Posted on 02/25/2008 12:20:00 PM PST by Caleb1411
I'm didn't watch the Oscars. Normally I do. But I've spent enough time and money on the most depressing, dark and disturbed lineup of movies I ever can remember. I don't need to see them get rewarded.
Am I the only one who remembers when they actually gave Oscars to movies that had happy endings? There's not one happy ending in this lot — unless you consider an unplanned teenage pregnancy resulting in someone else's adoption a happy ending. That's the big payoff in "Juno."
Otherwise, you have "There Will Be Blood," in which a tyrannical oil baron destroys everyone and everything around him; "No Country For Old Men," in which a serial killer destroys everything and everyone around him; "Michael Clayton," in which greed gets nearly everyone killed; and "Atonement," in which a false accusation ruins the lives of all involved.
Um. Remind me again.
Why do we go to the movies?
THERE'S NO DEBATE HERE
Now, I'm not a Pollyanna. I enjoy films. I collect them. And I understand that not every story ends with music swirling and heroes walking off into a sunset.
But lately there's this sense that unless a movie is dark, violent and hopeless, it can't be "real." It can't be "art." It can't truly "matter." I put these words in quotes because it feels as if critics and awards committees define things that way.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
Well let’s see there is The Silence of the Lambs and this year’s winner and...that’s it.
I went to this internet site to find out what I could with regard to your question.
Box Office Mojo
I don't know how credible they are, but I used their figures none the less.
No Country for Old Men fell out to 40th place for box office draw for last year.
I did note that it wasn't released until 11/09/07. To find a more equitable way to compare it to movies that had been released earlier in the year, I took the following steps.
1. I looked at total days released for the top forty films (NCFOM) being the last on that list.
If a film had been released and withdrawn, I used the start and ending dates. If the film was still out on 12/31/07, I used release date to the end of the year.
2. I divided total gross sales for each picture and divided it by days released. This gave me the per day dollars.
3. I then took the top picture for gross sales in 2007, and determined it was on the street for 107 days.
4. I then took the daily gross sales for each picture, and multiplies by 107. This gave me a fairly good number to compare.
There were a few pictures released in the last days of the years. I didn't throw them out, although I probably should. They won't keep those numbers for a long period.
None the less, through this process, No Country for Old Men shook out to no better than 25th. If you're a purist and want to remove all pictures released after 12/01/07, there were seven.
This is a reasonable thing to do, since six of the top six did open in December and the tenth is also a December released film.
However, this would only move NCFOM up to 18th gross sales for the year.
It is also worthy to note that NCOFM's position would probably have been adversely affected if we considered that it's total number of days, being a less than a lot of others,
probably pushed it's per day total up higher than it should have been, thus skewing the overall standing somewhat.
These are the adjusted top five films of 2007, using the above method of judging. (disqualifying all movies released in December)
1. Shrek the Third
2. Enchanted
3. Spider-Man 3
4. Transformers
5. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Apart from Enchanted those were all terrible.
I drink your milkshake!
I dunno...the Emmet Walsh character was great, the final gun battle where he was trying to kill the mistress/wife of the bar owner was great, very suspenseful, and she thought her husband was the guy trying to kill her, but he was actually dead, I just really liked it.
Fargo was great, too. Steve Buschemi is always good. I like well-done crime dramas like Miller’s Crossing, Long Good Friday, etc., and fargo and Blood Simple both fit well into that genre.
Sorry I can’t be more explicit...
Ed
Psycho (1960)
Psycho didn’t win any Oscars.
I only make it to the movies where there’s a 007 movie, Star Trek or a George Romero movie.
I will make it to see Iron Man, Quantum of Solace and thats probably it this year. I havent been to the movies since casino royale, in 2006. That was the best film that year.
Saw it on Saturday night, couldn’t agree more!
I won’t give you a lot of guff over that. I pretty much agree. I did like that they tackled the whole transformer idea, but the writing was sub-par. Some scenes were laughable.
Ed that was good. Thanks for your comments. I hadn’t seen the movies and wanted to get some insight. I understand where you are comging from.
My concern was for how they set up oil men and depicted them in an age where the left in the U.S. is convinced anyone having to do with oil has a tail, horns, and a severe sunburn.
You take care.
Thanks, DO.
I grew up in Southern California where there were tons of oil wells all over, and yeah...I regard oilmen as heroes.
Or at least the small wildcatters. Just like gyppo loggers, they risk it all for sometimes small gain.
Ed
Yeah, those old wells are almost all gone. Hard to believe huh.
You take care. Thanks again.
BTW, I also regard people who do hard jobs for relatively little pay to be some of the best.
Does this mean that Transformers should at least get an Oscar?
Oh absolutely!!!
Ah no... ;-)
But when “An Inconvenient Truth” gets a Oscar for the best Documentary and the best Song you can suspect that politics just might have something to do with it.
yes you can be certain that is what is going on.
I hate America or lets blame America for everything wrong is the song most sung in Hollywood. I have worked here for more than 17 years. But try to understand when you are full of self hatred why would you not hate something that loves its self.
That’s very funny. It reminds me of an incident about 20 years ago when I decided to have an afternoon at the movies for my then-10-year-old stepdaughter. Unfortunately, I chose “Cool Hand Luke” as the featured attraction. Midway through, she stood up weeping and stomped from the room saying, “You call that entertainment?!”
HAHAHAHAHA! There are too many movies these days where this is the case. Too many dark, depressing movies. Give me an uplifting movie any day.
How about Monster? Taxi Driver? Sweeney Todd?
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