead in the first twenty minutes. My girlfriend will never forgive me either. Turned to her and said "Hey, he's dead." I will admit that it was one of the few movies to scare me.
American Beauty was good too except for one problem. Why are the suburbs always depicted as some seething pit of insanity with just a thin crust of normalcy? The implication that if you live in the suburbs then you must be some kind of repressive nutcase or crazed homophobe/secret homosexual just strikes me as a bit simple bordering on insulting. Still a good movie if you take it as a allegory and not a depiction of actually life.
1....I thought Sixth Sense was much better myself, in the Best Picture but more particularly the best Original Screenplay category... i dont think anything comes close to being john malkovitch. that was a incredibly creative movie. i think it was horibly over looked. dam academy.
The Matrix was the Wachowski brothers saying "how cool!" Pi was Aronofsky saying "watch out." ExistenZ was Cronenberg saying "you suck."
Supposedly. EMP tech should of come after the matrix was built. If the humans used EMP to blow up the matrix, then 'most' of mankind in the matrix would be killed. Their goal is not to kill everyone, but to save them one by one.
:. Ultimate Control Dedicated/VM Servers
I noticed the same thing. They seemed more concerned with getting up on stage as fast as they could. Talk about exploiting someone for personal gain...
They were 'researchers' from the University of Maryland. No relation to Keplinger...
Well, then let's post some stuff about how they use it and the benefits they reap from it, I don't care about who won and who lost. Maybe if you quit watching all those dumb movies adn TV your head would clear and get rid of all the clutter!
Had anyone actually seen or even heard of Topsy Turvy before last night? What's it about? Is it worth seeing?
Even though it didn't win any REAL awards (costume design IMHO is no a real award, and best makeup -- Fat Bastard's makeup was WAAAY better), I'm still curious about it.
You know that that whole camera-zoom-around-the-apt.-thing is all CG? I've seen the wireframes, and it's amazing. They were in a mag called Cinefex.
The GAP ads weren't the first to do their version of the effect either. Several months before the GAP ads, there was some rock vid (can't remember who, involved an ice cave) Anyhow, the observant amongst us realized that what the Matrix was doing had to be at least somewhat different because there was movement during the rotations. The GAP ads (and the rock vid) froze, rotated, resumed.
Intolerant people should be shot.
Well, that one I'm not sure of, but I know they changed the scene involving shooting up some Stormtroopers in the comm(control?) room so that you no longer see the actual weapon impacts on their armour.
Intolerant people should be shot.
It showed up here in Edmonton at the Princess. (A single screen place that likes the art movies) Actually, I think its still playing. Maybe I'll go burn a few bucks before work tommorrow...
Intolerant people should be shot.
How can Fight Club (>6 months old now) be inspired by a movie that's not going to be around for >3 months, might I ask?
Intolerant people should be shot.
Ah, I see. Your saying FC was inspired by the book. That I can follow. I misunderstood your original post.
Intolerant people should be shot.
old news or try searching for "matrix rumors" on google.com.
"Classic UFO's
I've been talking with my friends about which film should have won best picture, and we seem to be evenly devided between The Sixth Sense and American Beauty. I've seen both, and, IMO, American Beauty was the clear winnier.
It's not to say that The Sixth Sense was a bad movie, (it was a GREAT movie!) it's just that the way the ending is written, you can't really watch it more the once. It's like a murder mystery -- you allready know the butler did it, so what's the point?
American Beauty, on the other hand, didn't have a surprise ending. Hell, Kevin Spacy tells you right at the beginning what is going to happen! But the movie is a beautiful look at suburban life.
Just my 2 cents..
,-----.----...---..--..-....-
' CitizenC
' "Bug? That's Not A Bug, That's A Feature!"
`-----.----...---..--..-....-
Got Best Director for Best Picture, Unforgiven, but he didn't win the leading male award.
matt
The cake is a pie
Man, I care about what they're wearing. I'm sorry to say. Go here to see why:
http://www.oscars.com/redcarpet/red_026.html
Dan
I have a different version of a similar rant on my web site, if you care, but the guts are all here:
Star Wars sucked not because of the ungodly amount spent on advertising and endorsements and whatnot, but because it was a bad movie.
The backgrounds, wow, very amazing. The movie, while nothing new, was still wonderful to look at. Unfortunatly, that's all.
I have no qualms with completely CGI characters. I have no problems with monster characters. However, they do leave an impression of "what was that?"
The reason the first (middle???) Star Wars movies were so great was that evil was personified. There was a man under the plastic and behind the light saber, yadda yadda. A real tortured soul. Darth Vader had that. Darth Sith, well, doesn't. He's flat and we can't (as humans) identify with him as easily (if at all, I think he was there just as a scary face). Jar-Jar was the same way. Aside from the uncomfortable feeling I got with his stupidity, he was very flat. There was nothing there. There were no motivations for Sith. Jar-Jar was too stupid to have motivations. Bah!
There is no movement to any of the characters internally. Yeah, Obi-Wan takes over to train Anikin, so what. There's nothing there, he does it out of duty, a friend and master's dying wish, I suppose. All the characters in TPM were flat. The most interesting character was Queen Amadala, only because I was wondering who was really the queen for security reasons and who was the slave girl.
So, while Star Wars was a movie I didn't walk out on, it didn't sit with me like a movie that I cared for (admittedly American Beauty) would. Star Wars was pretty. Wow. Mindless evil, again, boring. Give me evil with motivations. You can imagine what the motivations are in the Marine in American Beauty (not 100% evil). In the Matrix, Agent Smith comes out and tells Neo (the audience) what his motivations are. They're still computers, but there is something more there. Fight Club: there was no evil, just primal.
later
Dan
The whole "back in reality?" theme seems to be a fav of David Cronenberg and can be seen in some of his earlier films. Videodrome explores this in a cool way by video/mind control/reality mucking about with the idea that perception/hallucination=reality. Naked Lunch is simular, but uses drug addiction to examine the question of reality. Both are very good films, anyway.
As to the violence... eh... if you're going to be ultra-violent, you'd better show the gore as well. Like you said, people don't just fall over when shot, it's very messy and not guaranteed to kill them. If you've got an R rating already, you might as well use it for some realism. And maybe that will get people to realize this isn't quite as glamorous as it's made out to be.
Finally, Neo should have stayed dead when shot. I personally thought it would have been a better ending that way, leading to them discovering the real hero in the sequel (and maybe a better actor as well!).
______________________
nah, Saving Private Ryan was too "Braveheart" derivitive for my tastes.
I'd agree but only on the grounds that both movies where quite gruesome. What other parts make you think SPR is Braveheart derivitive? The stories are based on real events with storylines added AFAIK.
-- Bucket
Just thought the choice of movies you decided to mention as better than the Matrix was odd as both ExistenZ & Cube are Canadian. I guess we really should blame Canada.
Also please tell me I'm not the only one who though Pi used cool music to attempt to jazz up a basically pointless film the contained nothing but art house dribble attempting to masquerade itself as insight.
How many theatres across America did "Boys Don't Cry" show on?
According to the comments made on "Politically Incorrect," it wasn't widely released either and I believe that one was produced on a $2 mil budget.
-Vel
No way, I'm from Canada and everyone I knew wanted it to win. It was by far the most original song there, not to mention the best performed.
Actually his singing wasn't the best I must admit, but the dance sequence definatly made up for it. And they only censored the one word.
I have to second "ExistenZ". It was a very well done movie whereas I couldn't even sit through the Matrix once (DVD version, didn't see it in the theatre).
"The area of penetration will no doubt be sensitive." ~ Spock
I can do nothing but agree with you. TPM was the biggest letdown in movie history, and most people that defend it do so only on the basis of their (quite warranted) love for the earlier Star Wars films. Lucas was in it for the money this time.
I saw Matrix in the theatres 3 times, on the other hand (a record for me!). Simply the best movie of 1999 (hand in hand with American Beauty, of course.)
Yes, I heard those comments, too.
But, I was assuming it was Jude Law (one of the presenters) commenting on the titles of the films. He mentioned as a part of his remarks that one of the nominated films had an "interesting" title. So... the other presenter rattles off the names of the films and he is murmuring "Not this one, not this one, not this one, not this one, thi is the one" since it had the long title (the film about the Grandma who wants to hang out with the biker guys in NYC.
That was my interpretation, anyway.
One thing that has constantly nagged me ever since the 1997 Oscars (why did THE ENGLISH PATIENT win over the better film FARGO?!) is the fact that the Oscar Awards are being more and more bought. Much like what happens in Congress with lobbiers, the big studios woo, charm, and lobby Academy Voters with gifts trying to make them vote for their movies.
:-)
The fact that THE CIDER HOUSE RULES, a movie that really lack a moral base(taking a stance on a contraversal issue is better than waffling over one), was nomiated over far better and more inventive films like BEING JOHN MALKOVICH, MAGNOLIA, and THREE KINGS is the biggest evidence of this kind of abuse by the studios(this time Miramax). My biggest fear was that Miramax would do such a good job buying off the votes that THE CIDER HOUSE RULES would sweep the biggest awards.
My prayers where answered. THE CIDER HOUSE RULES didn't sweep the tops spots. MATRIX won the tech awards it deserves. AMERICAN BEAUTY deserved every award it got. At least this year, the winners made sense and has kept at least a little of my faith in the Academy's system.
ps. Does anyone know if Dreamworks did anything like send out a bunch a gifts and promotional material for AMERICAN BEAUTY to the Academy Voters?
Why do geeks have to be ugly? I get mad bitches.
__ While you sleep, I creep... gaining ground by the week.
Epilogue: I checked - Dragonheart was nominated - it lost to Independence day. Still, they should have honored it specifically for breaking the ground Lucas so dreadfully trod with Jar Jar.
-=Best Viewed Using [INLINE]=-
Uh. You're a year late, d00d. Lola Rennt was released 20 August 1998, making it ineligible for the 2000 Academy Awards. Sad, but true - foreign films which are widely released in America but not in the same year they come out get reamed. (Didn't get released U.S. until 18 June 1999.)
-=Best Viewed Using [INLINE]=-
Uh... Yeah, a completely CGI character interacting with real actors was pretty groundbreaking. Goddamnit, Dragonheart should have won that bloody award. It was a better movie than TPM, to boot.
For that matter, if TPM deserved it, why didn't Toy Story 2 get nominated?
TPM was nothing any three geeks and a renderfarm couldn't have come up with. TPM didn't do anything that hadn't been done before, they just did it better. Most of the effects were just computer-enhanced versions of effects found in A New Hope or Jason and the Argonauts.
I'm not saying The Matrix was that much more. I'm just saying that no _new_ ground was broken in TPM.
-=Best Viewed Using [INLINE]=-
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/03/27/09582 01&threshold=-1&commentsort=3&mode=threa d&pid=181#245
haha (Score:0)
by ArchieBunker (root@[127.0.0.1]) on 02:33 PM March 27th, 2000 EST (#245)
(User Info) http://www.stormfront.org
Best fight choreography? Thats a laugh, all those backflips and jumps were 90% CG.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws" - Tacitus
[ Reply to This | Parent ]
You saw enough of the movie to claim that "90%" of the backflips were CGI, but you refuse to see it..?
Watch it and you will feel so good about your own life....
You bet...
tho' I'd watch it just to hear my favorite line in the movie:
"I RULE" (K. Spacey... and he's right!)
Go ahead and jump! Ten thousand lemmings can't all be wrong.
i didn't really watch the oscars, but i saw a five minute clip. and a really strange thing happened:
when they were announcing the nominees, we heard "not this one" being quitely said for the first 4 nominees, and then "this is the one" for the last nominee, and it won!
is this some kind of prank? did anybody hear this, and if so, was it repeated again?
Film & Sound Editing, Sound, and Visual Effects.
I've never quite understood the difference between sound and sound editing.
OK, I can imagine the politics that made American Beauty a runaway Oscar favorite and the strangely similar, equally mind-bogglingly amazing, but much more stupidly promoted Eyes Wide Shut shunned.
What I don't understand is how come Kubrick wasn't even mentioned in the tribute to film folks who died last year. That's just bizarre.
mt
WTF? Come on. Run Lola Run was one of the best movies this year. It wasn't nominated for one thing! I was, needless to say, more than a little upset. I don't know how many of you have actually seen it, but those of you who have, I'm sure you agree with me.
:)
YES. My roomate saw it last summer, and he told me about it endlessly until we rented it a few months ago. That was such a cool movie. I couldn't understand too much of the German (thank god for subtitles, huh?), but I enjoyed it immensely. I don't think it's really describable to anyone who hasn't see it, though. At least I couldn't, and neither could my roomate, at least beyond: "Run Lola is so good. It's fucking awesome. I love it". Oh, well, just because the Academy is going to be dorks about it doesn't me I can't like it.
I commented to my wife that Russel Crowe seemed really pissed when he was up, announcing an award. Did he already know he was going to lose? (Probably.)
"Prejudice is wrong; you should hate everyone the same."
SlashMirror: Where to put files for fellow /.'ers
SlashMirror: Where to put files for fellow /.'ers
I not sure if it fits in as "gratuitous violence" (I haven't seen the whole film.), but Total Recall got the award for Visual FX. In fact, they were the only act in town that year and they didn't even have nominees. They just came out and said Total Recall was so good, we're just going to give the Oscar to them.
-- Lex
lexbaby
"Be Brave, Be Loyal, Be True." -- Hawkeye Pierce
... which was in the initial blurb on this thread :) I don't know if I personally would classify it as a violent movie but there were alot of people complaining about the number of graphical beheadings.
Best regards,
SEAL
much more amusing than the cnn-report is this report on salon.com (even though it's not a list)...
-- "Tradition is the illusion of permanence."
Jarjar was impressive and yet the reason that that he isn't more significant is that he was completely unecessary. Why do we need a CGI character? (let's forget about how annoying he is) A special effect may be impressive but in my view it isn't significant if it is superfluous. George Lucas was doing this just so he can say they had an entirely computer generated character interacting with real people. So what? The fact that he was CGI had nothing to do with anything and so was more tiring because when I was watching it because I saw graphics and nothing to do with plot. Just compare this to Terminator 2. The morphing is essential to who the T2 is and the great special effects make sense and strongly add to the story.
The reason why I think the Matrix won all the awards (and in my view why it certainly merited them) was because the effects were brilliant and they were significant to the plot. Other than being visually stunning (the angles, the washed out colors of the "real world", the atmospheric effects (rain on the bridge, etc), the special effects that the Matrix employed were exceedingly clever. They weren't just replicating the world with a computer (Twister, Volcano, Mission to Mars, Star Wars I) but actually giving us a new way of seeing. If I just throw up a neat backgound, that is nothing more than doing something in Photoshop. But if I come up with a new way of perceiving time, or of showing the nature of objects, then that is worthy of an Oscar. Matrix showed us a fundamentally different way of seeing. Normally you are the camera's eye and you are locked to all the physical realities of that point of view but with Bullet Time, you were every camera. This is why the Matrix won the oscars and Star Wars didn't.
I would agree with you on all the points except #2. Michael Caine has only won 2 Oscars (including the one last night). Concidering how many films he has been in I am suprised that he has only won twice and has only been nominated 4-5 times.
Unfortunately, I missed the Oscars last night.
Was anyone able to do a vidcap of Robin Williams singing Blame Canada? Please post if you do, would love to see it.
Thanks!
Starting at 7 EST would mean 4 pm Pacific, where the event is actually held...
...now that doesn't make very much sense, does it?
They don't have to be ugly - that's my point. It's retarted when they try to make beautiful actors ugly to fit the sterotype. Take Hackers for instance, (it sucked), the characters weren't made to look like rejects. The chick was really hot, but I thought she came off reasonably well as a geek, dispite the movie's overall stupidity. There is something so alluring to the sound of 'mad bitches'... a lovly white frothing at the mouth, perhaps?
I saw about 5 minutes of it, mostly entrigued by floor's shifting light patterns. Then some hollywood fairy walked over it like it wasn't there and I shut off the tv. F the Oscars.
I didn't have her in mind at all, since she was supposed to be pretty. American Beauty was very entertaining, but I didn't find it to have that much deep meaning. The movie is largly motivated by characters I could not relate to and did not seem real to me on most levels. Kevin Spacey's character was my favorite, and I could buy into it. I find more and more movies try to wow us with interesting, but unrealisitic characters whose lifestyles only work because of their amazing ability, in American Beauty I think of the beauty obessed kid in this regard. He's an interesting, amazing, maybe even inspirational character, but does he add anything to my understanding of the world? Not really - because he doesn't work like anything else I've seen in the world, not even in a minute way.
....by this thread. they don't let nerds into the oscars, why should we promote them. We know Matrix rocked, we don't need some academy to tell us that. American Beauty, another movie that tries to dress up beautiful young actors/actresses as geeks... like putting glasses on Alicia Silverstone and calling her ugly. We're going to swallow this?
I agree and I personally didn't care for much of Spacey's performance in the movie. I found his performance at the beginning of the movie to be wooden and 2 dimensional. Only after he started getting wierd does his character seem to have any life to him at all. Maybe he did it on purpose, maybe not, the fact is I really didn't like it. It was nowhere near as good as his performance in The Usual Suspects.
Granted though, American Beauty deserved the award much more than Shakespeare in Love did last year. I was insulted when it won best picture. If I was a WWII vet I would have actively boycotted the Oscars. Saving Private Ryan was such an incredible film. I left there with a whole new respect for my grandparents generation. I mean the movie gave veterans flashbacks when they saw it... SiL was just a good movie in comparison and thats not a good enough reason to give it the Oscar.
So far I've gotten all my Karma from telling people they are wrong... :)
To bad there isn't an award given out for people lining up of a movie. Thats about the only one it could have one
Me
Umm... The Special Edition films are, IMHO, one of the best things that Lucas could have done. Not being old enough to have seen the originals in the theater, the special eddition films gave me a chance to see all three on the big screen. It was breathtaking, amazing, and a dream come true. I saw each multiple times. Then the Phantom Menace came out. Yes, I was really hyped up for it, who wasn't? But when I got to the theater, I was still, I don't know, kid enough to suspend my view of the real world to enjoy the movie. Really, that movie goes back to the basics of what is Star Wars. Yes Jar Jar was annoying, but was technically amazing. The pod race was well done, not just superfluous graphics. The notion that trusting the force came out there. Destroying the trade federation ship, just like the death star. The movie was awesome if you weren't going into the theater as a disallusioned adult hoping that TPM was A New Hope all over again. Next time you see it let yourself be immersed in the world Lucas creates. He is a master crafter of worlds and movies. I hope the next two are just as good, minus jar jar. I think that TPM was definately robbed.
If not now, when?
I was expecting it too, and when we missed him in the montage, it was argued by others that he was in last year's show. If I remember correctly, EYES opened in early June, which means he would finished editing a few months before that and probably died before last year's show.
My only problem with the Matrix came in the scene where they are trying to avoid those big electric squid type things and someone says they are going to use an EMP bomb to disable the critter. At this point, Keanu's character says, "EMP? What's that?"
Now, he's been "chosen" because of his skills. Because he is smart, because he is smarter than most, right? Well then how come he doesn't know what an EMP is?
It just blew the entire movie for me, and it is really common. Just like in Star Trek where there is always someone on the bridge who has to ask for something to be explained when it seems to be common knowledge for the rest of the crew.
I suppose that this is because television/movie people just assume that their audience will contain really stupid people (when in fact most of the audience of The Matrix and Star Trek are probably fairly bright; stupid people watch 'Who Wants to Be A Millionaire) and so they have to explain things. Well, I think it's an insult to our intelligence to have it done in that way. Maybe if these writers came up with some explanation that doesn't interrupt the flow of the script, or violate the character, it would be different....
Sorry for ranting. I am a bit crabby today.
sig not found
I, too, was surprised that this did not make any categories. Absolutely brilliant - unique filming and storyline. I saw it in the theaters 3 times and bought the soundtrack immediately after the first viewing. If you can, go see it in a theater. This movie defintely requires a quality surround sound system. - tokengeekgrrl
"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions
Episode 5 was even better, even if we had to ignore the dangling endings.
Episodes 6 and 1 marked the transition into toy infomercial. I hated "Jedi" and was disappointed by TPM.
For those of us who were adults in '77, Star Wars was still magic. But to appreciate the latest two episodes, we must recapture a preteen perspective to enjoy it. Bah!
There was a memorial to him last year.
I remember this quite explicitly because I made a comment to my girlfriend about how they just went for the stage. Now, I am not saying that they were rude or anything, because there were other people there next to him helping him out. In fact, it kinda looked like the people helping out told the winners to go get the award and they would handle the gimp on the floor.
It was just a little bizarre...
True, it was quite a nipple, but I recall Lucy Lawless (She-ra, ..no.. Zena) was singing the national anthem for the NHL playoffs game (Detroit vs Anaheim) maybe two years ago and she reached for the sky and so did a nipple... The camera angle was perfect, and the color was dark enough to be undisputed. It was quite hilarious!
Ooohhh say can you seeee? Yep, we all did!
Shut up, be happy. The conveniences you demanded are now mandatory. -- Jello Biafra
I am especially glad that The Matrix beat out The Phantom Menace for Best Visual Effects since it had such innovative special effects rather than just tons of special effects. I hope they can be just as innovative in the sequels. If the VFXPro interview from April 2, 1999 with John Gaeta (Visual Effects Supervisor for The Matrix) is any hint, I wouldn't be surprised if we see a virtual camera moving around real bullets and real explosions, essentially giving you billionth per second exposure time. Now that will be something to see.
Looking for political forums? Check out "The World Forum".
I think that in all the categories, nominations are decided by Academy members with that background - editors nominate editors, actors nominate actors, etc., but the whole academy votes for the winners. This is probably why films that get nominated for Best Picture tend to win in the editing, cinematography, what-have-you categories as well, even if say, Schindler's List didn't have better costumes than The Age of Innocence (to cite my favorite example). The old geezers who probably haven't even seen most of the movies just vote for the names they recognize/like ('Goodfellas was too foul-mouthed to have good editing - I'll vote for Dances With Wolves again') rather than thinking.
South Park probably never had a chance at winning, so it WAS an honor just to be nominated for them.
"Bugger this, I want a better world." - Jenny Sparks
- laden with emotion
- historically-based
- sort of British
- long
- chick movies
- not intellectually challenging
- slow-paced
- not too controversial
- politically correct
For some reason SF, comedy, and action films are not considered "serious" or "real" enough to win Best Picture. Absolutely, Blade Runner should have won. Also, A Fish Called Wanda, and Empire Strikes Back. I guess the Academy is a bunch of snobs. It could also be that the academy members are NOT a cross-section of the public, and the actors, writers, and directors vastly outnumber the special effects and technical people.It would be nice if the academy considered expanding into more categories, like the Golden Globes (best comedy, best drama, etc), so that a movie like Blade Runner isn't forced to compete directly with Chariots of Fire. Of course, then the broadcast would never end!
Sometimes I cannot put two and two together ... other times I cannot remember the past.
... and the more I think about it, I seem to recall a long segment covering Kubrick on last year's Oscar ceremony.
If Kubrick died last March 7th, odds are that his memorial was *last year*
I should personally be scored -1 (stupid) for posting time of death but not doing anything with that information in my original post in my haste to pay homage to Rory Calhoun.
He wasn't -- or at least, not that I saw.
And he died on 7 Mar 1999, according to the bio on IMDB ... perhaps he was not a member in good standing of the Academy or whatever organization one must belong to in order to qualify for the memoriam. It probably was in poor taste not to mention something regarding Kubrick, given that a number of his films were sampled -- 2001 during the "history at the movies" piece introduced by Morgan Freeman, "Dr. Strangelove" during George C. Scott's memoriam piece ...
Good news, though, that Rory Calhoun was remembered ...
Burns: There you are...there you go, little fellow...and you.[one of the puppies stands on its hind legs]
[gasps] Smithers, look: he's standing up. I've never seen anything so adorable! Do you know who it reminds me of?
Smithers: Benji?
Burns: No.
Smithers: Lassie?
Burns: No, no, no, a person. You know who I mean.
Smithers: Snoop Doggy Dogg? Bob Barker? David Brenner?
Burns: No, no! The person who's always standing and walking.
Smithers: Rory Calhoun?
Burns: That's it!
Why can't Slashdot take PRE tags for HTML formatting?
First, the correct title is 'eXistenZ'. It was a good movie and comparable to The Matrix but I don't really think it was better. Pi was dismal, and The Cube didn't impress me much...but I suppose it's all a matter of opinion.
My God, /please/ do not make me remember that movie. It was absolutely terrible. The name says it all - dark. Would it have been that much trouble to have at least a scene or two with some LIGHT? The entire movie is dark and dreary. The plot was mediocre. The acting was awful. It was just plain horrible. HORRIBLE I tell you. If I could pick one single movie as the absolute most horrid film in existence, the one film that makes me want to scream at the thought of it, one movie so utterly repulsive I become outwardly aggitated, it would be Dark City.
//awful//.
This movie was
signature smigmature
- James
The Academy members are not previous Oscar winners (Not to imply there are none among them). There are around 5,600 members in the academy. There have been 72 shows. Half of those people are dead. Assuming 50 awards given per show, the numbers dont add up. Especially considering technical awards are all decided by a Board of Governors.
signature smigmature
- James
eXistenZ better than The Matrix? I don't know about that. I thought eXistenZ was only ok and definitely *not* something I wanted to watch again. There were really no memorable scenes, dialogue, or performances in eXistenZ that made watching the movie fun enough to warrant watching it a second time. The movie could have been cut down to a half hour and one still would have gotten the point of the flick, if there even was one.
:)
The Matrix, however, had cool music; a chick in tight leather who could kill with her pinky if she wanted to; helicopters crashing into the sides of buildings; daring escapes; Kung Fu; a rather menacing antagonist who could be anyone, anywhere, at anytime; ground-breaking special effects; and Lawrence Fishburn. The Matrix may not be one of the most thought provoking movies to come around, but damn if it isn't fun to watch!Yeehaw!
Of the other movies mentioned, I have only seen Pi, which I liked a lot. I am not even sure why, I just do. I liked the music in it quite a bit (even bought the soundtrack) and enjoyed the mono/dialogue just as much. It has attained a certain level of cult status with me much as Forbidden Planet has. I can watch it again and again.
Sys
Ah, well. Hurry back to your day trading. Bah.
I mean c'mon guys...powering the alien civilization with electrochemical brainwave energy? Really? They can create hyperrealistic virtual environments, but they can't figure out how to get hydrogen nuclei to fuse?
...and that's about it.
It all depends on the initial boundaries you ask me to believe at the outset: staying within the introduced level of ridiculousness.
-Star Wars: Spacecraft that maneuver like a P-51; spacecraft that make ZOOOOOM noises. ESP, levitation, magic. Faster than light travel, death rays, energy weapons.
-Conclusion: No rules. Fantasy. Show me a flux capacitor to explain it away, or recycle some Zen to explain superhuman powers. I'll believe it. Saturday afternoon reality vacation.
-Star Trek: See above. Add time travel, unbelievably pretentious fake techno-jargon, all humanoid sentients, shake well.
-Conclusion: Wednesday night reality vacation. I'll still believe it. Its still BS, and yet I want to see the green-skinned chicks and hyperintelligent blondes with rude attitudes.
-2001/2010 (Film Versions): Centripedal gravity, theoretically based propulsion, artificial intelligence as a rare and unstable commodity. Those Others can do some pretty interesting things, like turning Jupiter into a star.
-Conclusion: Pretty well rooted in common sense. Extrapolation of the real to the level of the believable. Assumes the viewer understands the physics. (Waiting for flames concerning 2010)
-The Matrix: Absolutely the worst actor possible to portray the protagonist. Maybe DiCaprio would have been a worse choice...but only maybe. Green. Everything green. So are the Borg behind it all...is that the Big Message I missed? Everybody is wearing black leather. So PETA has been forced underground by wraparound sunglasses manufacturers? Is that the Big Message? The distinction between the Real and the Virtual is pretty neato. Oh...that was the Big Message. Oh...thanks...whew...sheesh... I was worried there. Carpenter's "They Live" did a better job at portraying There's A Whole World You Don't Know About And Its Pretty Sinister. And Carpenter didn't sit on the set with a triple mocha gunning Marlboros while furiously assaulting a dog-eared copy of Neuromancer with a highlighter. Well, okay he was chaining Marlboros...but that's it. And They Live had Roddy Piper for god sake.
Sentences new to the English language:
There is at least one actor who is worse than Roddy Piper.
Now are they not actually using the energy of the brain activity? In other words, instead of feeding off of amps and volts are they feeding on Pain, Joy, Love, Hate? Was that another Big Message I missed? Does that explain why everything is green? Because of all the Envy?
Let's see....one flick portrays the Boy Messiah as the savior to return balance to the Force. The other flick portrays the Boy Messiah as the One who will liberate us from the Bad Guys. One flick is a fairy tale. The other flick has a Big GenX Angst Filled Message. And don't accuse me of assaulting the young...I look toward my thirtieth birthday with dread. C'mon gang, put down your Bret Easton Ellis novels, walk out of the Cafe Pretensioso, put on some socks, and get a clue.
Neato bullet tracks, jiggly helicopter crashes
Is the movie industry calling sequels "versions" now?
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How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
Yes, but... Don't forget, we might think of ourselves as the people the Matrix was written for, and screw the rest, but we aren't. Fact is, a LOT of non-geeks saw it as well. And since this is Hollywood, 5 will get you 10 that the makers of the movie were hoping that would be the case. And what's more, a lot of geeks probably don't know what EMP is either. It's not exactly a common topic for everyday conversation. Further, I've read 3-4 different reviews of the Matrix here in NZ. Every single one complained that it was confusing, never explained what was happening, and you left the theatre not knowing what the Matrix was. I'm serious! Now, I saw it twice, and both times the theatre was pretty full. This is NZ here--chances are 4/5 of that theatre wearn't geeks and didn't know what an EMP blast was. Hell, if they were as clueless as the reviewers, they left the theatre wondering what the hell that scene where he woke up in the alien bathtub was all about. Don't underestimate either the stupidity or the numbers of the general public. And that's why they had to explain what EMP was. But as I say, there is absolutely nothing strange about the idea of Neo not knowing what EMP was. Now if they'd had to explain to him what a computer virus was, or something, you'd have a case. But EMP? Apart from a few mentions in Tom Clancy books, *I* wouldn't know what it is either.
I guess these replies really point out the nature of films like eXistenZ. They either appeal to you or you hate them. Not much avoiding that, when a film is this distinctive. I personally liked it, especially the twisted "mutant reptiles & amphibians" theme and Cronenberg's patented orifice fixation. Mmmm, Bioport-ilingus on Jennifer Jason Leigh! Oh yeah and I'm Canadian, we mindlessly boost our own films dontcha know :-)
That said, I thoroughly enjoyed The Matrix. It deserved every award it got last night. And Keanu must have enjoyed making the movie, he was making the hand gestures when the guy mentioned the red & blue pills...
Freedom: "I won't!"
Oh, I've got to disagree with you.
And I've got to disagree with you. Within the first 5 minutes I think it became pretty clear what was going on. Personally, I found the premise extremely weak, and very transparent. The movie I watched was an endless parade of "Look at this! Aren't we clever writers? Hehe!"
Basing an entire movie on one simple trick is flawed, and insulting. Masterfully done? Please. They're talking about the same subject, but not to each other. You know, I'm actually getting mad (because I have this argument with a good friend all the time), so I'll stop. Now.
Yes, I know, I'm the only one who didn't like it -- I just needed to say something. And yes, Haley was terrific in it -- it still doesn't make it a good movie. Give me American Beauty or Being JM any day - please.
.sig last updated Jan. 14, 2000
The Matrix won 4 Oscars, not 3. Sound, sound effects, visual effects, and editing.
Kubrick was honored at last year's if you happen to watch it.
KUBRICK WAS HONORED LAST YEAR! THEY DID A WHOLE KUBRICK MONTAGE! SPEILBERG EVEN PRESENTED IT!
Kubrick was honored last year! The Oscars came earlier last year and they honored him with a huge montage last year!
The Wild Wild West, Adam Sandler, Pauly Shore, Sly Stallone, Heather Donahue (from the Blair Witch project), Jar Jar and Denise Richards (from the new 007)... There is a lot of bad to go around!
Hint: How many people in the audience know off the top of their head what an EMP is? It's just another case of a science fiction story having to explain itself to its audience... sometimes it can be done subtlely, and sometimes not.
Scientist #1: "If things keep getting worse, we may have to resort to using the Figulon Device..."
Scientist #2: "The Figulon Device? You mean the device that can rip a hole in the fabric of space-time allowing us to journey to the dimension of the squid-people?"
Scientist #1: "Exactly."
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share and enjoy
Ahh, the Oscars, then night where pretentious actors and actresses dress up real nice and pretend they like each other. And all we care about is where they're wearing. *sigh* A sad state of affairs._ ____
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I'm an exhibit on the mounted animal nature trail.
If they used a giant emp, they would effectively kill everyone that was a part of the matrix. entire crops would be lost, how could they justify that? you are not human.
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I have seen it but I didn't think it was AS good. It had a really good plot and made me keeping changing my mind on who was evil. Also if you didn't like it just Blame Canada, because that is where it came from.
where was THAT song ? Unforuntately I didn't see it on UK reports of the Oscars was it sung at the Oscars or am I missing something living hubwards...
And some days you can't even get the movie right... I meant American Beauty. Honestly. I just got a blue screen... that's all. Error in system. Reboot with REALITY.SYS? (Abort/Retry/Fail/Grab Hammer?)
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
I'm just really glad that no movie really "swept" the Oscars like Titanic did. And at least American Pie was more 'deserving' of it... and didn't have Leonardo DiCaprio in it... a definite plus ;-)
--You will rephrase your request for me to go to hell. Goto statements are not acceptable programming constructs
wow. suburb bashing. that's fresh.
it was a well made movie. but i can't deem a work with tired old, false platitudes as its theme oscar worthy.
the edge city is dead, long live exurbia.
Gun owning wasn't really an issue.... Repression and keeping up appearences were the big issues..... owning all those guns and military paraphenalia, and leading such an austere life were symptoms of the repression.... unnatuaral behaviours come out of unnatural situations.... it was a comment on how the pressure of suburbia produces such mutated reactions.... etc.....
....Be careful of dueling with dragons - you are crunchy and taste good with tomato sauce....
Anyone recorded Blame Canada from the oscar in QT or even in rm format?
Twaddle.
That film was quite good until the last 15 minutes or so. It was just another hollywood "alls well that ends well" piece of shit.
I wasn't one of those people who hated the character. In fact Jar Jar was probably the best character in the entire film. It says a lot about the rest of the cast and the script when a CGI effect has the most personality out of the lot of them..
The script was crap, the plot was non-existant, the acting was abysmal, the CGI was nice but certainly nothing special. And as for revolutionary non-human interaction - have you ever seen Who framed Roger Rabbit or Cool World...
[q]While I would disagree with an excellence rating on any other element of TPM, I do think they win the Oscar for "Best fight choreography of all time". If nothing else.[/q]
ha! I made the mistake of watching a Jet Li film (fists of fury if I remember correctly, not sure) before watching TPM. The light saber fight made absolutely no impression on me. TPM's fight scene adds NOTHING to a typical HK kung fu vocabulary and doesn't even do it all that well.
On the other hand, HK movies could learn a bit from that cool Matrix lobby massive gun blow everything up in the lobby scene (but it might be just cause I don't watch that many action movies in general so I'm not sure if its a rehash of something that is going on)
[q] I have to diagree. Some of the effects used in the Matrix were completely new, (bullet time, [/q]
if I remember the didn't Blade use similar effects for a couple scenes when Snipes is shooting at the badguy?
Or am I missing something about the use of slow-motion bullets in Matrix?
[q]And finally there is the fact that the kid who has the camera, the one who films everything, find beauty everwhere, but only throught the lens of a camera. Gee, more Hollywood self validation. [/q]
/. in mind) often get so enraptured in camera beauty they can't find beauty ANYWHERE outside of the constructed and framed reality of movie or photograph.
I thought that he was capturing the beauty so that it could be viewed again, not that he only saw such beauty through a camera lens.
if so then its EVEN MORE of a self validation congratulatory scene.
The whole CONCEPT of Hollywood is to capture beauty for future reviewing...they want us to think that beauty can be [better] captured by the camera and then have us pay for the experience.
I mean beauty CAN be captured through the camera but its crazy how its seems as if people (noone on
That's also why I refuse to attend gatherings (and usually travel) without a camera. I'm there for the experience...not to document the experience for future reference. I use cameras for documentation (I don't have enough skill or desire to produce art using cameras) but I think it a foolish trap to allow the camera dictate one's experience. For God's sake the culture seems to be fixated on the audio-visual medium while forgetting the several other senses we have left.
Chuck Palahniuk has written 3 novels now, and all are very good, though Fight Club is head and shoulders above the other two. Who called Palahniuk a hack? An author who writes one good novel and can't write another is called a "Wonder Boy" (like Michael Douglas's character in movie of same name). You don't call someone a hack unless they suck.
Hurqalya
The other films? Pi I thought ws a great flick, and the same goes for the Matrix. As for Cube, I thought it was also mediocre, but better than eXistenZ.
Just another of the hundreds of reviews of this movie which have showed up in this thread.
I think that the Wachowski brothers' influene by anime shows even more than their influence by comics. Just take a gander at Ghost in the Shell.
I think that Sixth Sense and The Insider deserve a better luck, The Matrix surprises me. And I like to say: "Felicitaciones Pedro, hace tiempo te lo merecías"
If you could fight any celebrity who would it be? I think I would fight Alex Trebec. He needs a good ass whooping and he's from Canada ("Blame Canada eh?") Who would you fight?
I'm an applied mathematician, there's nothing pure about me.
Did you watch The Matrix? Did you see the sparring scene with Morpheus and Neo? It was unreal
I'm an applied mathematician, there's nothing pure about me.
Is it me or was anyone else ready to scream if they heard the phrase "He is the One" on more damn time. I understand that a few references to the "One" once or twice in the movie would be appropriate, But how stupid do the makers think we are that they had to shove it in our throats every ten minutes. end rant
..which just shows that the human brain is ill-adapted for thinking and was probably designed for cooling the blood-T P
Wouldn't it be much more interesting than simply showing the same ol' clips from the special effects nominees to spend a few minutes with each of the teams in a "making-of..." segment, showing off the technical component to films the academy talked about? There are only three nominees in those categories, so some quality time could be spent...ah, wishful thinking I know. Did anybody catch the ABC pre-show, where Keanu Reeves said that not only is a Matrix sequel coming, but part 3 will be made at the same time? Some great news gleaned from an otherwise unwatchable Tyra Banks set of "interviews".
Everything ILM does is top notch. Everthing associated with Lucas is the best that money and talent can produce. Yet TPM was the worst POS I have had the misfortune of sitting through. "Visual stunning does not a good movie make" I feel robbed that good money was paid to see nothing more than a merchandising vehicle and launching point for more of the same! Whatever GL had that brought us SW in '77 seems to have evaporated. I applaude the Academy for refusing to honor Shite!
While in the Matrix, the rules of reality are only what has been programmed, and as a participant in the Matrix you can learn how to adjust those rules.
why are they fighting?
because when they hit each other, they will do harm.
is that roughly accurate?
so why does the one guy just stand there like an ass while the other guy hits him? and then why does the first guy take a turn at standing like an ass while the *second* guy hits *him*? if getting hit will hurt you, what exactly do you gain by standing there and getting hit? if it doesnt hurt you, why are they fucking hitting each other to begin with?
the explanation for the fight scenes in _the matrix_ is the same as the explanation for all fight scenes in movies: they have to choreograph it so nobody actually gets hurt, and then they have to film it. making it realistic under those constraints would cost ten times as much. theyd only get one-tenth the return, too, because stupid fucking action movie fans want a cheesy superhero "fight-ballet" cartoon instead of something believable. theyre too fucking stupid to see the bullshit for the bullshit it is.
in a word, action-movie fans are the stupidest fucking animals on earth.
you must be one of them, because your completely ignoring my point. its amazing, your just babbling gibberish at me. you changed the subject and you think that proves your point. wrong. it just proves your an idiot (which we already knew, by the way. your reputation precedes you).
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your being reasonable.
:)
:)
:)
whats with that? how the hell am i supposed to flame people who respond thoughtfully? your no fun.
i now understand what the misunderstanding was. or at least i think i do
how can my reputation precede me when I'm posting anonymously?
uhh... ill have to get back to you on that
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what theyre doing in both cases is cutting down by a factor of ten the number of cues that keanu reeves has to hit. given keanu reeves' probable attention span and intellect, i can accept their reasoning :) some of the fighting *was* more interactive that the worst cases im bitching about, but those parts looked fake too, because they were so precisely rehearsed.
theres also the whole thing where they do backflips and spin around and whatnot. wtf is up with that? yeah, its an established principle of physics that people turning cartwheels cant get hit by bullets. grrr...
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My first post here and it WILL be controversial. My understanding of "American Beauty" is that gun owners in the flick are largely portrayed as psychotic wack-o's. I realize that my post has absolutely nothing to do with Linux but the one thing that I've noticed about the Linux world is an incredibly strong desire for freedom and privacy. Am I right? Get the government out of my biz? Hmmm... it's not hard to see where I'm going here, is it? My advice, boycott "American Beauty". Those shameless hypocrites in Hollywood are more than willing to make their living with shoot 'em up bang bang's and then they have the temerity to tell us "ordinary" citizens that we can't be trusted with firearms. Musko Smack in the middle of America's Heartland PS Does anyone out there know what handgun Mr. Torvalds likes to shoot? I'd like to know. Thanks!
And that's the dilemma, see the film and thereby support more Hollywood hysteria or withold my $'s in a feeble attempt to get the huckster's attention? I'll stand by my conclusions regarding the film industry. I offer Sigourney Weaver and Micheal Douglas as examples of Hollywood's hypocrisy. Both have made movies where firearms and violence were a large part of the equation, yet both are vehemently anti-gun. What's wrong with this picture?
I'm sure that gun owning by and of itself was not a central issue to "American Beauty". However, like a lot of what we see in the media nowadays, gun owners more and more often are not portrayed as "normal" or "respectable." Hollywood and the six o'clock news cannot and will not portray firearms usage in a positive light. Some months ago, Scientific American had an article written about PGP and in it the author made a statement lamenting the fact that the government is attempting to crack down on a technology simply because a few people choose to do wrong with it. Does this sound vaguely familiar? Anyway, my point was, and is, freedom is freedom and it's precious. We're letting it slip through our fingers. And if you think that protecting PGP, Linux, Apache and other s/w is the whole picture, then you're wrong. Sorry, there's more L'd like to say, but it's time to go to work. :) Tim
I agree, the effects were truly stunning and unique, and though not that new, the visual effects team on The Matrix used them in such a fantastic way as to blow away the competition. Phantom Menace looked like kidsplay in comparason.
Tane Piper
Lead Designer - Silent Space
http://www.silent-space.com
Tane Piper
Lead Designer - Legion
http://www.legiongame.nl
http://www.zzict.com
Are you fux0red in the head? Matrix has much better effects, and also there used clevely and as plot devices - not just to pad our a long boaring movie.
Tane Piper
Lead Designer - Silent Space
http://www.silent-space.com
Tane Piper
Lead Designer - Legion
http://www.legiongame.nl
http://www.zzict.com
I saw it. It was ham-handed, gross, and dull. I know the storyline confusion was deliberate but it scrambled the plotline and left me unmoved.
" I would say that a completely CGI character interacting with real actors was pretty groundbreaking "
Which is why "Stuart Little" had better CGI than TPM... The clothes on Stuart are amazing. There is some excellant CGI work there. I have to agree with the academy's decision tho' "The Matrix" deserves the Visual Effects Oscar... too bad they couldn't have given one to "Stuart Little" as well.
If it were "Stuart Little" vs. TPM, I'd give the award to Stuart... The mouse character was much more visually realistic and complex then those stupid gungans, robots, and spaceships. Not only that, clothes and fur are really really hard to do right.-
[signature]
"THAT had never been done before"
Except maybe in say, a GAP commercial.
I would say that a completely CGI character interacting with real actors was pretty groundbreaking (even if the character itself annoyed people) and the shots they got using completely CGI backgrounds got were a lot more awe-inspiring than digitally removing the wires from kung fu scenes.
Take a look for yourself.
Before movies they worked for Marvel Comics and it shows in their cinematography.
Regards,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
I'll admit, that when I saw it last year, Matrix impressed the hell out of me.
Then, a few months later, I watched the DVD of Dark City. WOW, no comparison in my mind.
They cover some of the same thematic ground. But Dark City did it without the freeze frame trickery. Frankly, I thought that DC was a much better film. It just didn't have a marquee star like Keanau (god it's sad that he's become a marquee star at all).
If you haven't seen Dark City, go check it out. It's an awesome movie.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
1. Pi\Clint Mansell
2. P.E.T.R.O.L.\Orbital
3. Kalpol Intro\Autechre
4. Bucephalus Bouncing Ball\Aphex Twin
5. Watching Windows\Roni Size
6. Angel\Massive Attack
7. We Got The Gun\Clint Mansell
8. No Man's Land\David Holmes
9. Anthem\Gus Gus
10. Drippy\Banco De Gaia
11. Third From The Sun\Psilonaut
12. A Low Frequency Inversion Field/Spacetime
13. 2Pi\Clint Mansell
Should have used 'This Film's Crap, Let's Slash the Seats' by David Holmes...
They did this one sequence of film people that died in the last year, honoring such notables as George C Scott. Unless I blinked and missed it, though, Stanley Kubric was nowhere to be seen.
What the fuck? He was one of the greatest directors ever, and certainly the most original. I saw no menion of him or his recent "Eyes Wide Shut" the entire night. Grrrr....
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grappler
Vidi, Vici, Veni
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
Shirley Manson had a good side-nipple exposure during the VH1 movie awards s few years ago singing "Stupid Girl." Her shirt was buttoned half-way up, and when she turned 90 degrees to the camera, exposure! And the cameras didn't switch to another band memeber.
You can find it on USENET all the time.
Pope
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
ObCoinkyDink: Isaac Hayes was associated with two films last night, and both of them had to censor the F-word in the middle of a song... and both were handled brilliantly. He played the voice of Chef in "South Park", and wrote/performed the theme from "Shaft", which was presented in one of those (actually quite good) retrospective pieces.
Isaac, you still Da Man.
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That Shaft is one baaaad muthah-Hush yo' mouth!
I'm just talkin' 'bout Shaft! We can dig it!
Well, yes, and that's the main part of the idea of the movie.
-- Abigail
Sad to see Blame Canada not win best song but I think that they should still win best dress of the evening ;)
Matt Stone & Trey Parker
-- "Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read."
Not that I remember - they (and others helped him back into the wheelchair, and then they walked up. I don't remember them leaving before he was in place, or at least had other people setting him in the chair.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
My understanding (granted from a biased source of the bonus audio track on the dvd of the main editor, the main fx guru, and trnity (forget her name) was that they were running grossly over-budget/time (filming time) and the studio was demanding to know what the story was. The editor put together the first "chunk" of the movie (begining through telephone booth crunch), along with temporary sound effects and music and they sent it back to the studios. The studio execs watched it, and promptly shut up and gave them the extra time/money they needed to finish the film. They may not have had money to shoot over some scenes they would have liked to have done a different way, and they may have made some poor choices for certain effects (the police->MiB morph at the end for instance), but those happen in any movie (with few exceptions).
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
Three words: Eyes Wide Shut
It's terrible, and sad, but what Mike wallace's character said in "The Insider" was very true: You are remembered and judged on what you did last. EWS sucked so badly, that they left him out.
Scott
Hey Rob, Thanks for that tarball!
"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion." - Jed Babbin
Ah, so YOU'RE the other person who saw that movie besides me! I watch ANYTHING with Richard Kieth O'Brien in it. I'm a big Rocky Horror nutcase from way back. Wasn't Dark City last year, or the year before? Maybe even older than that. I didn't think it was eligible this year?
Scott
Hey Rob, Thanks for that tarball!
"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without your accordion." - Jed Babbin
He died March 7, 1999, just in time for last year's Oscar show.
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Wrong again. The GAP Swings commercial merely took two frame from different angles and had a 'Morph tool' generate interpolated frames to simulate a camera pan. OTOH, Bullet-time combined high-speed photography(150frames/s) with a camera pan, and use CGI for compositing and lens distortion cleanup.
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In the word of Gene Siskel (may he RIP); "I disagree Roger"
Bullet-time WAS the most visually stunning FX of '99. Check out the DVDs making-of feature. They had something like 50~100 35 mm cameras circling the set to take those pictures. THAT had never been done before. CGI effects? Been there done that. It was stunning set design, but hardly groundbreaking stuff.
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The acceptance for "One Day..." was the worst speech I've ever heard. 'You all suck and nobody watches good movies, and ours isn't even out yet, and I'm a crotchety old geezer, and thank god I won this so I can go die in peace - did I mention you all suck?' was about the gist of it... on the other hand, the speech for best supporting actor (Caine) was one of the most gracious speeches I've heard, individually praising each of the other nominees, and saying that he was 'representing them' accepting the award. That's class.
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
Agreed, briliant film. The DVD is a treasure as well, with film critic Roger Ebert contributing a commentary. It's practically a course in film theory, pointing out all the references the director makes to other films.
"How perfectly Goddamn delightful it all is, to be sure" Charles Crumb
Well I should think that the deck was decidedly stacked against the Matrix. Many other movies were nominated for as many as 10(?) and Matrix won all 4 that it was nominated for. I would like to believe that it would have easily won cinematography had it been nominated for that (Robbery that it wasnt!!!). Anyway American Beauty was an excellent movie and it did deserve best picture =)
God Fucking Damnit
WTF? Come on. Run Lola Run was one of the best movies this year. It wasn't nominated for one thing! I was, needless to say, more than a little upset. I don't know how many of you have actually seen it, but those of you who have, I'm sure you agree with me.
~Jester
"I have great faith in fools: Self confidence my friends call it." ~Edgar Allan Poe
The only reason why Matrix got the awards it did over Star Wars is because most of the Star Wars effects didn't stand out to the voters. They had seen lightsabres and spaceships and blasters and armies of identical bugs... ah, robots. They hadn't seen the biotech stuff before. They hadn't seen the bullet-dodging, wallwalking bad-@$$ cyber-kung-fu $#!~ before. Sure, we may have, but they haven't and it made an impression.
You hit it exactly here.
Star Wars took existing effects to a all-time high, with more, better, clearer, faster, etc. But when it comes down to it, it was still the same old effects.
However, The Matrix took effects to the next level, with new ideas, procedures, methods, etc.
It's all the difference between mastering what you've got or gambling on something untried.
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"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
My only problem with the Matrix came in the scene where they are trying to avoid those big electric squid type things and someone says they are going to use an EMP bomb to disable the critter. At this point, Keanu's character says, "EMP? What's that?" Now, he's been "chosen" because of his skills. Because he is smart, because he is smarter than most, right? Well then how come he doesn't know what an EMP is?
Think for a second how aware and intelligent YOU'D be after going through the same thing he just went through. I'd have a hard time keeping my wits around me, and would surely have asked the same question.
Besides, he's in a whole new environment, and I'd prefer a person willing to make sure he understands, since there's plenty of chance that things could be different.
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"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
Shouldn't they rename best supporting actor/actress "lifetime achievement"?
No they shouldn't. Often both the supporting and leading actor/actress awards are used this way as could be argued for Michael Caine, or for Jack Palance.
But when a newcomer does manage to get one, it can lift a superior actor from supporting roles to lead roles, which it certainly did for Kevin Spacey. Spacey has had some great supporting roles in the past, such as his Oscar winning role in the Usual Suspects, or for his creepy character in JFK. But he is not your stereotypical leading man type, so were it not for his supporting actor Oscar, he might never have been given leading roles in major films.
Let's hope that the industry starts offering Angelina Jolie challenging leading roles, now that she has proven herself in a supporting role.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
I haven't seen it and I probably won't but it's hard to believe that American Beauty could be more of a "feel-good" movie than Fassbinder's Merchant of Four Seasons.
Someone please tell me where I can buy a video of that movie, please! I mean the Fassbinder one; I know where to get the Hollywood thing - in fact I can hardly swing my damn arm without slapping up against another videotape store. Hollywood everywhere, everywhere, aaagh!
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
I think Uncle F*cka would've been more original, and has a more catchy tune. Can you imagine the censors going on that one....
Shut your f.... face, uncle f.....
you're a c... sucking a... licking uncle f.....
you're an uncle f.... yes it's true
nobody f.... uncles quite like you!
Gackk - Phil Collins's song from the Disney-muddled Tarzan getting the Oscar? It was ok, for the kind of characterless stuff Disney uses, but Blame Canada certainly should have beaten it.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
If the humans used EMP to blow up the matrix, then 'most' of mankind in the matrix would be killed. Their goal is not to kill everyone, but to save them one by one.
I think you might have misunderstood. I was pondering why the pre-matrix humans didn't use EMP to destroy the AI that they were warring against. It seems like that would take less energe than tourching the sky, and it'd have a less harmful effect on the environment.
There were a few inconsistancies with the Matrix, actually, but that's the one that bothered me the most.
I'm pretty sure the prople "exploiting someone for personal gain" were his parents. They also helped him back into his chair before they left. It looked like a very common occurence and they seemed to handle it very matter of factly.
The cube really was excellent. The academy doesn't go for movies that aren't widely released, however (I never saw cube in a theatre here). I think the budget was under 1 million...
It was one the rare sci-fi movies that actually made me think (the best kind of movie, IMO). It's too bad that most sci-fi movies these days are nothing more than action flicks. Oh well...nothing beats a book in the end.
I don't know, some friends of mine have seen 'Pi' and they said that it was OK, but it kept going on and on in circles and seemed like it would never end....
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This was one of the films which I enjoyed the most this last year, and I would certainly rate it as being on a par with American Beauty. It didn't get a single nomination, despite the best performance from Nicolas Cage ever, a seamless yet unpredictable plot progression, direction which was clearly smooth as silk (as you'd expect from Martin Scorcese), a soundtrack which I enjoyed immensely and a further excellent performance from Patricia Arquette. Don't get me wrong - I enjoyed the films which did win a lot too. I'm just baffled as to what happened here.
"What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist." Salman Rushdie
Unabashed Star Wars Geekiness Begins....Now...
Phantom Menace? Giant toy commercial? Ok, granted.
But you know what, it made me feel seven years old again. Sure, most of the dialogue was written BY a seven year old, but I did recaptur some of that Summer of '77 magic. Was Phantom Menace Best Picture? Ah...no. Did it have all the Han Solo adventure magic. No...but it was a load of fun. I took my 11 year-old brother-in-law. To see his bouncing, enthusiastic reaction was classic. To hear his recitation of every move in the lightsaber battle was awesome. A little magic was passed on.
So Lucas drew inspiration from WWII battle flicks, Japanese epics, and Westerns. The result is a synthesis: Star Wars movies. Fun, bubblegum, Saturday afternoon at the movies. Good versus evil.
The Matrix. Awesome, technical achievement. Really, really cool effects. On purely technical merits, did it have superior visual effects than Menace? Toss-up. Hollywood gave it to the young guns. Just like they lauded Lucas and Spielberg for being young guns in the 70's and early 80's.
Technical achievement. Grumbling admiration from a
huge Star Wars geek. But cinematography? A GREEN FILTER? Story? Uh...everything written by Sterling, Gibson, Dick, and Brunner---cut out all the big words for Keanu---run everything through a green filter, take some notes from the TRON script---BANG! There's your story.
The Matrix. No One Can Stay Awake Through The Matrix. Larry Fishburne---cool actor. The scrawny leather chick---cool to look at. The bullet effects and the antigrav ninja fighting---cool to look at. The funny guy from Risky Business and Running Scared---funny guy. Filter---very green. The bad guy---only interesting character in the whole film. I wish to god he had just spent the first five minutes disemboweling Keanu. The rest of the film could have then involved the Bad Guy allying himself with Darth Maul for a final battle against Laurence Fishburne and Samuel L. Jackson.
Now that would have been cool.
"Which one is your lightsaber?"
"Its the one that says, 'BAD MOTHERFUCKER'."
Now that would have been entertaining. Not for eleven year olds, though.
The Matrix. Please.
Well, what he should have said was that it had never been done before on the big screen.
Phantom Menace was far from robbed. It relied on special effects to carry a weak plot with poor character development.
The Matrix, OTOH, merged its visual effects with its theme quite nicely. We've all seen the 3D freeze-frame pan around an object in the Gap commercials and the occasional QuicktimeVR...it's obviously computer-generated, similar to the world they were in, which merely strengthened the movie. Had these effects been cut, I suspect that the movie would have fallen flat on its face.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Star Wars fan, but Episode One blew dead Jawas.
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All I can say is that you must have been so fascinated at seeing the guy go into spasm that you didn't notice the filmmakers standing there looking at him in concern and even reaching to help while others there told them to go and get their award.
Their concern with getting on stage fast had to do with the fact that they were practically sitting in the back row. What other winner had to walk up from the area under the balcony to accept their award? They obviously insisted on bringing the guy they filmed with them and the Shrine was unprepared to seat a wheelchair anywhere but the very back of the place.
Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Canard: a false or unfounded repor
Was it just me or did it look like Sean Penn was praying come time for the best actor award.
What show were you watching last night?
Sean Penn wasn't at the Oscars! The picture they used of him for nominations was from the film he was nominated for.
Feminism is the wild notion that women are human beings.
when the Oscar for short subject documentary "King Gimp" was announced. The guy they made the film about was sitting in his wheelchair clapping and just fell out and was trashing around on the floor. The film makers just walked up on stage and left him! Really weird.
Where was Fight Club? I can't believe it was only nominated for "sound effects editing". The film industry finally comes out with a violent film which has a godo story, and doesn't have the guts to admit it. You know who I'd fight? I'd take on the Academy.
Fight Club is a great movie full of memorable moments and great quotes "I am Jack's ..." The writing was brilliant. Unfortunately I think it got panned because a lot of people are annoyed by Brad Pitt or assumed the whole movie is about gory bare-knuckle-boxing. Also the writer has been panned by critics as being a hack since this is his first novel.
Compared to all other films this year, Phantom Menace was a over-budgeted debacle. Lucas should've restricted himself to a $5 million budget and then maybe the film would've been interesting -- it would've forced him to to rely more on the story than the effects.
Last year I think Saving Private Ryan should've won hands-down, but instead it was Shakespeare In Love. Bah!
Basically the Academy of Motion Picture Sciences is like a club, and the Oscars is the process by which the existing members (previous Oscar winners) welcome new members into their club. Votes are not always cast for best in each category but rather with consideration of who's in and who's out.
Shouldn't they rename best supporting actor/actress "lifetime achievement"?
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"I do not speak for my employers, though they are controlled from my Teddy's huge pulsating brain."
While I always like watching Kevin Spacey, he was good in this film, the more I think about this movie, the more I dislike it.
Caution, mild spoilers:
My main problem with the movie is that all the characters are 1 dimensional, even Spacey's character.
--The wife was a typical unhappy houswife.
--The neighbor's father, the homophobic Marine who just happens to be a closet homosexual.
--Spacey, the unhappey middle aged suburban father.
Also, I really find it insulting that Hollywood is trying to tell me that Americian life if vapid and materialistic. Gee, that's like Al Gore and George Bush calling for campaign finance reform. Also, I don't think that Americian life is vapid and materialistic. I might hate suburbia, but I think that most people who live there are fairly happy.
And finally there is the fact that the kid who has the camera, the one who films everything, find beauty everwhere, but only throught the lens of a camera. Gee, more Hollywood self validation.
All in all this movie left a bad taste in my mouth.
All in all, that movie
"Attention Citizens, 2+2 now equals 3.947547175. Please recalibrate your equipment now" --The Computer
Why doesn't anyone even know of 'ExistenZ'? It is far better than 'The Matrix', but from the same genre... Go see it!
Other good movies are 'Pi' and 'The Cube'.
--The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
--The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
I did enjoy American Beauty a lot..but...
Fight Club and Being John Malkovich got shafted. Those were the two of the most original films I've seen in years.
There's a shot in Fight Club where the camera pans around Ed Norton's empty apartment and each item he owns starts appearing along with its catalog description. It was absolutely brilliant.
-B
... blame Canada for "Blame Canada!" not winning?
- Hollywood continues to amaze me at how hard they can pat themselves on the back. I mean really, I thought they damn near broke their arm off last time, but oh... oh no. Because of one kid's fantastic job in a movie this year, we got to see other fantastic kids in other movies in other years. There must have been about an hour and a half of this useless junk.
- Roberto Beninni should host the oscars. You'd never know what was coming next. He was just as excited to stand up there giving an award as he was receiving it.
- Spielberg. Just get on, and say here are the nominees.. oh damn! Smile! I knew I forgot something!
- Blame Canada was given the full treatment, I was pretty impressed. They went at it full force (even though it was ironically censored at points).
- Warren Beaty... please, next time you have to make a speech, have some of whatever Roberto's drinking.
- Billy Crystal... yeah, you were funny... the first time. The parodies were lacking this year, although the opening songs weren't bad.
- Was it just me or did it look like Sean Penn was praying come time for the best actor award. Dude, look around you... you actually think you had that much of a chance?
- Tommy Lee Jones is waaay cooler. He at least knows when to get a haircut.
All in all I liked the choices they made for oscars, but the show was so obviously bloated and forced, it set a new low.
I thought when I first saw Episode 1 I would have sworn that it would win best costume (or at least one oscar). I think the Matrix deserved all the oscars it got, and I think it should have been a nominee for best picture. Oh well. Also, all the awards that American Beauty won makes me want to go out and watch the movie. Did you know that it took the screenplay person 50 rewrites of the script to get it right. True.
Who mourns for Q? I do, he was a great actor and it was sad to see him go. (car accident)
Sorry, but the matrix had a few 'neato' effects, most notably the bullet-time sequences, but TPM was probably the most visually stunning movie in history. Say what you will about the movies problems, but to brush off ILM's groundbreaking work like this was a slap in the face.
Some little-known facts about the Matrix.
The directors came from a background in superhero comics, not movies. This shows in their choice of effects, angles, etc.
Secondly they did an extremely good job of cutting the film back. Partway through shooting their budget was cut drastically - after they had already spent a lot. Which is why some of the special effects are high tech, and some are painfully obviously low.
Somehow I think that their next version won't have the budget problems...
Cheers,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
The Matrix got 4 Oscars namely:- Editing, Sound, Sound FX & Visual FX. Better information here.
I've go a spoiler explanation for the Matrix:
The Matrix didn't contain any information about EMPs because the AI knew that if by chance anyone escaped they'd use EMP against them. The real questions are:
How did they know the term for "EMP"?
Why didn't the humans use EMP against the AI in the beginning? If they had enough tech to torch the sky they had enough to unlease a massive EMP that would have disabled all the AI. If that's explained away by saying that the AI had protection against EMP built into them, why didn't they use it with the squids? Hmmm?
Was I the only one who walked over to his (or her) computer to check up on Slashdot after Mr. Williams's rendition of "Blame Canada"? I would have thought that, given the number of Slashdot headlines about the song *prior* to the Oscars, some enterprising newshandler here would post a tidbit about how things turned out *afterwards*. Sadly, it was not to be. And no wrap-up on the Oscars here after it concluding early Monday morning -- was I also the only one to make it all the way through to the other side this year? But to wait until late this morning to post a story about the Oscars ... inexcusable for a site that (over)hyped the Oscars in advance, IMHO. I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Oscar awarded to "One Day in September", the speech delivered by its maker (did the Academy buy this guy off?), the deserved multiple awards for "Topsy Turvy", Russel Crowe's brooding throughout the ceremony, the numerous close-ups of the Cruise/Kidman combo, etc. etc. After midnight, when it became clear that "American Beauty" was walking away with the remaining hardware, I had more fun watching "Rocky" on TCM ... I just don't think they make them like they used to. Interpret that as you will. Just my two cents.