Oscars Brouhaha 2010!
Monday, March 8th, 2010 11:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
retsukoWhat better way to celebrate International Women's Day 2010 than with the win of Kathryn Bigelow, the first woman to win an Oscar for outstanding directing? And as for "The Hurt Locker" winning Best Picture... well, all I have to say is: In your face, Avatar! Quality over quantity!
I really enjoyed "The Hurt Locker", which surprised me: war movies and I don't get along, and I only get a hankering for them about once every six months or so. But this movie, whether it's 100% accurate or not (and apparently there are disputes about its accuracy, which I wasn't previously aware of) held my attention from the get-go, and built up the suspense so neatly that I had to remind myself to breathe several times. But the best thing about this movie was that it wasn't only about war, it was also about its consequences: the damage to the souls of the citizens involved, the sensation of being an Occupying Other (with two academic capital O's, yes, I'm serious), and addiction. It was a beautifully made film, too; there were shots of small details that were achingly touching, like the stray feral cats wandering through the battered city landscape, or the eerily over-lit supermarket that one of the characters returns to in the U.S. It also utilized points of view in magnificent ways. At various times in the movie, I was seeing the action from the soldier's point of view, then of the Iraqi civilians' who were watching him dismantle the bombs, and then from the unknown insurgent's (or were they?). I highly recommend this movie, and I'm glad to be able to do so. It's a universal statement about the toll of violence on the human soul.
10 Movies for Best Picture is a lot... and it was hard to see them all. I ended up having seen "Precious", "District 9", "Up", "Avatar", and "The Hurt Locker". I meant to see "An Education" and "Up in the Air" but lost track of both of them before I had the chance. While it's great that more films were up there, I can't help thinking it was easier to be on top of things when I only needed to have seen five, total.
Stray observations about the Oscars, the ceremony, the fashion, etc. etc. can be found underneath the cut:
* There were a ton of beautiful dresses this year (yay!), and only a few real missteps (SJParker, why the Chanel bath towel with fake flowers attached to it?). I can only hope that I look as good as Helen Mirren when I'm 64!
* George Clooney seemed to have walked through a shower of ashes before entering the theater. And having a love-hate relationship with his celebrity status, and the camera in particular... Uhm, dude? You're freaking out now? You've been famous for years! What gives??
* Why couldn't Neil Patrick Harris have just done the whole hosting gig? He would have been much funnier than Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, who didn't seem to have a lot to do and spent most of the event teasing the various luminaries in the audience, not to good ends. I did get a laugh from them a few times, like the "Paranormal Activity" parody, or the Snuggie shot... but those were few and far between.
* I liked the choreography for the scores very much, except for the theme from "Up", where the dance made no sense.
* The "Horror Homage" was pretty toothless, given that there was no way that actual R-rated material could be shown. Furthermore, the editing on it was done at Attention Deficit Disorder Speed.
* I will now be ungracious and say something incredibly rude: I don't think John Hughes was that great a filmmaker, and the tribute to him was overwrought. Hollywood is in love with people who think they've somehow captured the voice of a particular target demographic, but Hughes never spoke for me, as a kid or a teenager, or an adult, and I resent the implication that we should look to him as some great auteur. There, I've said it, and I feel better. (Insert sarcastic emoticon here.)
* Miley Cyrus and Amanda Seyfried acted as if they were hosting their high school talent show, not presenting an Oscar.
* On the more gracious side: Mo'Nique's acceptance speech was so wonderfully put, and I was so happy she won. She truly deserved it for her work in "Precious" and it was so touching to see her thank her husband along with luminaries like Hattie McDaniel.
My Mom and I will have our annual Friday-after-the-Oscars buying People magazine and dissecting the fashion ritual this year, too. Huzzah!
I really enjoyed "The Hurt Locker", which surprised me: war movies and I don't get along, and I only get a hankering for them about once every six months or so. But this movie, whether it's 100% accurate or not (and apparently there are disputes about its accuracy, which I wasn't previously aware of) held my attention from the get-go, and built up the suspense so neatly that I had to remind myself to breathe several times. But the best thing about this movie was that it wasn't only about war, it was also about its consequences: the damage to the souls of the citizens involved, the sensation of being an Occupying Other (with two academic capital O's, yes, I'm serious), and addiction. It was a beautifully made film, too; there were shots of small details that were achingly touching, like the stray feral cats wandering through the battered city landscape, or the eerily over-lit supermarket that one of the characters returns to in the U.S. It also utilized points of view in magnificent ways. At various times in the movie, I was seeing the action from the soldier's point of view, then of the Iraqi civilians' who were watching him dismantle the bombs, and then from the unknown insurgent's (or were they?). I highly recommend this movie, and I'm glad to be able to do so. It's a universal statement about the toll of violence on the human soul.
10 Movies for Best Picture is a lot... and it was hard to see them all. I ended up having seen "Precious", "District 9", "Up", "Avatar", and "The Hurt Locker". I meant to see "An Education" and "Up in the Air" but lost track of both of them before I had the chance. While it's great that more films were up there, I can't help thinking it was easier to be on top of things when I only needed to have seen five, total.
Stray observations about the Oscars, the ceremony, the fashion, etc. etc. can be found underneath the cut:
* There were a ton of beautiful dresses this year (yay!), and only a few real missteps (SJParker, why the Chanel bath towel with fake flowers attached to it?). I can only hope that I look as good as Helen Mirren when I'm 64!
* George Clooney seemed to have walked through a shower of ashes before entering the theater. And having a love-hate relationship with his celebrity status, and the camera in particular... Uhm, dude? You're freaking out now? You've been famous for years! What gives??
* Why couldn't Neil Patrick Harris have just done the whole hosting gig? He would have been much funnier than Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, who didn't seem to have a lot to do and spent most of the event teasing the various luminaries in the audience, not to good ends. I did get a laugh from them a few times, like the "Paranormal Activity" parody, or the Snuggie shot... but those were few and far between.
* I liked the choreography for the scores very much, except for the theme from "Up", where the dance made no sense.
* The "Horror Homage" was pretty toothless, given that there was no way that actual R-rated material could be shown. Furthermore, the editing on it was done at Attention Deficit Disorder Speed.
* I will now be ungracious and say something incredibly rude: I don't think John Hughes was that great a filmmaker, and the tribute to him was overwrought. Hollywood is in love with people who think they've somehow captured the voice of a particular target demographic, but Hughes never spoke for me, as a kid or a teenager, or an adult, and I resent the implication that we should look to him as some great auteur. There, I've said it, and I feel better. (Insert sarcastic emoticon here.)
* Miley Cyrus and Amanda Seyfried acted as if they were hosting their high school talent show, not presenting an Oscar.
* On the more gracious side: Mo'Nique's acceptance speech was so wonderfully put, and I was so happy she won. She truly deserved it for her work in "Precious" and it was so touching to see her thank her husband along with luminaries like Hattie McDaniel.
My Mom and I will have our annual Friday-after-the-Oscars buying People magazine and dissecting the fashion ritual this year, too. Huzzah!
