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2018-08-08, 02:41 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2009
New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
So apparently a new category is being added to the Oscars: Outstanding achievement in popular film. Based on analysis, this is apparently the category for the blockbuster films, and other genres that don't normally get Oscar nods (horror, etc.).
Have to agree with the writer of this story... This seems like a way for the Oscar committee to keep popular blockbuster films out of the Best Picture category.
Thoughts?"That's a horrible idea! What time?"
T-Shirt given to me by a good friend.. "in fairness, I was unsupervised at the time".
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2018-08-08, 02:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Feb 2013
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
When was the last time a blockbuster was nominated for Best Picture? I honestly can't remember if it's happened since Return of the King.
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2018-08-08, 03:00 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2012
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
That seems fairly condescending.
I suppose its intent is to make the Oscars more popular by having a category which regular movie-goers can be invested in. It's like having a new Olympic event for out-of-shape people because athletes are hard to relate to though.Last edited by Kitten Champion; 2018-08-08 at 03:00 PM.
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2018-08-08, 03:02 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Feb 2013
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Well, if the ratings trend continues they can just cancel the big ceremony in a few years and hand out the awards in a conference room in the local Hilton, with a press release most people will ignore as clickbait.
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2018-08-08, 03:08 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2006
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- Germany
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
I don't really see it.
While essentially creating an 'audience award' seems superfluous, I don't understand the reasoning of this being made to keep popular films out of the 'Best picture' category, where only 'artsy' stuff is allowed. I mean, looking at 'Best Picture' since 1990, most of those were won by widely popular, commercially succesfull movies from all kinds of genres.
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2018-08-08, 03:23 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2012
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
I haven't watched the Oscars in years - so whatever - but who cares? Like, lots of organizations have internal recognition rewards without it being a bloated international media event.
Granted, it's still a useful PR exercise for Hollywood - which still needs it as much as it did with the Fatty Arbuckle scandal apparently - but there's just so much media in general now that it's impossible to satisfy such a fragmented audience. Particularly when politics show up.Last edited by Kitten Champion; 2018-08-08 at 03:23 PM.
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2018-08-08, 03:29 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2009
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
"That's a horrible idea! What time?"
T-Shirt given to me by a good friend.. "in fairness, I was unsupervised at the time".
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2018-08-08, 03:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2006
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- Germany
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
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2018-08-08, 04:11 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2012
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- Ottawa, Canada
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
The Martian, in 2015 ($228 million domestic). American Sniper, in 2014 ($350 million domestic). Gravity, in 2013 ($274 million domestic).
In 2010, Toy Story 3 ($415 million - the highest-grossing film of that year) and Inception ($293 million domestic).
And in 2009, one of the biggest blockbusters of all time, Avatar ($750 million domestic).
It's relatively common.Last edited by LadyEowyn; 2018-08-08 at 04:18 PM.
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2018-08-08, 04:15 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2015
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
That is an extremely clickbaity thread title.
And I’m not much of a movie person, so that’s all I have to say about this.Last edited by rooster707; 2018-08-08 at 04:18 PM.
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2018-08-08, 04:17 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2007
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
I'm in favour of it, if they rename "Best Picture" to "Outstanding achievement in pretentious film" at the same time.
GWInterested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
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2018-08-08, 05:52 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2009
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
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2018-08-08, 06:54 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Jul 2015
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
I think the story of how this category unfolds will depend on how the Academy defines eligibility. Presumably 'popular' has something to do with commercial performance, so you could group the pool out of box office results (domestic only one imagines, since this is an American award). A possible choice is requiring that a 'popular' film make a minimum of $100 million dollars at the domestic box office, but that will still bar certain films. For instance, in 2017, that would leave out John Wick: Chapter Two ($92 million). There were also only 33 films total that managed to make that much and it is difficult for even high-end horror films to crack that barrier. If you limited candidacy to the top 25 or 30 films of the year that's particularly restrictive, but will still allow the academy to snub blockbusters.
For example, if you had to pick five nominees for this category out of the top twenty-five of 2017 you'd probably get:
1. Wonder Woman
2. It
3. Thor: Ragnarok
4. Logan
5. Dunkirk
Which, actually, isn't nearly as bad as I thought, and Dunkirk is the only double-counted one. Logan would probably win, and I think most of us would be fine with that.
Doing the same thing for 2016 is...less promising:
1. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
2. Finding Dory
3. Hidden Figures
4. Deadpool
5. Moana
2016 had a large number of high-grossing animated films with four in the top ten (amazingly Sing was the #10 movie of 2016) and a stunning 7 in the top 25 that distorts the pool. Deadpool probably deserves to win this one, but I struggle to imagine the Academy being that brave.
Let's go for three and do 2015.
1. Star Wars: The Force Awakens
2. Inside Out
3. The Martian
4. The Revenant
5. Mad Max: Fury Road
That's even worse. With the exception of TFA - which only makes it do to its juggernaut status, all four of the others were nominated in other categories anyway. Mad Max would win, but this definitely supports the thesis that films like that would be hurt by this category. Mad Max: Fury Road was honored far better by receiving an actual Best Picture nomination than it would be by winning this category.
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2018-08-08, 07:40 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2007
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- UTC -6
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
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2018-08-08, 08:38 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2009
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
"That's a horrible idea! What time?"
T-Shirt given to me by a good friend.. "in fairness, I was unsupervised at the time".
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2018-08-08, 10:21 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2013
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Maybe they want to distinguish between entertainment and art. I hope you'd all know what this means.
I can only really speak for things I've seen and I won't bother trying to compare nominees to one another, so considering that for my example...
Something like Jurassic Park and Requiem For A Dream are really two completely different types of movie. It takes skill to make a movie fun, but it also takes skill to give the movie an impact that lasts longer than it takes to eat all the popcorn.
Maybe there's some confusion or dissatisfaction from their general audiences for that event from people who enjoy one of those categories of movies, but not the other?I write a horror blog in my spare time.
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2018-08-08, 10:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Back in the early 2000's, after they snubbed Beauty And The Beast an Lion King for best picture, they created Best Animated Movie. Since then we've seen hugh numbers of animated movies get snubbed cause they now all have to compete in this one category, and were put there by the admission of the academy voters cause they don't watch cartoons. (That's a quite from one of them the year The Boss Baby got a nomination.)
This is them repeating that. At last, they can ignore the movies people actually got to see by ghettoing them into this one category."I Burn!"
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2018-08-08, 11:16 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Jul 2015
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Huzzah now I can rest in peace knowing that fantasy, scifi, and innovate genre fiction will be pigeonholed in this dungeon for the foreseeable future.
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2018-08-09, 02:47 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Until 2016, the AMPAS (the committee who votes for the Oscar winners) was something like an average age of 63, 76% male, 94% white and overwhelmingly US citizens. There was a particularly high-profile protest by people such as Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith who boycotted the ceremony that year, and the AMPAS were forced to take on a large number of new, more diverse members - they're now something like 40% female and 13% PoC.
As such, I can't help but feel that this new proposal is just a a snobbish way of the old guard trying to maintain their control over what they see as being the "rightful" winners, giving them an excuse to dismiss popular films compared to "worthy" offerings for the Best Picture award by 'hiding' them in a new category. It's segregation, of a kind - an "the same but not equal" mentality.
So I think that it just proves that we ought to remember more keenly: The AMPAS is a private committee of self-appointed judges who have no formal authority and any prestige they have is entirely illusionary. While I'm sure that winning any award is nice for a film maker, the Oscars represent no one but themselves and their own private opinions - they've never meant to reflect public preference.Last edited by Wraith; 2018-08-09 at 02:48 AM.
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2018-08-09, 02:58 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Jan 2007
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2018-08-09, 03:02 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Sep 2014
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2018-08-09, 07:00 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2010
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
The only reason any blockbusters are nominated for best picture nowadays is because they doubled the number of nominees for best picture in 2009 to specifically allow nominating “popular” movies (to get viewers) with no intention of having them win.
Might as well call a spade a spade and make a specific category instead.
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2018-08-09, 08:30 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2009
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2018-08-09, 09:42 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Nov 2009
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
I have a counterproposal: an Oscar for movies about making movies. Let's be honest, you know that they aren't judged fairly. People in the commission see themselves in the characters and then go all like “oh this film is so deep, it really touches the viewer” and don't understand that it only works like that on people in their field of work.
Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien, 1955
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2018-08-09, 10:21 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2007
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Further refinement:
In addition to those two categories, and the existing Best animated feature and Best Short, add maybe one or two other categories to cover all major approaches to film, and have Best Picture be voted only from the winners of those categories. The voting to be done by the attending public to the event at the time and/or the viewers via text message.
Grey WolfInterested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
Deep in the corners of your mind
Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est
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2018-08-09, 10:30 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2013
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
“Evil is evil. Lesser, greater, middling, it's all the same. Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred. I'm not a pious hermit, I haven't done only good in my life. But if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all.”
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2018-08-09, 10:36 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
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2018-08-09, 10:38 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2007
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
Oh, no, no, I wouldn't dare make such pronouncement. They are most certainly the most qualified for the Outstanding Achievement in Pretentious Film. And I will defend their right to believe that such award is the most important one in the ceremony. To their faces, anyway.
(I would pick a non-sarcastic bone with the idea that a popular vote is an objective standard, though)
Grey WolfInterested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
Deep in the corners of your mind
Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
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2018-08-09, 10:53 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2013
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Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
“Evil is evil. Lesser, greater, middling, it's all the same. Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred. I'm not a pious hermit, I haven't done only good in my life. But if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all.”
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2018-08-09, 11:13 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Oct 2009
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- In my library
Re: New Oscar category will actually HURT popular films?
This isn't actually a terrible idea.
Honestly, I'm surprised that they didn't call the category 'Best Genre Film'. Because I suspect that's part of the intent, get these silly genre films out of the running so that they can concentrate on the cinema....litera....'proper' films. Although I suppose that doesn't get the modern day bang bang films out as well.