87TH ACADEMY AWARDS CEREMONY DISCUSSION THREAD AAAHHH! | Discuss It Live Here

[BK007]

I think it'd be better and more interesting. Otherwise there seems to be a trend of nominating just the "pretty good".

 

 

Good point.

 

But we all know that if it were down to 3, then those 3 would have been the "pretty good" ones. 

 

I love animation though, so 5 is good for me. I mean, look at the VFX category, that's just blockbusters, which would be around the same number as animated films a year, except animated films also include foreign and indie films and a lot of them at that, which makes up the numbers. The VFX category when expanded would have movies like Maleficent and Earth to Echo or whatever competing. 

 

Besides, for whatever reason, the animation studios tend to put out mostly really good efforts anyway. The ones that are real bad can be seen from a mile away. I'd say that the % of animated films that are good to how many produced is probably a lot greater than live action and that should be rewarded with some recognition, no? They don't actually *have* to make good movies, but most of them do. In live action you get Adam Sandler and Disney live action and some other awful stuff, so as an industry, they do better than their live action counterparts (I mean all movies here, not just family ones). 

[acsc1312]

 

So yeah, Spike Lee shares my thoughts on why Selma was snubbed:

 

“Anyone who thinks this year was gonna be like last year is retarded,” said Lee. “There were a lot of black folks up there with 12 Years a Slave, Steve [McQueen], Lupita [Nyong’o], Pharrell. It’s in cycles of every 10 years. Once every 10 years or so I get calls from journalists about how people are finally accepting black films. Before last year, it was the year [in 2002] with Halle Berry, Denzel [Washington], and Sidney Poitier. It’s a 10-year cycle. So I don’t start doing backflips when it happens.”

 

You gonna mock him too, Chewy?

 

 

And what about 2010? Mo'Nique, Fletcher (first black screenplay winner), Sidibe, Daniels. Give me a break.

[eXtacy]

Birdman 9.5/10

Imitation Game 8.5/10

Theory of Everything 8/10

Grand Budapest Hotel 8/10

American Sniper 5.5/10

 

I have no desire to see Selma or Boyhood, pretty keen to see whiplash

Edited January 18, 2015 by eXtacy

[Michael Gary Scott]

Boyhood-5/5

Imitation Game-4.5/5

Grand Budapest Hotel-4/5

Birdman-4/5

American Sniper-3/5

[The Panda]

Despite all of the controversy of the noms this year, there's a lot of quality, and as long as Boyhood does in fact win, we'll have one of (if not the) best BP picks the academy has done.

[CloneWars]

My ranking of the films in terms of quality (not whether I liked them or not)

 

1. Boyhood (one of the best films ever made. period)

2. Birdman

3. Grand Budapest Hotel

4. Selma

5. American Sniper

6. The Imitation Game

7. The Theory of Everything

8. Whiplash

 

By the way, this is the first year ever where I felt all the nominees were of exceptional quality. I could see 7 of these films winning any other year. Whiplash while strong is the only film I could not see winning BP on an off-year, but it's still a good film.

[Empire]

Here is how I would rank the BP nominees:

1. Whiplash

2. Birdman

3. The Grand Budapest Hotel

4. Boyhood

5. American Sniper

6. Selma

7. The Imitation Game

8. Theory of Everything

The last two, especially ToE, I would rank way below the rest and I would rank Whiplash way above the rest.

[acsc1312]

If boyhood wins, it'll be the best winner since American Beauty, imo.

[CoolioD1]

Erm. If American Beauty is your bar for a quality Best Picture winner, then jeez.

[DAR]

I think Argo was a solid winner even though Django would have been my pick.

And I would have picked Captain Phillips last year

[CloneWars]

I think Argo was a solid winner even though Django would have been my pick.

And I would have picked Captain Phillips last year

Captain Philips felt very average to me. This is the first year I can recall where I felt all 8 nominees are actually really good films.

[Joel M]

1.Boyhood

2.Grand Budapest

3.Whiplash

 

4.Birdman

5.Theory of Everything

6.Imitation Game

 

The first three are all great movies, the other three range from decent to completely forgettable.

 

Haven't seen Sniper and Selma yet. 

[FilmBuff]

I understand that there are going to be people pissed off about some movies not getting nominations and you just cannot make everyone happy. With that said, how the fuck does the Lego Movie get snubbed? Not saying it had to win, but to not even get nominated is fucking stupid.

 

[baumer]

Erm. If American Beauty is your bar for a quality Best Picture winner, then jeez.

 

American Beauty is the best best picture winner perhaps of all time, imo.

[baumer]

And why does anyone listen to Spike Lee?  The way he talks, if a film has black people in it, it should be lauded and lionized.  I don't buy that Selma was snubbed.  Just because it's about MLK and it has a black cast, doesn't make it a great film.

[CoolioD1]

American Beauty is the best best picture winner perhaps of all time, imo.

Oh, that doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

[baumer]

Oh, that doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

 

Yea, but it's not like I have the minority opinion on this.  American Beauty was on a ton of top ten lists that year and it was loved by the audience as well.  You can have your opinion that it's not good.  But it's not like it wasn't lauded when it came out.  To me, it's a movie me and my mom saw together and we both loved it and spoke in length about on the way home.  It's one of the most observant films I've ever seen and I loved it to pieces.

[Ezen Baklattan]

Casablanca is the best. Cliche choice, I know, but god damn I love that movie.

[CoolioD1]

Talking about this in the other thread but Rocky is the best. you can disagree all you want, it's ok, it just means you don't have a soul. it's a perfect mix of 30s capra-esque optimism and the post-vietnam filmmaking aesthetic that dominated the oscars in the 70s.

[MovieMan89]

RotK of course is my pick, and it's so far out in the front the other 85 may as well not exist to me. 

 

Anyways, Bohood seems ridiculously far out in the lead now for BP/BD. Gonna probably be a long boring month while we wait for the inevitable. Although I will say that the Academy likes to throw a major curveball at least once a decade where they don't award the odds on favorite or a very close competitor. It's been since Crash since that happened, so maybe we are finally due again for a BP upset?