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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.
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.
Please, somebody either moderate the original comment back down or moderate up a correction.
It is true it was a wierd moment, but the original comment's description creates a strong negative impression about the award recipients that I think is unjustified. Here's what actually happened:
The award to "King Gimp" was announced and the guy in the wheelchair (who the documentary was about) appeared to be so overcome with emotion at the win that he became highly spastic and ultimately slipped forward out of his wheelchair, onto the floor, where he continued "thrashing around." This apparently is the condition the guy suffers from -- uncontrollable spasms. Anyhow, the film makers, seeing this, appeared torn over what to do -- assist the guy on the floor back into his wheelchair, or go forward. Remember, the whole auditorium is applauding them, a national (international, actually) T.V. audience is watching, and all are waiting on them to go forward. It is only a few moments in which they hesitate when some other people in their entourage move to help the guy back into his wheelchair. Seeing this, the film makers then head for the stage to accept the award. They did not just walk forward and leave a wheelchair-bound person thrashing on the floor, unassisted.
In fact, the impression I got was that this kind of episode was not necessarily uncommon for the guy and, regardless, it was clear he was not hurt and was not going to hurt himself. During their acceptance speech they spoke glowingly about the guy and his "beautiful spirit" and a few camera closeups were shown of him watching their acceptance speech and it was plain he has uncontrollable spasms -- at least when filled with strong emotions. But, it was also plain that he was happy and not harmed.
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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.