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knives wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:48 pm

mfunk9786 wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:40 pm

knives wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 10:14 pmWhy not have fun with Tim Blake Nelson?

"Who?" - the people buying the advertisers' chips and soda

Well duh, but the song does have a lot of fun stage potential and bluesgrass seems like a way to get new people to watch.

The Venn diagram of people who unironically use "Hollyweird" and listen to bluegrass might not be two separate circles, but I'd be willing to bet it's close

That's my point. A very new audience (says the guy who listens to bluegrass and has never said Hollyweird).

DarkImbecile wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 4:44 pm I still need to see A Star is Born, Green Book, and Bohemian Rhapsody, but there’s a reason for that.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions and yadda-yadda-yadda, but if you do get around to A Star is Born you might just find it's pretty good, old-fashioned Hollywood-studio storytelling in its best sense. It's not my favourite film of the year, but if it won from among the other BP nominations ... the Academy would have made far worse decisions.

I suspect I'll like Star the best of those three, and I'm always hoping to be happily surprised by even the least promising film I catch. At the same time, I see about 90-100 releases from a given year in the theater, and I've been dragging my feet on these pre-nominations because they aren't the type of films that I generally feel the need to rush out to see. I also pointedly avoided Can You Ever Forgive Me? both on the festival circuit and during its initial release for similar reasons, but have been intrigued by the breadth of support it's received from critics I respect, so I'll see it as it comes back onto nearby screens this weekend.

All that said, I have a very hard time believing that any of these will come close to cracking my top ten — but I hope they do!

bdsweeney wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:03 pm

DarkImbecile wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 4:44 pm I still need to see A Star is Born, Green Book, and Bohemian Rhapsody, but there’s a reason for that.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions and yadda-yadda-yadda, but if you do get around to A Star is Born you might just find it's pretty good, old-fashioned Hollywood-studio storytelling in its best sense. It's not my favourite film of the year, but if it won from among the other BP nominations ... the Academy would have made far worse decisions.

Surprisingly, of those three, I found Bohemian Rhapsody was the least worst, probably because I'd rather hear Queen songs than Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper songs. But your mileage etc.

And I'd say Star is slightly better by virtue of getting what it feels like to be a musician/celebrity way better

knives wrote:Does anyone even remember the Black Panther song? Why not have fun with Tim Blake Nelson?

I still have the Black Panther soundtrack in my Spotify rotation but the song feels like it came out forever ago.

I'd actually rather the Black Panther song win, if only because it would mean that SZA (and Kendrick, I guess) would get some kind of major industry recognition.

Speaking of Black Panther, not that it matters too much, but the SAG awards (which are happening right now) giving it Outstanding Stunt Ensemble over the new Mission Impossible is one of the stupidest things I've seen this whole awards season. Were there even practical stunts in Black Panther? I can barely remember the individual action sequences in that movie, let alone what the stunt choreography was, whereas the helicopter chase and especially the HALO jump from Fallout are burned into my brain.

And the bathroom fight, which puts any hand-to-hand fight choreography in Black Panther to shame.

Prior to the SAGs, Rami Malek, Glenn Close and Mahershala Ali were my predix to win the Oscars, so their wins tonight have only reinforced that. Emily Blunt's win for Supporting Actress was weird but probably the only bearing that has on the Oscar race is to reinforce that Adams, Stone and Weisz won't win(?). I predict Regina King.

Variety’s awards editor is tweeting disheartening things about the Oscar broadcast’s plans for cutting out “lesser” categories, foremost among which is that Cinematography will be one of the untelevised awards.

Serves me right for being halfway hopeful after the noms weren't a shitshow. Can we just like fast forward to next year's season already?

DarkImbecile wrote: Thu Jan 24, 2019 11:18 pm I see about 90-100 releases from a given year in the theater...

!! I'm not doing enough with my life...

DarkImbecile wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 3:54 amCinematography will be one of the untelevised awards.

It's especially weird and disappointing for this to happen while John Bailey is president of the Academy.

I thought Fallout was a fun but a wholly forgettable experience. Not too surprised it lost anything.

DarkImbecile wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 3:54 am Variety’s awards editor is tweeting disheartening things about the Oscar broadcast’s plans for cutting out “lesser” categories, foremost among which is that Cinematography will be one of the untelevised awards.

Getting very close to not even watching, and I loved the Oscars

Cutting the visual foundation award from the ceremony honoring a visual medium makes sense if you think about it.

Possibly unpopular opinion incoming: Why not cut the shorts before cutting cinematography? Those are always the speeches that people sort of scratch their heads during, having no idea who those folks are

I'd give you a paragraph on why they're cutting cinematography and it wouldn't be in English.

DarkImbecile wrote:Variety’s awards editor is tweeting disheartening things about the Oscar broadcast’s plans for cutting out “lesser” categories, foremost among which is that Cinematography will be one of the untelevised awards.

Cinematography is only one of these because Bailey is a cinematographer and put his money where his mouth is. If he’s not willing to do it to his category, how can he do it to the shorts and sound categories like they want.

Still the profound ignorance by pundits of how live tv operates continues. See my earlier post for a realistic look at how this is going to happen, it will probably be so seamless you won’t even know it happened. You lose a lot more time bu cutting presenter walkouts and banter for the commercial break categories and cutting out the walk to the podium than you would ever gain trying to cut a speech.

mfunk9786 wrote:Possibly unpopular opinion incoming: Why not cut the shorts before cutting cinematography? Those are always the speeches that people sort of scratch their heads during, having no idea who those folks are

It should definitely be the shorts. With the exception of Pixar's animated ones, I can't imagine more than a handful (%) of the Academy's audience have seen them.

mfunk9786 wrote: Mon Jan 28, 2019 2:52 pm Possibly unpopular opinion incoming: Why not cut the shorts before cutting cinematography? Those are always the speeches that people sort of scratch their heads during, having no idea who those folks are

For years my local multiplex that plays big indies and occasional foreign films has an “Oscar Nominated Best Shorts” program that runs for 2-4 weeks around the ceremony, longer than certain nominees and winners do. I don’t know the specifics, but I imagine some distributor buys up the nominees collectively and has a vested interest in keeping them broadcasted to continue selling that package.

Right, but people still have much more awareness of the cinematography nominees. I'm not in favor of them cutting any categories from being broadcast on TV, and would love it if some of the ones not aired were added back in at the cost of bits and gags, but if you're going to cut something, Short Documentary (at least) seems like a better way to go

Perhaps they’re cutting cinematography this year only, because Cuarón has a high chance of winning and being on the podium multiple times in other categories. They may just be trying to avoid repetition in hearing the same names thanked over and over.

Speaking of bits and gags I'm wondering what atrocities we're going to have to sit through due to the whole "No Host" situation. Groan inducing cameos anyone?