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 ...
Now, that’s a mouthful.
Thailand?
“Blood Simple” was definitely something. Frances McDormand was still a hottie then and it was the first time I really sat up and took notice of character actor Dan Hedaya (the abusive husband who conspires to kill her but ends up the victim).
Wonderfully sleazy role for fellow bit player M. Emmett Walsh as the private-eye-turned-assasin.
I’ve never looked at yellow leisure-suits the same way since...
Same Cohen Brothers. Yes.
Blood Simple. Check it out. Released around 1983.
That’s kindof funny actually. Isn’t it patently absurd what the leftist movie industry has turned into? These folks are infantile in their approach to life.
Not much would suit me more than to see their industry replaced by a conservative industry that actually made movies that heralded the good things about our nation, and it’s potential for the good of mankind.
Oh, I forgot. That really doesn’t exist... /s
LibTards!
Exactly right. They’d trash their own just to get in a jab at those they loathe.
Mitch hits it on the head!
Agreed, an excellent movie. Also agree about all the Cohen movies with the exception of "The Ladykillers" which wasn't (IMO) up to their usual standards.
Blood Simple is one of my favorites, but I can’t find it in my local video store.
If you get to read a book called “The Prize”. Its a very comprehensive book on the oil industry. Really interesting.
Isn’t No Country full of violence?
It’s happened before. 44 years ago all four acting awards went to foreign born actors (Rex Harrison, Julie Andrews, Peter Ustinov, Lila Kedrova).
This was actually the best crop of Best PIcture nominees in a long time.
Brolin carried the movie. It fizzled thereafter into a dumb movie IMO.
“Anyone remember that old one?”
Old One? That was just in the early 80’s. What are you 30? :-)
The average person simply wants an equitable situation. When things get out of whack, it festers in our minds. It is inconceivable to me, that we would short up a communist state intent on replacing the United States as the world’s leading hegemon.
What possible rationality could be used to justify what we have done? None.
When the Mogels ruled Hollywood and the Studio owned YOU, Frank Capra made movies where Good was Good, Evil Was Evil, and nobody you really liked got killed in the end. They understood that movies were like cans of beans or any other product. You might feel like cooking for yourself once and awhile, but it didn't really make the Studio as much money as making something the public actually wanted. The "stars", for all their glory, were cattle, traded and loaned out between studios when need be. If they slept with one-legged chimpanzees in their spare time, they damn well better keep quiet about it, and there were assigned press agents to do whatever was required to keep it away from the paying public; most of what went on in Hollywood stayed in Hollywood, and everybody like it that way.
When the stars finally broke loose with the dawn of TV ("that devil box"), they started making "art" for themselves; before long we had blood splatter and stabbings, and the way you got real recognition was by impressing your peers with how much you could push the envelope and re-educate the rubes, not by telling a story people wanted to hear.
RIP, Hollywood.
I thouight Brolin was excellent in American Gangster.
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