Main things I’m happy about: LOTR is up for best picture and Johnny Depp was recognized for his fantastic work in “Pirates.”
Main things I’m unhappy about: That once again the LOTR actors have been given short shrift, from Elijah Wood to Andy Serkis to–in the most frustrating omission this time–Sean Astin’s gut-wrenching, tear-envoking performance as Samwise. “I may not be able to carry the ring…but I can carry you!” Has there ever been a more clear definition of “Supporting Actor” than that? Also, the title song from “School of Rock” should have been nominated, if for no other reason than the notion of Jack Black blowing the place wide open with his performance of it.
PAD
• 
First of all: Money wise… master and commander:
Release
Running Time: N/A Production Budget: $150 million
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Est. Marketing Costs: $30 million
That’s from Boxofficemojo.com.
Second of all… already my predictions (with a bit of explanation)
Best Picture: “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” – Because they kept on putting it off til the third one.
Best Actor: Bill Murray, “Lost in Translation” – As good as Depp was in Pirates, Murray doesn’t do as much as Depp. And Depp has many years ahead of him.
3. Best Actress: Charlize Theron, “Monster” – Nuff said.
4. Supporting Actor: Tim Robbins, “Mystic River” – Actually I have no clue on this one… just sniped it from the globes.
5. Supporting Actress: Renee Zellweger, “Cold Mountain.” Same as above.
6. Best Director: Sofia Coppola, “Lost in Translation” – Definitely.
Adapted Screenplay: LOTR
Original Screenplay: Sofia Coppola, “Lost in Translation.”
Animated feature film: “Finding Nemo” – Nothing really needs to be said here.
Art Direction: “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King,”
Cinematography: “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World” – Peter Weir always has a great cinematographer.
Sound Mixing: “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl”, Sound Editing: “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World”, Film Editing: “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World” –
“Seabiscuit.” One or the other
These three awards usually go to action pics. Heck, Speed got an Oscar for Sound Editing.
Most seem a rip-off of the Globes, but truthfully, as much as a non-award show it is, they usually pick em close.
Travis
Oh, that School of Rock song! That would have been fabulous!
And I’ve definitely got my fingers crossed for Johnny Depp.
And yet, Satoshi Kon’s overlooked while Brother Bear gets a nomination.
No bloody justice.
This is what they get for not casting Billy Boyd as Frodo.
For me the best surprise was seeing Keisha Castle-Hughes get nominated for her luminous performance in WHALE RIDER. PAD, if you haven’t seen it, it’s one you and your girls would love.
Have we set a record yet for year with the most nominated films with a hyphenated title? Because this year’s batch ought to do it…
I’m actually pretty interested in this year’s Oscar race: there’s a bunch of good films/performances running against each other. There doesn’t look to be a clear-cut winner in best picture, though I find “Master & Commander” and “Seabiscuit” to be the weakest of the five.
This is exactly what I worried about three years ago, when “Fellowship of the Ring” was nominated for best picture, and everyone said, “Oh, it’s just a placeholder nomination until ‘Return of the King’ is released. That one’s guaranteed to win!” And the 2001 Best Picture Oscar, instead of going to “Fellowship,” went to “A Beautiful Mind.” Since then, there’s been the expectation that “Return of the King” would make some kind of Oscar sweep to make up for the previous three years.
And I looked at the idiotic people who told me that dreck and said, “well, what if some really really really good movie comes out in 2003, and blows everything else away? Or if several really good films gome out? Or if ‘RotK’ ends up being awful? What happens then?” All I got were blank looks.
Most years, the Academy seems to want to nominate pet projects and obscure stuff for awards, totally bypassing good films and good performances for no discernable reason. I fully expected Johnny Depp’s performance in “Pirates” to get shafted, and I’m grateful it wasn’t. But for every year the Academy pulls its head out of its ášš enough to pay attention to what’s going on, there’s three years where politics and favoritism get mediocre movies the attention that other movies should be getting.
I could (obviously) go on, but I suspect I’m preaching to the choir. I’m just grateful for a decent round of noms this year.
That OTHER John Byrne
I went to see Master & Commander on opening night, and while I thoroughly enjoyed it, I can’t see how it’s getting 10 Oscar noms.
But then, when you look at the fact that it’s in 8 of the same categories as Return of the King, many of them technical, maybe it isn’t all that surprising.
(But how did RotK not get noms for Sound Editing and Cinematography?)
I thought The Last Samurai was better than M&C though.
Love Actually was great, and that didn’t even get a Best original screenplay nod!
Ye gads.
People say how the Golden Globes are useless, yet they seemed to be more balanced, in terms of noms and winners, than the Oscar noms.
All in all, the shaft for acting noms shouldn’t be surprising – too many actors getting too little screen time.
Maybe it’s time the Oscars introduce an emsemble cast award as well.
I just cannot see how RotK doesn’t win best film. But then the Oscars and I don’t really speak the same language. I cannot stand many of the high-brow period pieces and low-budget films that dominate the awards. But somehow I doubt that genre films will ever get the respect they deserve.
I am thrilled, therefore, about Depp’s nomination. And equally nonplussed that the ROtK cast was ignored. So too, though, were the casts of M&C and Seabiscut. Clearly, actors are not that important unless you have a film like Mystic River, which in the hands of a more pretentious director and a lesser cast could have been awful. (OK, without Jackson the LotR films wouldn’t even exist, but I think changes in the general cast wouldn’t have harmed these films that much.)
Lastly, I find it cool that Michael McKean and Annette O’Toole are up for an Oscar for “Kiss at the End of the Rainbow.” Way to go, Martha Kent and Perry White!
I’d love it if, as the news / entertainment shows announce the nominations throughout the day, Johnny Depp’s name were accompanied by the clip of him slurring: “I think I d’served that one.”!
Hooper
Adding to all the comments above, I’d point out that comics fans who keep track of such things should be duly impressed at American Splendor‘s nomination in the Adapted Screenplay category, and duly dismayed that neither Paul Giamatti nor Hope Davis squeezed in nominations in the acting categories. (Davis had been nominated for a Golden Globe, but lost out to Renee Zellweger.)
The LOTR acting shutout doesn’t surprise me, simply because I thought many of the performances in the two of the films I saw (albeit under duress) were howlingly bad. And even for those who enjoyed the movies, I suspect the ensemble nature and sheer size of the cast works against them when it comes to acting awards.
Nice to see Depp nominated, though I’d also been hoping Billy Bob Thornton would get a nod for BAD SANTA.
I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed for LOST IN TRANSLATION and Bill Murray.
Really, ‘Master and Commander’ is better than ‘Return of the King’ in every possible way. Better acted, more creatively directed and more effective drama.
Sad that true creativity and brilliance in movies like ‘American Splendor,’ ‘Lost In Translation’ and ‘Mystic River’ is going to be runover by a billion dollar cartoon.
Well, at least ‘Titanic’ won’t be the most annoying camp to ever win Best Picture anymore.
John Popa writes:
Sad that true creativity and brilliance in movies like ‘American Splendor,’ ‘Lost In Translation’ and ‘Mystic River’ is going to be runover by a billion dollar cartoon.
Well, at least ‘Titanic’ won’t be the most annoying camp to ever win Best Picture anymore.
I may disagree with your assessment of LOTR:ROTK, but that aside, I think it’s far from a certainty that LOTR:ROTK will take the best picture Oscar. It may well, but IMO, it’s not a lock.
Sad that true creativity and brilliance in movies like ‘American Splendor,’ ‘Lost In Translation’ and ‘Mystic River’ is going to be runover by a billion dollar cartoon.
I’d be interesting in knowing how much Master & Commander cost to make, because I’m sure it wasn’t a pretty penny either.
Billion dollar cartoon? What a joke.
Atleast it isn’t a billion dollars spent on knowing that the ship sank.
Craig J. Ries observes:
I’d be interesting in knowing how much Master & Commander cost to make, because I’m sure it wasn’t a pretty penny either.
For what it’s worth, http://www.the-numbers.com cites Master & Commander‘s production budget at $135,000,000. LOTR:ROTK‘s is given as $94,000,000
The site also cites a $50,000,000 prints & advertising budget for LOTR:ROTK, but doesn’t include a prints/advertising figure for Master & Commander
I can’t believe PAD made that “best supporting actor” joke. Wait, he’s the writer who had a HULK strip with two women realizing their names were Betty and Veronica — I can believe it.
My hope is that LOTR will *finally* get recognized for Best Picture. I’m sorry more of the cast wasn’t nominated — Andy Serkis would’ve been my pick for Supporting Actor — but Bill Murray is an excellent choice.
If you want a hopeless choice for Best Comic Performance — and I’m not sure Bill Murray’s role in LOST IN TRANSLATION wasn’t drama — I’d go with Bruce Campbell as the fat, old Elvis in BUBBA HO-TEP. Not a chance, but it’d be my pick!
Of course, the Oscars are just another version of the Professional Critic Love-Hate Theory: People love to cite them when the result agrees with their opinion (“I said that movie was the best, and the Oscar proves it!”) and dismiss it when the results disagree with them (“They never give the award to the best ones out there anyway!”)
As for me, I’ll read the results the day after.
Not to rain on the parade of all the RotK lovers here, but the only time in Oscar history a sequel has ever won Best Picture was in 1974 for the Godfather Part 2. I’m expecting a repeat of the last two years, where it gets a bunch of technical awards, but loses the top prize.
I may disagree with your assessment of LOTR:ROTK, but that aside, I think it’s far from a certainty that LOTR:ROTK will take the best picture Oscar. It may well, but IMO, it’s not a lock.
There doesn’t look to be a clear-cut winner in best picture, though I find Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World and Seabiscuit to be the weakest of the five.
I hate to burst your bubbles, but if you step back and look at this objectively, there’s only one conclusion to be reached. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King must be considered the prohibitive favorite to win Best Picture. Overlooking the fact that it got the most nominations, it’s won Best Picture awards from most of the critics groups, including two important bellwethers–the Producers Guild of America “Golden Laurel” award and the Hollywood Foreign Press’ Golden Globe Award for Best Dramatic Motion Picture. Granted, the winners of these awards don’t always win, but they very usually do. If Peter Jackson wins the Directors Guild of America award on February 7th, it’s a very, very good bet that ROTK will win Best Picture, and Peter Jackson will get some hardware that evening (either as screenwriter, director, or producer).
That once again the LOTR actors have been given short shrift, from Elijah Wood to Andy Serkis to–in the most frustrating omission this time–Sean Astin’s gut-wrenching, tear-envoking performance as Samwise. “I may not be able to carry the ring…but I can carry you!” Has there ever been a more clear definition of “Supporting Actor” than that?
No. In my book, that’s a clear definition of leading actor. The only reason people were pushing Sean Astin in the supporting category was that the producers felt it would be easier for him to be nominated there. Unfortunately, the Actors branch of the Academy (along with most critics groups in the country) apparently felt that less acting was required for ROTK than lower budgeted films like Mystic River and Lost In Translation. (If there were no Fell Beasts or Oliphaunts, would Astin have been given the same consideration as Russell Crowe, who undeservedly won an Oscar for Gladiator?) But Astin had just as much screen time as Elijah Wood, and his character was a far more active force. I firmly believe that all things being equal, Sean Astin fully deserved to be nominated as a leading actor. It’s up to the Academy’s discretion to decide what constitutes a “leading” or “supporting” role. Marlon Brando was nominated for Best Actor in The Godfathereven though his character was only on-screen a very small amount of time. Ditto for (the former Sir) Anthony Hopkins in The Silence of the Lambs. Also, Morgan Freeman was nominated for Best Actor in The Shawshank Redemption even though his character is constructed as a sidekick role to Tim Robbins.
Sad that true creativity and brilliance in movies like American Splendor, Lost In Translation and Mystic River is going to be runover by a billion dollar cartoon.
Well, at least Titanic won’t be the most annoying camp to ever win Best Picture anymore.
I pity you. While I would not say it is the best film ever made, Titanic was a masterpiece that fully deserved to win Best Picture in 1997. In fact, one of the biggest weaknesses to the last two films in the LOTR trilogy is that the endings to both The Two Towers and The Return of the King are fairly week. HMKW James Cameron on the other hand crafted a perfect ending to his film, which is why I think Titanic will still be considered a classic film for generations to come.
Edward J. Cunningham
P.S. British subjects use the initials HMQ to refer to their sovereign. These letters stand for “Her Majesty, the Queen.” Out of respect for Cameron’s achievement, which I doubt will be equalled for many years to come, I preceded his name with the acronym HMKW which of course stands for His Majesty, the King of the World.
(If there were no Fell Beasts or Oliphaunts, would Astin have been given the same consideration as Russell Crowe, who undeservedly won an Oscar for Gladiator?)
I find it odd that actors plying their craft opposite fictional creatures that clearly do not exist are considered less likely to be recognized for their effort than actors plying their craft in real-life situations. Acting is, in part, a case of convincing the audience that you are what you are pretending to be in the circumstance written for you. So why then would it be a shoe-in for the actors of ‘Mystic River’ to be nominated but not the actors of ‘RotK’? I’d say convincing the audience you are a three foot six Hobbit in a life and death battle with a giant spider for your best friend’s well-being is something of a more monumental feat than, say, convincing the audience you have angst over losing your daughter. Nothing against ‘Mystic River’. It’s just a curious point. When do we reach a place where fantasy and science fiction get the credit they are due and the actors breathing life into the mythic and impossible along with them?
I love useless, Oscar sniping, so I’ll through my two cents in… 🙂
While it’s nice that Depp got nominated, as he saved the entire movie, I will be monumentally upset if he beats Bill Murray. His work was amazingly great in an amazingly great movie.
I guess I’m one of the only people in the country who really didn’t care for POTC. But then again, I didn’t see it until it was out on video, so after seeing a million commercials for it when it was in theaters (showing about 90% of the humorous/interesting parts) and then a million more commercials when it came out on Video/DVD (showing the other interesting 10%), I was quite jaded with it by the time my girlfriend convinced me to see it (I got her back, made her watch Evil Dead 2).
I was actually surprised that either of the Matrix movies got a nod for effects. That struck me as odd.
If anyone from ROTK deserves a nod, it’s Sean Astin in a supporting role. The others, while all good, didn’t stand out that much. Wait, I take that back, there’s Gollum/Smeigel/Andy Serkis. I think I forgot about him because all of my disappointment about his snubbing was last year.
But you know what the song says, it’s better to have disappointment than no appointment.
Not to rain on the parade of all the RotK lovers here, but the only time in Oscar history a sequel has ever won Best Picture was in 1974 for the Godfather Part 2.
And the last time an American woman was nominated for best director was…er…never.
There was no guarantee that audiences would see Godfather II when they awarded the first film Best Picture. The Academy was well aware that two more sequels were coming, and I’m guessing they hedged their bets that the final movie would be a worthy representative with which to honor the trilogy.
I still like the first one the best, but ROTK is certainly worthy of Best Picture.
Is RotK Oscar-worthy? Sure, but I hate that they have dissed the previous entries knowing the third was coming. It was as if they were thinking, “well, if we give it to FotR, and RotK is better, then we will HAVE to give it later”. Since no one wants their hands tied, they left the spot “open”.
IMHO, FotR is by far the best entry of the series. I’ll admit to bias against TTT because I thought it strayed too much from the book. However, RotK was just not edited as well – it lasted too long. PJs love of battles cost him dearly in this movie. That Oliphaunt Rider? Bleeech. FotR was by far the smoothest and best handled of the three.
(One caveat: the soundtracks. Even though I think TTT was weak, it had the best score. The music from it did more “speaking” than either entry from the other two movies.)
Based upon the audience responses during the nomination announcements, I think its going to come down to “LotR:TRotK” versus “Lost in Translation”, since they’re both up for best director and best picture.
The actual winner?
If I knew that, I wouldn’t be here.
I’m excited by “A Kiss At The End Of The Rainbow” has been nominated. First off all there’s the possibility that Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara performing the song in character at the Oscars. Then, as a friend of mine suggested, we have the possibility that they could sit through the whole show in character.
No noms for Comic Book: The Movie?
So, let me pick on a movie that I don’t think anybody here has commented on yet–the shockingly overrated “In America.”
It’s garnered almost universal acclaim from critics. Richard Roeper even called it the no. 1 movie of the year and claims he cried through it, for Christ’s sake! Well, I cried too; I cried over wasting my 4 bucks on such absolute dreck.
No, seriously, it’s cloying, cliche-ridden, and emotionally manipulative to an appalling degree. It also constantly used “E.T.” as its touchstone, yet “E.T.”, for all its sappiness, is veritably subtle in comparison!
About the only saving grace in this film is the performances by the two young girls, who are both quite good (and this is coming from someone who normally hates little brats in films!)Yet instead of nominating them, the Academy saw fit to nominate Samantha Morton as the long-suffering wife (ick!) and Dijmon Hounsou as the mystical black dude with the heart of gold (double ick!) If this movie wins for either of those by-the-number performances, or for Best Original Screenplay, it will make the Martin Scorsese/Robert Redford travesty of 1981 seem pale in comparison.
My favorite Oscar nomination: Keisha Castle-Hughes. Glad to see that the Academy hadn’t forgotten her luminous performance in WHALE RIDER.
And for this year, my favorite Oscar omissions go to Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. 🙂
“No noms for Comic Book: The Movie?”
Was it even in exhibition? IN any case, I LOVED watching that hilarious panel discussion with Peter and all of those voiceover acting talents (see the special features).
KET
I don’t care who actually wins; Sean Astin was the best supporting actor of 2003. He owned that movie. And thanks for reminding me of the School of Rock song; two nominations for Cold Mountain? Geez, Sting and Randy Newman take the year off and they go into a tizzy.
What? No nomination for Rowan Atkinson as “Johnny English”? Say it ain’t so!!!!
Best movie of the year was shut out — Big Fish.
Oscars. Feh.
Gooooo LOTR!!!! and no, I dont watch these PC award shows either but I would like to see that movie get best picture.
And shall we all start taking bets on who will be the big finale to the “Hey, look, we’re dead!” salute to 2003’s passed-away celebrities…will it be Bob Hope or Katharine Hepburn? I think it’ll be Bob Hope.
By a nose.
Craig Ries wrote:
Atleast it isn’t a billion dollars spent on knowing that the ship sank.
I have heard this silly statement about TITANIC before, and it makes no sense to me. Whatever you think of the movie, isn’t the same basic complaint true about any movie based on a historical event? (Civil War movie: the North won. D-Day movie: The germans got creamed. And so on.)
ROTK will win Best Picture. As well as many other Oscars.
Sean Astin being snubbed is a bunch of crap.
Andy Serkis is the man.
Agreed that either Serkis or Astin deserved some sort of acting nomination for RotK — then again, it’s not like McKellen had any chance of winning for Fellowship, and that was a pretty solid performance as well.
TWL
I don’t know what this means, but, for the first time in my life, I had seen all Best Picture nominees before they were announced. I do think RETURN OF THE KING will take the prize.
As much as I would like to see Bill Murray or Johnny Depp win Best Actor, I’ve got a feeling it’s going to go to Sean Penn. The buzz I’ve heard so far has been for him for two movies, MYSTIC RIVER and 21 GRAMS. I think he’s going to get votes for both movies combined into the one he was nominated for.
I think Best Actress will go to either Diane Keaton or Charlize Theron, with the vote tipping to Theron because (1) comedic performances don’t win that often and (2) Keaton has already won.
Best Supporting categories are always a pain to guess. I would like to see Ken Watanabe win for LAST SAMURAI, but I could see Tim Robbins winning. (Then again, I have my suspicions that Robbins and Ed Harris are the same person, and Harris keeps getting nominated and not winning. Laugh if you must, but just answer this: Have you ever seen Robbins and Harris together at the same time?)
Best Supporting Actress really has me in a quandry. I’ve only seen one of the nominees, Marcia Gay Harden in MYSTIC RIVER. I don’t think she’ll win because she won just two or three years ago. I’m going to take a wild guess and say that Shohreh Aghdashioo will win for HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG, just because her win seems the most unlikely, which is EXACTLY the sort of thing Supporting categories go to.
Besides Sean Astin, I was disappointed to see that Bill Nighy wasn’t nominated for LOVE ACTUALLY — or that his song didn’t make the Best Song nomination. (ButI guess it wouldn’t have qualified anyway.)
Edward Cunninghm please please please tell me that was Sarcasm.
Titanic was Horrible. Technically yes very good. Acting was okay the writing was terrible! which is why it didn’t get nominated for screenplay. It won because it was an epic. It made it’s money because you had teenage girls who couldn’t get enough of DiCaprio.
Cameron did do what people thought was impossible take a movie that was horrendously over budget and make money.
Jackson did something similar he took a set of books that was thought to be unfilmable and yet he did it, and the films were not just successful they were monsters.
I wonder if maybe the acadmey held off on best picture for FotR not because they knew they would give it to RotK but because they wanted to see if he could pull it off. if they gave it to FotR and the sequels pulled a matrix then they have egg on their faces.
JK wrote: Best movie of the year was shut out — Big Fish.
Actually, it wasn’t entirely ignored. Danny Elfman was nominated for Best Score for “Big Fish.”
TITANIC may well have been “horrible,” but that’s not the point.
The point, which I saw people braying long before the movie was even released, was: why would you sit through such a movie when you know that the ship sinks at the end?
I heard this mantra so many times, applied to this one film about a historical event, that I wondered why people would say it about this film and not, let’s say, about any Civil-War film.
Not to mention the fact that we know how MOST films end. Most light romantic comedies WILL end with the guy and girl getting together. Most cop films will end with the cop stopping the bad guy. KILL BILL vol 2 *will* end with Uma killing Bill.
So?
It’s the journey, isn’t it?
Whatever else you think about TITANIC, and I understand you hating it, “three hours learning that the ship sank” is just a dumb comment.
(My own take on TITANIC specifically: the drama and romance are high mediocrity, the recreation of the terror surrounding the sinking of the ship downright magnificent for what there was of it; but though it was made at a time before we knew for certain that the ship had split in two, and therefore did not include that pivotal moment, A NIGHT TO REMEMBER is still a better telling of what actually happened that night. That’s a GREAT film. And it still establishes, dammit, that the ship sank.)
Somebody wrote —
Not to rain on the parade of all the RotK lovers here, but the only time in Oscar history a sequel has ever won Best Picture was in 1974 for the Godfather Part 2.
Uh, there was one other. SILENCE OF THE LAMBS.
Perhaps, but I doubt 80-90% of the Academy had seen or even heard of Manhunter when they were considering Silence of the Lambs. It wasn’t nearly as direct a sequel, having been made by a completely different team of people with a completely different purpose in mind.
Geez, Sting and Randy Newman take the year off and they go into a tizzy.
Actually, Sting is nominated for Best Song, for somthing from “Cold Mountain.” And I can’t wait to see Mike McKean performing at the Oscars, since he’s up with Catherine O’Hara for a song from “Mighty Wind.”
Posted by Joseph J. Finn:
And I can’t wait to see Mike McKean performing at the Oscars, since he’s up with Catherine O’Hara for a song from “Mighty Wind.”
To clarify, it’s Michael McKean and Annette O’Toole that are nominated for having written “A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow” from “A Mighty Wind,” but in the movie, the song was performed by Catherine O’Hara and Eugene Levy.
As someone pointed out above, it’d be very cool to see O’Hara and Levy perform the song on the Oscar telecast in character–and that’s certainly plausible, since it’s not always (often, but not always) the songwriters who do the Oscar performances.
“Titanic” would have been a much better movie if the DiCaprio-Winslet forbidden love angle was written out of the script. It’s a brilliantly executed, well-researched film with incredible attention to detail. The pathos of the film is overwhelming… there are moments in that film that bring me to tears (the big one for most people I know being the musicians playing that final piece as the water comes rushing towards them; whether it actually happened or not it’s just plain moving).
You’ve got a brilliant movie, based off one of the most easily-recognizable incidents in public consciousness, with moving true stories of people who actually existed, and all of it is set aside to tell the humdrum story of two twits in love? Such a monumental waste. I wish they’d do a DVD version of the film with all the DiCaprio-Winslet stuff either excised completely or minimized to the bare bones basics so that people can appreciate the true nature of the tragic events of that night without equating it with some dippy necklace and a Celine Dion song.
tOjb
“To clarify, it’s Michael McKean and Annette O’Toole that are nominated for having written “A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow” from “A Mighty Wind,” but in the movie, the song was performed by Catherine O’Hara and Eugene Levy.”
I hope it wins! Then the WB can have commercials for “Smallville” that boast “Oscar-winner Annette O’Toole” as a cast member.
If memory serves, the folks behind the song get to pick who performs it — that’s how we wound up with Robin Williams performing the song from the South Park movie.
Now for those who haven’t seen the movie: both “Kiss at the End of the Rainbow” and the title song (which was nominated for one of the other awards, I think it was the Globes) are sort of generic-y attempts at real folk songs, well done on their own level but not the sort of thing that really made this satirical movie interesting. The more upbeat “Old Joe’s Place” was more fun to listen to, and in terms of songs that work in the context of the movie, “Never Did No Wanderin'” is brilliant, the funniest thing in an enjoyable movie.
Given the generic love duet romancy-ness of “Kiss at the End of the Rainbow”, and given not only the nature of the film but the particular people involved in it, there is just one band I want to see perform it.
Spinal Tap.
And it isn’t just for the inappropriately hard rock. I want to see Derek Smalls and David St. Hubbins kiss at the end of it.
Well, I’m going to go against everyone’s grain and say that Finding Nemo should have been nominated for — and deserves to win — the Best Picture Oscar.
Why? Because in addition to being well-written, emotionally satisfying, humorous, action-packed, and a visual spectacle, Nemo is the only movie of 2003 that delivers all the goodies and that you can see with the entire family. It deftly manages to please everyone while remaining substantive and memorable, a feat few things in life can accomplish.
This is all just blatant anti-animation bias, I tell you! The clownfish wuz robbed!
You know, if “Silence of the Lambs” had come out one year or later, “Beauty and the Beast” would likely have won the Oscar for best picture, and we wouldn’t have this ‘Best Animated Feature’ dreck. Not that it’s a bad idea to recognize excellent animation, but as I understand it, there’s no possibility of an animated film crossing over to the best picture race the same way a film in the running for best foreign film can cross over to best picture (a la “Life Is Beautiful”). The Academy is just plain warped.
tOjb
BrakYeller writes:
Not that it’s a bad idea to recognize excellent animation, but as I understand it, there’s no possibility of an animated film crossing over to the best picture race the same way a film in the running for best foreign film can cross over to best picture (a la “Life Is Beautiful”).
As I understand it, it’s not that there’s no chance of an animated film getting nominated in the Best Picture category–at least it’s not as if there are rules, regulations, and guidelines that would preclude that from happening. The existence of a “Best Animated Feature” category may well make it unlikely that an animated movie would be nominated in the Best Picture category, but that’s not the same thing as saying that it’s impossible.
Don Swan wrote:
No noms for Comic Book: The Movie?
Say, didn’t someone named Swan, direct Comic Book: The Movie?
But seriously, Don – Comic Book:The Movie was edited and prepared in 2003, but wasn’t released until recently in 2004, to the best of my knowledge. Was there a theatrical limited release of it in 2003? If so, sorry I missed it.
I understand that some of the footage was screened in 2003, but I’m not sure if that counted as a “theatrical release.”
Currently, there is a thoughful review for “Comic Book: The Movie” in comicon.com’s pulse section.
Those who are curious, check it out!