Luke
stu-kicks
CibbuanoThe Oscars - Director and Best Film stats
February 16th 2007 10:34
Well, only nine days or so to go to the Oscars now, and yes I am very obsessed, we've been over this before. Just a quick look at the last remaining big nominees... you can read my articles on the Actor nominees here and the Actress nominees here, but today we will looking at the director and best film nominations...
BEST DIRECTOR
If there was any justice in this world, then the winner of this category would be very clear. Unfortunately, we've been burnt in the past on this one and sometimes the Academy never gets it right.
Martin Scorsese has to win. He has to! If he doesn't then the Academy are going to look like a laughing stock, and history will scoff rather unfavourably at them. The way it does when it looks at the 1980 Oscars and sees that Robert Redford's 'Ordinary People' beat out 'Raging Bull'. The only thing more laughable than Scorsese not winning for 'Raging Bull' is the fact that he didn't even get nominated for Best Director for 'Taxi Driver'. Ooooo, it makes my blood boil! Scorsese has been nominated for Best Director five times prior to this... twice in the 80s for 'Raging Bull' and 'The Last Temptation of Christ', once in the 90s for 'Goodfellas' (which, in a vote that perhaps reflected the average member age and traditionalist slant of the Academy, lost out to 'Dances with Wolves'), and twice more in recent years for 'The Gangs of New York' and 'The Aviator' - films that represented a return to form for Scorsese and gave the Academy a chance to re-nominate him, perhaps in the hope of redressing the balance.
The other big contender this year is Clint Eastwood, who has won two Best Director Oscars in his time - 'Unforgiven' and 'Million Dollar Baby', and was also nominated for 'Mystic River'. Eastwood has gone on record saying that it should be Scorsese's year, which hopefully should sway a few votes towards 'The Departed'... past examples of nominees graciously stepping aside include Jack Nicholson's championing of Adrian Brody's performance in 'The Pianist' (Nicholson was nominated that year for 'About Schmidt', and already had three Oscars to his name) and Jude Law's public urge for Academy members to vote for Sean Penn (who subsequently won for 'Mystic River'... Law was nominated that year for 'Cold Mountan'). Even if Eastwood hadn't've said this I'd like to think Scorsese might still've won, but you can't tell these things - Eastwood is very much a hot property director for traditionalist Academy members.
The other three nominees are somewhat smaller fry... Paul Greengrass and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu are both nominated for the first time, and probably have little chance of winning, Greengrass' patriotic efforts notwithstanding. And Stephen Frears is nominated for the second time, having previously been nominated for 'The Grifters' back in 1990. It's unlikely he'll get it either... all three of these directors are kind of dwarfed by the two giants in the category.
BEST FILM
The big upset of this category was the snubbing of 'Dreamgirls'... a lot of people expected it to get a Best Film nomination, but alas - there are only so many films that can be nominated. Little Miss Sunshine is easily the dark horse of the category, the film least expected to win, and one that I would love to see take out the top prize just for being so sheerly unpretentious. Unfortunately a lot of people probably see it's nomination as award enough.
If Scorsese gets his Best Director Oscar then it's most likely that The Departed will win Best Film as well, usually the director and best picture prizes go hand in hand. One possible outcome though is that if Scorsese is given the Best Director prize the Academy might split it's votes between that and Letters from Iwo Jima for Best Film. It's worth reminding ourselves how enamoured with Clint Eastwood the Academy and critics have been of late, they might just vote 'Letters from Iwo Jima' for best film as a consolation prize to Eastwood for losing the Best Director Oscar to Scorsese.
Just a brief aside here... why is 'Letters from Iwo Jima' even in the Best Film category? Shouldn't it be in the Best Foreign Language Film category? It's all in Japanese, and features an all-Japanese cast. Just because it's American-financed and directed by Eastwood doesn't mean it should be singled out for a Best Film nomination. I know there have been other precedents (EG. 'Life is Beautiful'), but still... how does the Academy draw the line on these things? Isn't it a little arrogant and Americentic to imply that 99% of Foreign Language films aren't eligible for the Best Film category simply because they're not good enough? That a foreign language film has to be either about the holocaust or filmed by Clint Eastwood to be considered for Best Film is more than a little insulting to a world of filmmakers.
Anyway, the other two nominated films are The Queen and Babel. A lot of people (including the media) have been touting 'Babel' as this year's 'Crash' (and 'Crash' was last year's 'Traffic', remember?). I think for this reason alone it won't win, a lot of people will consider it old hat as a result of it's connection to these previous films (even though it isn't a jot like them). I hope it doesn't win anyway, I didn't really dig it. 'The Queen' has slim chance of winning too, despite being an excellent film, mainly owing to the fact that it's not an American film (Hollywood has been rather sensitive about non-American films being nominated lately) and the fact that Helen Mirren will probably win Best Actress, which will probably be viewed by most as award enough for the film overall.
Martin Scorsese
BEST DIRECTOR
If there was any justice in this world, then the winner of this category would be very clear. Unfortunately, we've been burnt in the past on this one and sometimes the Academy never gets it right.
Martin Scorsese has to win. He has to! If he doesn't then the Academy are going to look like a laughing stock, and history will scoff rather unfavourably at them. The way it does when it looks at the 1980 Oscars and sees that Robert Redford's 'Ordinary People' beat out 'Raging Bull'. The only thing more laughable than Scorsese not winning for 'Raging Bull' is the fact that he didn't even get nominated for Best Director for 'Taxi Driver'. Ooooo, it makes my blood boil! Scorsese has been nominated for Best Director five times prior to this... twice in the 80s for 'Raging Bull' and 'The Last Temptation of Christ', once in the 90s for 'Goodfellas' (which, in a vote that perhaps reflected the average member age and traditionalist slant of the Academy, lost out to 'Dances with Wolves'), and twice more in recent years for 'The Gangs of New York' and 'The Aviator' - films that represented a return to form for Scorsese and gave the Academy a chance to re-nominate him, perhaps in the hope of redressing the balance.
The other big contender this year is Clint Eastwood, who has won two Best Director Oscars in his time - 'Unforgiven' and 'Million Dollar Baby', and was also nominated for 'Mystic River'. Eastwood has gone on record saying that it should be Scorsese's year, which hopefully should sway a few votes towards 'The Departed'... past examples of nominees graciously stepping aside include Jack Nicholson's championing of Adrian Brody's performance in 'The Pianist' (Nicholson was nominated that year for 'About Schmidt', and already had three Oscars to his name) and Jude Law's public urge for Academy members to vote for Sean Penn (who subsequently won for 'Mystic River'... Law was nominated that year for 'Cold Mountan'). Even if Eastwood hadn't've said this I'd like to think Scorsese might still've won, but you can't tell these things - Eastwood is very much a hot property director for traditionalist Academy members.
The other three nominees are somewhat smaller fry... Paul Greengrass and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu are both nominated for the first time, and probably have little chance of winning, Greengrass' patriotic efforts notwithstanding. And Stephen Frears is nominated for the second time, having previously been nominated for 'The Grifters' back in 1990. It's unlikely he'll get it either... all three of these directors are kind of dwarfed by the two giants in the category.
BEST FILM
The big upset of this category was the snubbing of 'Dreamgirls'... a lot of people expected it to get a Best Film nomination, but alas - there are only so many films that can be nominated. Little Miss Sunshine is easily the dark horse of the category, the film least expected to win, and one that I would love to see take out the top prize just for being so sheerly unpretentious. Unfortunately a lot of people probably see it's nomination as award enough.
If Scorsese gets his Best Director Oscar then it's most likely that The Departed will win Best Film as well, usually the director and best picture prizes go hand in hand. One possible outcome though is that if Scorsese is given the Best Director prize the Academy might split it's votes between that and Letters from Iwo Jima for Best Film. It's worth reminding ourselves how enamoured with Clint Eastwood the Academy and critics have been of late, they might just vote 'Letters from Iwo Jima' for best film as a consolation prize to Eastwood for losing the Best Director Oscar to Scorsese.
Just a brief aside here... why is 'Letters from Iwo Jima' even in the Best Film category? Shouldn't it be in the Best Foreign Language Film category? It's all in Japanese, and features an all-Japanese cast. Just because it's American-financed and directed by Eastwood doesn't mean it should be singled out for a Best Film nomination. I know there have been other precedents (EG. 'Life is Beautiful'), but still... how does the Academy draw the line on these things? Isn't it a little arrogant and Americentic to imply that 99% of Foreign Language films aren't eligible for the Best Film category simply because they're not good enough? That a foreign language film has to be either about the holocaust or filmed by Clint Eastwood to be considered for Best Film is more than a little insulting to a world of filmmakers.
Anyway, the other two nominated films are The Queen and Babel. A lot of people (including the media) have been touting 'Babel' as this year's 'Crash' (and 'Crash' was last year's 'Traffic', remember?). I think for this reason alone it won't win, a lot of people will consider it old hat as a result of it's connection to these previous films (even though it isn't a jot like them). I hope it doesn't win anyway, I didn't really dig it. 'The Queen' has slim chance of winning too, despite being an excellent film, mainly owing to the fact that it's not an American film (Hollywood has been rather sensitive about non-American films being nominated lately) and the fact that Helen Mirren will probably win Best Actress, which will probably be viewed by most as award enough for the film overall.
| 70 |
| Vote |
subscribe to this blog
Comment by Stanley
Comment by Luke
Old Movies
Cane Toad Warrior