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Montgomery 
"F**k!"
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 Posted - 01/22/2007 : 17:00:57
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quote:
Originally posted by duh
Another actor who is underappreciated is Dennis Quaid. I heard that he deserved an Oscar for his role in "Far From Heaven" but I haven't seen that one. I think his work in Savior was definitely Oscar-calibre.
Dennis Quaid.  I enjoy anything he's in.
EM :) |
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w22dheartlivie
"Kitty Lover"
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Posted - 01/22/2007 : 17:05:50
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quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
Dennis Quaid. I enjoy anything he's in.
EM :)
Yes, I should add him to the list of actors whose films I always try to catch. Ever since Caveman (slinks and hides). |
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Montgomery
"F**k!"
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Posted - 01/22/2007 : 17:39:42
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quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
Dennis Quaid. I enjoy anything he's in.
EM :)
Yes, I should add him to the list of actors whose films I always try to catch. Ever since Caveman (slinks and hides).
Didn't see Caveman, now I'll have to rent it (also slinks and hides).
What about Suspect? With Cher. He's very cute in that, and The Big Easy. I guess I should have listed that one first.
EM :) |
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randall 
"I like to watch."
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Posted - 01/22/2007 : 19:29:44
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quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
quote:
Originally posted by Randall
How could AROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS or THE DEER HUNTER have been thought to be Best Picture?
I'm going to try and not sound too ignorant on this, but forgive me if I do. I think what quality one attributes to The Deer Hunter depends a lot on your generation and feelings regarding the Vietnam War. It was one of the very first post-war films that dealt directly with the effects of the war on the characters as more than just as a subplot device. To me, it was a gutwrenchingly realistic view of the effects that the horrors of that war had on its veterans, and how dehumanizing the experience was. I know or knew quite a few Vietnam vets, many of whom were just as screwed up as the ones depicted in Deer Hunter. Some of them never recovered. One committed suicide in a parking lot a few short years after coming home. Another spent the next 15 years trying to kick his drug habits. At the time, people seemed to see all this distantly and detached, putting it down to weakness. Yet both of those men were neither weak nor defective. Only ruined by what they saw. Films like The Deer Hunter and Coming Home and a handful of others began to open the door to understanding what it was like and for many, marked a turning point from lambasting the veterans for doing what was required of them and understanding what that meant.
I watched Deer Hunter on cable in about 1983, with a few friends. It so deeply tore us that we didn't talk about it for days. Then one night as we gathered for our Saturday night drafts at a pub across the Ohio line that served 3.2 beer to 18 year olds, one friend said "Now I know why Kimmy did that." I avoided it like the plague for the next 25 years. Last summer, it ran on AMC and I hesitantly watched it again. Christopher Walken still chilled me, John Savage broke my heart, De Niro was still so solid, Meryl Streep still had that georgous loving and hopeful glow, and John Cazale... well, God bless him. It was a fascinating study of how that war affected a group of friends in a small town, and rang close to home for a lot of people.
You don't sound ignorant at all, and I hear you loud and clear. Please consider what I say when I try to separate THE DEER HUNTER's subject matter from its craftsmanship as a motion picture.
Yes, it was one of the first Viet-vet ruminations, and not only is war hell, it's especially hell when you get the feeling the country didn't support what you did. [Aside from a few left-wing kooks, I believe this country has always been able to hate the war while loving the warriors. But a few Vietnam vets caught a different vibe upon returning, to our eternal shame.] These characters' Vietnam experience really changed them. However...
...we didn't see any of that experience except for a crude Russian roulette metaphor which almost surely did not really happen in Vietnam. Nobody since has ever reported this particular kind of torture being used on Americans. [Certainly there were other kinds, even more venal, but remember that we're talking now about one specific movie.]
...we saw plenty of cruelty in the first deer hunting sequence. Not violence, but still cruelty. These men were not angels, not even before they went to Vietnam, so their character arcs are far from white to black. And what exactly constitutes nobility on a deer hunt? I never felt that I got a straight answer, so the meaning of the second central metaphor eludes me. Once again: I know war is bad. We're not talking about that. We're talking about one movie in particular.
THE DEER HUNTER is at least an hour too long, including a protracted wedding and reception that does absolutely zip to advance the plot, except for a brief, profane interlude with a returning Special Forces veteran at the bar. Watch HEAVEN'S GATE to see Cimino do it again!
Finally, to hand Best Picture and Best Director to THE DEER HUNTER in a year when a far stronger movie on the same subject, COMING HOME, was also nominated, strikes me as an injustice. DEER HUNTER is beautifully acted, shot and cut. So is COMING HOME. [So is MIDNIGHT EXPRESS, another failed nominee.]
THE DEER HUNTER is powerful. It's also deeply flawed. IMHO it did not deserve the Best Picture award. |
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Sean 
"Necrosphenisciform anthropophagist."
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Posted - 01/22/2007 : 23:05:39
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quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
The second question is easy -- Cate Blanchett for Elizabeth. She was spectacular.
You won't get any argument from me on that one. She was also deserving. But they can't all win.  |
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Sean
"Necrosphenisciform anthropophagist."
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Posted - 01/22/2007 : 23:43:10
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quote:
Originally posted by Randall
THE DEER HUNTER is powerful. It's also deeply flawed. IMHO it did not deserve the Best Picture award.
It's quite likely that some Academy voters vote on their emotional reaction to a movie rather than an academic analysis of it's positive points relative to it's flaws. In my view that's a fair way to rate a movie.
This movie was supposed to punch people in the face, and it did just that. Also, one could argue that those in the USA who were less than sympathetic to the returning soldiers (as you mentioned) needed to be punched in the face, and subsequent to a viewing would have a better understanding of the plight of returning soldiers (as wildhartlivie suggested was the case), become more sympathetic and see them all as victims. Movies like Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now - even though they are quite fictional and unrealistic in plot - IMO do a lot more to help the non-participants in a war understand why their returning soldiers are unable to act like normal human beings again and come home as "damaged goods" than do movies like Platoon or Saving Private Ryan.
So I believe Deer Hunter was judged on it's relevance at the time (and it's still very relevant), it's punch-in-the-head emotional impact, and it's usefulness as a social tool in helping the masses understand the plight of soldiers returning from any war. Next to this the flaws in the movie such as the boring wedding scene pale into insignificance and were quite rightly ignored by the Academy. In my view it's a great movie and the Oscar went to the right place. |
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ChocolateLady
"500 Chocolate Delights"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 06:13:51
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quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
Dennis Quaid. I enjoy anything he's in.
EM :)
Yes, I should add him to the list of actors whose films I always try to catch. Ever since Caveman (slinks and hides).
Didn't see Caveman, now I'll have to rent it (also slinks and hides).
What about Suspect? With Cher. He's very cute in that, and The Big Easy. I guess I should have listed that one first.
EM :)
Okay, ladies - stop drooling! See him in whatever you wish, but don't bother watching his version of Yours, Mine & Ours. The original is far better with Henry Fonda and Lucy Ball.
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w22dheartlivie
"Kitty Lover"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 08:11:05
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quote:
Originally posted by Se�n
So I believe Deer Hunter was judged on it's relevance at the time (and it's still very relevant), it's punch-in-the-head emotional impact, and it's usefulness as a social tool in helping the masses understand the plight of soldiers returning from any war. Next to this the flaws in the movie such as the boring wedding scene pale into insignificance and were quite rightly ignored by the Academy. In my view it's a great movie and the Oscar went to the right place.
That's what I was trying to say. Jon Voight rightly won best actor that year, and Jane Fonda may have deserved it. Part of me thinks that it was Hollywood's way of telling Jane she was okay even if the world hated her politics. |
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BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 11:00:18
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quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
[quote]
Part of me thinks that it was Hollywood's way of telling Jane she was okay even if the world hated her politics.
The world? Your world maybe!    
and now she advertises anti-ageing cream. Go figure!
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Edited by - BaftaBaby on 01/23/2007 11:00:50 |
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w22dheartlivie
"Kitty Lover"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 11:20:46
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quote:
Originally posted by BaftaBabe
quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
[quote]
Part of me thinks that it was Hollywood's way of telling Jane she was okay even if the world hated her politics.
The world? Your world maybe!
and now she advertises anti-ageing cream. Go figure!
Hey now, I wasn't old enough to have an opinion of Hanoi Jane, except that I didn't understand what was wrong with her speaking out. I much prefer the anti-age creams to the Jane Fonda workouts and watching her sleep on ex-husband Ted Turner's shoulder at Atlanta Braves games. |
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ChocolateLady
"500 Chocolate Delights"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 12:52:08
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quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
Hey now, I wasn't old enough to have an opinion of Hanoi Jane, except that I didn't understand what was wrong with her speaking out. I much prefer the anti-age creams to the Jane Fonda workouts and watching her sleep on ex-husband Ted Turner's shoulder at Atlanta Braves games.
The only thing that turned me off about Jane was those workout tapes. But she does deserve credit for building the bandwagon that so many jumped onto after her.
But back on topic - certainly Traffic was a far better film than Gladiator?
(Okay, so I think any film that year deserved the Oscar that year more than Gladiator - even How the Grinch Stole Christmas was better than Gladiator.)
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Cheese_Ed 
"The Provolone Ranger"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 14:14:26
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quote:
Originally posted by ChocolateLady
quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
Hey now, I wasn't old enough to have an opinion of Hanoi Jane, except that I didn't understand what was wrong with her speaking out. I much prefer the anti-age creams to the Jane Fonda workouts and watching her sleep on ex-husband Ted Turner's shoulder at Atlanta Braves games.
The only thing that turned me off about Jane was those workout tapes. But she does deserve credit for building the bandwagon that so many jumped onto after her.
But back on topic - certainly Traffic was a far better film than Gladiator?
(Okay, so I think any film that year deserved the Oscar that year more than Gladiator - even How the Grinch Stole Christmas was better than Gladiator.)
Cheers to that! |
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Montgomery
"F**k!"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 16:08:06
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quote:
Originally posted by Se�n
quote:
Originally posted by Montgomery
The second question is easy -- Cate Blanchett for Elizabeth. She was spectacular.
You won't get any argument from me on that one. She was also deserving. But they can't all win.
No, they can't all win. But she should have and Gwyneth shouldn't have. The roles are just not even comparable. The performances. Cate's was incredible. Gwyneth's was adequate. Just look at the work they've done since then to tell which of them is a true actress and which is just a pretty girl who can act okay. I'm not trying to dump on Gwyneth. Like I said, I enjoyed her in Emma. She is okay on the screen. I don't cringe. But Cate is something to watch in almost every movie she's in. She was just great in Notes on a Scandal.
And she deserved the Oscar for Elizabeth.
Shakespeare was a more popular film that year. I think that's what tipped it in Gwyneth's favor. But, I think it's an outright shame!
EM :)
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Montgomery
"F**k!"
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Posted - 01/23/2007 : 16:16:26
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quote:
Originally posted by ChocolateLady
quote:
Originally posted by wildhartlivie
Hey now, I wasn't old enough to have an opinion of Hanoi Jane, except that I didn't understand what was wrong with her speaking out. I much prefer the anti-age creams to the Jane Fonda workouts and watching her sleep on ex-husband Ted Turner's shoulder at Atlanta Braves games.
The only thing that turned me off about Jane was those workout tapes. But she does deserve credit for building the bandwagon that so many jumped onto after her.
But back on topic - certainly Traffic was a far better film than Gladiator?
(Okay, so I think any film that year deserved the Oscar that year more than Gladiator - even How the Grinch Stole Christmas was better than Gladiator.)
Gladiator was one of those big Hollywood production movies that gets a lot of attention. But, there is no comparison -- Traffic was way better. Good call!
Earlier in this thread someone wrote that Russell Crowe should have won for his role in Beautiful Mind. The real snub for him was his role in The Insider. That was great. And, I don't believe he even got nominated. Too much of a bad boy at that time.
EM :) |
Edited by - Montgomery on 01/23/2007 18:18:17 |
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Sal[Au]pian
"Four ever European"
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Posted - 01/25/2007 : 10:31:25
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Philip Seymour Hoffman should definitely not have won Best Actor last year. Toby Jones has shown that portraying Truman Capote excellently is not such a unique feat. (As I said last year, copying a real person is not as hard as making a fictional person seem that real.) Heath Ledger should certainly have won instead.
Shouldn't this thread be in Film Related/General? |
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Topic |
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Oscar Winners who shouldn't have.
