Dude they actually did that thing with Heath Ledger's corpse? I thought was a joke. Gross!
Pacing! Also, Oscars? That's a hamburger place on Milvia, isn't it?
Penelope Cruz managed to look innocuous and soccer-mommish. Why bother? Also, if she'd married Tom Cruise they could have hyphenated as Cruz-Cruise.
Somebody's long series of "thank yous" sounded like a long series of "fuck yous". Foreigners!
I don't want to watch, but want to know what's being referred to, so I looked for someone liveblogging... and spent five minutes reading before I realized it was about the 2006 Oscars. Shows how up with the times I am.
Penelope Cruz is wearing 60 year old Balmain = gorgeous. Also, Hugh Jackman's weirdo intro thing was hilarious.
Wait, so Wall-E really isn't up for Best Picture? (I haven't been paying attention.) Does that mean Hollywood is afraid of robots taking over their jobs?
Close up on Angelina whilst Jennifer presents. Nice, Oscars!
As I mentioned last year, at the Oscars you are reminded how much actors rely on scriptwriters.
I've never though of it this way before, but in addition to most film characters being unrealistically good looking (or bad-looking, if they're meant to be), most of the dialogue is also unrealistically interesting.
I'm not exactly asking for realism. Maybe just warning labels: Do Not Expect Real People To Be As Good-Looking and Interesting As These Actors.
Or maybe an unreal world could be invented and labeled, a world exactly like ours except that everyone is attractive, no dialogue is boring, and murders and disasters happen a lot more often. There could be a sort of Planet Krypton myth about it.
Somebody was asking about a liveblog?
Blume and I both noticed, whilst watching the ending credits of Milk, that a surprising proportion of the actors in that movie were actually less attractive than the real people they portrayed.
If Benjamin Button wins for Best Pic we get to burn shit down, right?
Haha, Mr Animated Short Japanese Guy!
(Haha confusing modifiers!)
14: life is like a box of fiery chocolates of disappointment.
16: Right, we're safe due to Double Jeopardy. I'll take bloated heartstring pullers with cinematic tricks for several hundred million, Alex.
They're going to give supporting actor to Heath Ledger and make it totally mawkish and embarrassing, aren't they?
Somewhere around here I've got a picture of me posing with one of Erich Korngold's Oscars. Those things are really frigging heavy.
Somebody was asking about a liveblog?
the first word i read opening the link is something 'a parade of facelifts', then i closed it
don't people like just see happy people, i like to watch it so far
19 nah those are the old-timey oscars. The new ones are chocolate inside.
22 makes me sad that Bruce Vilanch has sunk to writing people's unfogged jokes.
While watching the Bugs Bunny cartoon Rhapsody Rabbit, Korngold fell out of his chair laughing at the gags portrayed in the cartoon.True!
"You look like you work at a Chasidic meth lab." Funny!
19: When did people like Erich Korngold and Bernard Herrmann all get replaced by John Williams?
22: That would be an improvement on the ceremony. Winners would accept, unwrap and eat right there on stage, nom nom nom. No speeches or anything. Next!
oudemia's comments are, like, 20 minutes time-delayed!
13: Oh, screw you, Sifu and Blume. I'm not interested in the gay alternate universe where everyone is better looking than everyone else. It's against God and Reason! And please quit obstructing my repetitions of my old jokes.
I like to fastforward through commercials!
Spielzeugland: that hard to pronounce?
Randy Newman's whole family was Hollywood composers. However, they weren't the ones who migrated here from Austria and Germany. They were homegrown American Jews.
33: I would prefer scores composed by zombie Erich Korngold to John Williams.
My grandfather's cousin was a Hollywood composer. He got blacklisted and everything.
I have to say that these Oscars do suck, but they're not doing anything to dampen my crush on Hugh Jackman.
Blume needs to coach James Franco (on pronunciation).
Maybe she could also teach him to act?
The grandfather of one of my son's friends retired from the Cleveland Philharmonic and went to Hollywood to play film music. He doubled his income, or better, while doing what was, by his standards, nothing more than showing up. None of that stuff about wondering whether you'll be able to handle that tough passage in bar 38 of the second movement. No practicing.
40: Shh, my love for him is pure and unsullied by anything resembling lust.
43: if only he'd hung on for another forty or so years he could have moved to Miami.
36 gets it exactly right. Williams stole liberally from Korngold and others, though, so in a sense, when you hear the Star Wars theme, you are hearing zombie Korngold.
I think John Williams was eminently well-suited for the medium and y'all are just cranky poopyheads. (A good bit less of him would have worked just fine, however.)
38: You should go to graduate school in history, write a dissertation about him, and then get tortured by a former Nazi turned dentist.
47: The inspiration for/source of the main theme is from Korngold's score for King's Row.
Then there are the bits that sound just like Stravinsky.
Um, yes. Blume can tutor me and James Franco at the same time. I will not complain.
55: I will let her know. She will expect a tenure review in due time, of course.
With regards to Ben Stiller's Joaquin Phoenix parody, I gather that folks still don't think Phoenix was having a laugh at Letterman's expense. I'm convinced he was funnin' Letterman.
59: He may have been. But I think James Wolcott got it somewhat right: Look, whether it was an Andy Kaufmanish put-on or not is largely irrelevant--Joaquin Phoenix's Vincent Gallo-gone-to-seed appearance on David Letterman was a crappy, unprofessional stunt for a serious, gifted actor to pull when he has such a creditable film to promote.
I'm writing a screenplay called The Curious Case of Benjamin Britten.
I'm writing a novel called Death Cab for the Archbishop.
Lou Holtz got nominated for something?
max
['Cool.']
60: Yeah, I don't buy that professionalism stuff. Having been deemed both serious and gifted, fuck it, go nuts. Do what you want. Put a fucking bucket on your head and eat scorpions on live TV. Just because you can.
I endorse such behavior.
Anyhow, word is, he's filming some documentary and that act was part of it. I say that's slightly less cool. (But still okay because he had a laugh at Letterman's expense.)
64: Because Dustin Hoffman would play you in the movie.
67: oh, great. Not only does teo get tortured, everybody gets to see faux-teo prancing around in a stupid hat in Mr. Magorium's Torture Emporium. Not really selling this one, ari.
Wait, did they really have Werner fucking Herzog make a little spiel about how special effects are an assault on our sense of reality?
67: There was not enough history in that film.
70: Either that or it's possible that you and I weren't the target demographic.
69 makes me so glad. I'm not watching, but I can imagine this and it is delightful.
Sorry, I thought you were right there with me. Anyway, I was talking about this.
74: I've seen the movie. The feigned ignorance was to audience preferences.
73: It was a pre-recorded excerpt from an interview they did with him (they had one for each of the directors of the nominated documentaries), not Herzog up on stage. Still, a complete WTF moment.
That's the movie they named the candy bar after, yeah?
74: Despite the more famous stuff that came later, the part that really creeped me out in that film was the opening "funny" car chase abruptly turning real. Never have been quite sure about how I felt about that either. A little sad and pathetic in many ways.
I had never even heard of that movie until now.
Ooo, I love this dress Frieda Pinto is wearing. I'm not so into the bouffant wedding dress trend or the oddly folded drapery trend.
80: Did you see Jessica Biehl's dress? Oddly folded!
I was happy to learn finally at a museum or some such historical site that the round sofaesque furniture you see in 18th and 19th century period rooms were made to accommodate dresses. I'd wondered why they were shaped like that without ever bothering to ask.
80: Hm, I was not a fan. I felt that it looked oddly old on her; its something I'd expect to see Angela Lansbury in. The workmanship was beautiful, though.
Biel's dress was a strange choice for her build. She looks great in the fitted dresses that show off her waist-to-hip ratio. The oddly folded drapery works better, insofar as it does work, on the tall and thin, like the otherworldly Tilda Swinton.
I like Marion Cotillard's attitude towards the big Oscar Night dress: full-out, sequins and tulle AND transparency AND a train and blue and black. 700%!!!1
86: She's so freaking lovely but wow she is going on and on.
I'm so in love with Kate Winslet. We share a birthday, and I try to convince myself that means something.
a. Nobody may say anything against Werner Herzog if he is not present.
b. Who the fuck cares about anybody's clothes.
c. I do not know what the issue about Joaquin Phoenix is. He said something on Letterman, okay.
b. Who the fuck cares about anybody's clothes.
Me, me!
c. I do not know what the issue about Joaquin Phoenix is
The economy was bad after he got out of the asylum, so he could only pick up work as a draughtsman, not as an architect. His elder daughter moved out and is living in an efficiency somewhere.
True fact: Robert DeNiro is just over three feet tall.
Oh, I see. Art is never commercial.
(And no one cares about commerce, either, right?)
96: I'm just saying that focusing on something so crassly commercial ruins an otherwise pure celebration of film.
97: Oooh. Of course. Makes perfect sense.
Normally I'm all for putting words in other people's mouths but this is a little silly, isn't it?
PENN? Not Mickey? NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
The expression "celluloid fabric" is bad for the Jews.
Mickeyphilic. Milk was fine, but Penn is no Rourke.
How could they dis the star of Harley Davidson & The Marlboro Man like that?
Does the Academy hate crazies, maybe? That might be part of it. Rourke is obviously insane, but soooooo good.
Rourke scares me; I wouldn't be surprised if he scared most of the academy too. (Not that that should be a black mark against him, but you know).
I was surprised to find out Rourke is still around. I though he died of sleaziness a while back.
Do the INS and DHS know what's happening on stage right now?
I haven't seen either film, but if the Academy is as influenced as they say, well, Mickey Rourke is just not favoured.* Sean is, not without right. From what I understand, these things are only tangentially based on (judgment of) merit.
* on preview, see last few comments regarding Rourke. I happen to love him myself, actor-wise.
I suppose I could turn on my tv and find out what 110 is all about. There's no INS any more is there?
I don't get this whole "judgment of merit" thing by which Mickey Rourke is supposed to deserve it because he did a better acting job. Nobody has thought Mickey Rourke has done a good acting job in anything since about 1991, and it seems like his character in this movie is really very similar to how he himself is.
The real reason people are hoping he gets recognized for this role is that this was the perfect role for him at the perfect moment, and he will never again have any chance at any of these awards.
I guess it's now CIS, right? But I thought nobody would know what I was talking about if I used the correct acronym.
So what movies should I see? Aside from Milk and Vicky Cristina Barcelona, I can't even remember what new movies from last year I've seen at all. Oh, I guess the Batman movie and Burn after Reading.
But not Man on Wire, or The Wrestler, or My Winnipeg, or The House Bunny, or Let the Right One In (which I guess is this year's), or any of the arty French flicks my ma recommended. Those are worth seeing, right?
112: I assume ari's referring to the Indian presence on stage, a photo of which you may see on the NYT homepage at the moment.
he will never again have any chance at any of these awards
You know know. Barfly II is slated for release in a couple years.
"You never know" might have been funnier.
Man on Wire is very much worth seeing.
While it's unfortunate that Penn's win falls into the category of rewarding the straight actor for playing a queer, he was tremendously good in Milk, and I'm delighted.
c. I do not know what the issue about Joaquin Phoenix is. He said something on Letterman, okay.
He had a rather awkward interview with Letterman. My vote is that Letterman didn't get it. Other votes are that Phoenix was out-to-lunch crazy.
113: I don't get this whole "judgment of merit" thing
As I said, I haven't seen either film, but I assume that Penn was outstanding, as he always is. In the same way that Meryl Streep is always outstanding in everything she does (well, mostly, some experimental excursions recently for her that might not have worked). Penn hasn't always been outstanding either, I suppose.
What's the purpose of the awards?
What's the purpose of the awards?
To sell ad space and subsidize fashion designers.
i think it's time herzog ate another shoe
I didn't like Milk much, so I guess I'm a bit biased. I've listened to audio of Milk delivering some of those same speeches, and they're so much more powerful and full of conviction than Penn gave them. I dunno. I just wasn't terribly impressed.
We saw The Reader today. I liked Kate better than the movie.
I figure one should see Slumdog Millionaire, and anything else that comes recommended by trusted persons.
but I assume that Penn was outstanding, as he always is
I often think he overacts, but he hit it out of the park in this one. Really inhabited the role.
Penn hasn't always been outstanding either, I suppose.
Everyone knows you never go full retard.
130: As good as in Dead Man Walking, eh? Well, I intended to see Milk anyway.
We saw The Reader today.
I haven't seen it, but this rewarded my judgmental preconceptions.
I read a negative review of The Reader in The New Criterion way back when the translation came out and that did it for me.
The pettiness upthread against Mickey Rourke is unbecoming in any case.
135: I might be missing who you're aiming this at, parsimon, but I don't think it's particularly petty to say that Rourke scares me. He does - I get on edge when he's on (as himself, as opposed to in character) television because unpredictability makes me nervous. As for him as an actor, I missed out on his glory years and really only know him as himself.
If Mickey Rourke couldn't take a joke, he wouldn't have done that to his face.
And he probably wouldn't sleep in the closet with his chihuahuas, either.
136, 137: Oh, I actually don't know quite what happened to his face, except that it happened.
Still, whether or not the actor scares you has, or should have, nothing to do with a role he plays. You can tell the difference? If you know nothing of his past roles and performances, you're not qualified to judge his career.
Having spoken with people who read the book in German, I see that my problems with the movie are inherent in the story. We just don't get enough to understand why the central characters make particular choices in the film. It's not that I can't stand ambiguity, it's just that the range of possible motivations is so broad as be make the actions meaningless.
OK, I know, it doesn't matter what she thinks or feels, the dead are still dead.
138: I don't believe I did judge his roles.
If you know nothing of his past roles and performances, you're not qualified to judge his career.
I'll have you know I have, in fact, seen every minute of Harley Davidson And The Marlboro Man.
And beyond his role in The Wrestler, which I understand to be quite good, his role of what, the past five years?, has been playing himself in the tabloids. That, I'm pretty familiar with, and while it may mean that I'm a poor appreciator of film, it does make it harder for me to watch him as an actor. (Just like I have a hard time seeing Brad Pitt as anyone other than Brad Pitt nowadays).
Further to 139, it's striking that the only character who seems to understand anything about anyone is [the one who wrote a book]. Which is fine, and her admonition -- if you're searching for meaning, don't look at the Holocaust -- isn't half bad. But then you wonder why you're watching the movie.
142: he's actually worked pretty consistently. How can you be scared by the man who played Marv in Sin City?
I did not see Rourke play "Jan the Actress" in that Buscemi prison movie, but Sheila O'Malley makes me want to rent it, despite my lack of interest in the film.
142: he's actually worked pretty consistently. How can you be scared by the man who played Marv in Sin City?
Oh yeah, I remember him in that. Yep, no idea why the man might scare me.
Except for 2007, Mickey Rourke has been in at least one movie a year since 1979? That's pretty darn impressive.
140: I don't believe I did judge his roles.
You mean here, upthread? I wasn't speaking to you particularly in the first place.
The Mickey Rourke narrative doesn't make much sense to me. I thought The Wrestler was a big comeback for him, but imdb suggests that Tweety's right: the man has worked consistently in recent years. So what's he coming back from? Gainful employment? Or being insane? Because there's no evidence that the latter has changed, is there?
And really, why I care about any of this is something of a mystery.
Wow, pwned on the imdb link. That's what happens when I dither.
I think he's been working consistently at largely low-profile roles; perhaps The Wrestler has been the first in a long time where he's been the main draw. Well, him and Tomei as a stripper.
149: maybe he got locked in the closet with the Chihuahuas for a while, and had to call a locksmith on his cell phone?
There's little doubt that he's insane, but O'Malley's appreciation that I linked to above gets it; it's really exciting to watch someone act in some way that feels different from what other actors do.
locked in the closet with the Chihuahuas
We totally played that game at middle-school parties!
I should say that I first noticed Rourke in 9 1/2 Weeks, followed by Angel Heart, which was one hell of a movie. He gained my respect with that ever after, apparently no matter what.
153: Exciting and scary! But really, your own post on him was the first that made me think about him in a serious way in a long time - I thought it was excellent.
154: you went to middle school with R. Kelly?!?
Not to mention Rourke in Diner, Rumblefish, The Pope of Greenwich Village. I can't believe you people.
parsimon, it's hard to know if you're being serious. So I suppose it's best to ask: are you? Being serious, I mean?
parsimon, will it help if I tell you that all of those came out when I was a child? It's not that I haven't seen them and appreciated his work in the past, but for me it is all in the past and my first experiences with him were as he is now. You formed your opinions of Rourke at a specific moment in time. I'm not disputing his past actions in any way, I'm talking about the present image that I am guessing others of my age have as well of him.
160: I've liked Mickey Rourke in all those movies, yes. Why wouldn't I mean that?
I gather he's become quite a crazy person since, but if he's returned to the screen, I'll give him a fair chance.
Parenthetical, yes, I understand, and you don't have to keep explaining it to me.
Rourke looked old in Year of the Dragon, 25 years ago.
Posters of a younger Rourke were ubiquitous.
Ok. I took the I can't believe you people as a cry for more explanation.
Mickey O'Rourke, of course, has actually been in hell since the end of Angel Heart. His place has been taken by a shape-changing imp that possesses a small locket containing the souls of Eric Roberts, Don 'The Dragon' Wilson, Steven Seagal, Dolph Lungren and Jean-Claude van Damme.
max
['So, now you know what happened to his face.']
if he's returned to the screen, I'll give him a fair chance
He's never been away from the screen. It's just that he's been completely terrible, and appeared in completely terrible movies, is all.
Now, Don "The Dragon" Wilson? That man deserves an Oscar.
162: I was referring to your tone, which, in fairness, I may have misread -- hazard of the medium, and all that. But it seemed to me that you were genuinely aggrieved on Mr. Rourke's part. And that, in turn, seemed a bit odd. The dude's renowned as a world-class weirdo. Not a bad actor, mind you, but one creepy guy. Anyway, like I said, I well might have misunderstood you. And regardless, your spirited defense has not gone unnoticed; I've forwarded the thread to his management.
I am aggrieved on Mr. Rourke's behalf. He's been in hell since Angel Heart. Did you even see that movie? jesus christ!
Now, Sifu, if Mickey's been terrible, well, that's okay too. How is he in The Wrestler, is the relevant question.
I think, as far as comparison with Penn goes, Rourke had the harder job, even if it does seem somewhat more like "playing himself," because all Penn had to do was play someone who demonstrates total moral clarity at all times, with a script that was only interesting when it actually quoted Milk's own words, and was otherwise fairly leaden in its insistence that Milk is right and everyone else is wrong. Rourke may have only had to be "himself," but what an awful thing to have to be and show the inner workings of. It's really hard to watch The Wrestler because it's just way too personal and exposed. I never felt while watching Milk that I was not watching Sean Penn be not-Sean-Penn.
Aw, I'm done making fun of the lunatic. I've never been so much of a fan of his acting, but more power to, you know, everybody. I do indeed want to see The Wrestler, although geez that Aronofsky with the downer pictures.
I did mean it that I'm impressed with the work schedule; falling from grace like that but plugging away in crap is laudable.
At least, when I was acting, the "playing a terribly exposed and awful part of myself" roles were totally devastating to do, while the "I'm being someone I'm not!" roles were just a matter of, like, craft. I quit acting because the former kind of role ended up being all I thought was artistically interesting to me, but they were killers. They took up all of my energy and thought and made me really deeply disturbed.
172: Thanks for saying that, AWB. I've known actors/performers who've quit for that reason.
plugging away in crap is laudable
Alert my heirs: I've got my epitaph!
COMBIEN D ARGENT PUBLIC SARKOZY A T IL DETOURNE DEPUIS LE DEBUT DE SON MANDAT POUR SERVIR SON INTERET PERSONNEL ? En ce qui me concerne, lynchage, plagiat...etc En période de crise, voilà une question politique intéressante à débattre, avec du courage et de l'indépendance ?
I didn't see Sean Penn's movie but I was a little bit disappointed by some flat lines in The Wrestler. When Mickey Rourke's character explains to his daughter that he's just a washed-up piece of meat, for example. It sounded like omniscient exposition, not that character's voice. And if I'd've known it was an Aronofsky movie going in, I wouldn't have gone. I despised Requiem so much I promised I wouldn't see anything else by him; I was pleasantly surprised to say the least by The Wrestler.
falling from grace like that but plugging away in crap is laudable.
Well, if the reports are true, that's because he turned down all the boffo roles:
"He is alleged to have turned down a number of high-profile acting roles, including Eliot Ness in The Untouchables, Axel Foley in Beverly Hills Cop, Jack Crawford in The Silence of the Lambs, Tom Cruise's role in Rain Man, Nick Nolte's part in 48 Hours, Christopher Lambert's part in Highlander and a part in Platoon. In a documentary on the special edition DVD of Tombstone, actor Michael Biehn, who plays the part of Johnny Ringo, mentions that his role was first offered to Rourke. ... In the early 1990s, Quentin Tarantino offered Rourke the part of Butch Coolidge in Pulp Fiction."
Man, Mickey Rourke in Highlander would have been a thing of beauty. Dude deserves some kind of an award just for being unlucky.
175: What nina said. And I lurrrrved La Vie En Rose in 2007.
Let's see: Slumdog Millionaire got eight Oscars; by my count, two brownskinned persons went up to the stage.
It occurred to me last night as I was going to sleep that I put Rourke and Klaus Kinski in sort of the same box. They've both been in a ton of terrible movies in which they seem tired and leaden, and you can't even say they're always "on" even in the movies they're good in, but in those movies, when they're good, they can't be compared to anyone else. Their best moments are orders of magnitude better than anyone's.
Also, of course, both of them are completely batshit sleazeballs.
I am aggrieved on Mr. Rourke's behalf. He's been in hell since Angel Heart.
Hey. That's some serious method acting there.
Did you even see that movie? jesus christ!
I don't think He had anything to do with Angel Heart.
max
['The Gaffer of the Spirit!']
It's been legal for me to perv on Nastassja Kinski for 20 years now.
I quite liked the Council of Elders format for the major acting awards, which I'm told happened because last year's winners thought this year's Oscars were going to suck. (Not sure what their game is: surely if they revert to format, this year's winners will get dibs.)
It was completely creepy at first, but by the time Shirley MacLaine did her thing, talking plainly and directly to Anne Hathaway, I was sold. It was a good way to make the awards about craft and art.
The musical sequence was embarrassing, though. (Not the opening, which was cute if overlong.)
Let the Right One In
Fantastic. So worth seeing. Rah got me the novel for Yule and I am very excited to read it.
While it's unfortunate that Penn's win falls into the category of rewarding the straight actor for playing a queer, he was tremendously good in Milk, and I'm delighted.
I think he deserved it. It's a very well-rounded performance and the only time I can immediately recall feeling anything other than annoyance at seeing Penn on the screen.
We saw The Reader today. I liked Kate better than the movie
Concur. Glad Kate finally got her statue, regardless whether this movie was the right time for it.
Re: the point about characters' motivation, I think it's actually kind of cool to leave this as inscrutable as it is in real life. I mean, there are no *good* reasons for [terrible thing that Hannah participated in], or [other terrible thing]. Having reasons is kinda gross actually.
Two points:
(1) When Hannah asks the presiding judge what *he* would've done, he doesn't answer.
(2) Michael has the chance to do the right thing (confront Hannah in jail & get the truth out), but wimps out. Obviously the moral scope is different, but the point is made.
I loved Mickey O'Rourke in Spun, which was a pretty recent movie (2002? 2003?). There were some entertaining scenes in that movie. Touching actorly ones too!
"He is alleged to have turned down a number of high-profile acting roles, including Eliot Ness in The Untouchables, Axel Foley in Beverly Hills Cop, Jack Crawford in The Silence of the Lambs, Tom Cruise's role in Rain Man, Nick Nolte's part in 48 Hours, Christopher Lambert's part in Highlander and a part in Platoon. In a documentary on the special edition DVD of Tombstone, actor Michael Biehn, who plays the part of Johnny Ringo, mentions that his role was first offered to Rourke. ... In the early 1990s, Quentin Tarantino offered Rourke the part of Butch Coolidge in Pulp Fiction."
If he hadn't been in so many other awful movies (going by what people have said here--I haven't seen any of them), I'd have said this list shows Rourke's good taste. Except for Platoon.
re: 179
I'm not sure what you are getting at. It was written, produced, and directed by white British blokes. You'd sort of expect to see a lot of white faces.
Furthermore, when you actually look at the photos of them collecting the Oscar for best film, you'll find about half the people on stage have brown faces. Don't be a fucking prick.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnlOqlG6Icc
I did not see any movies in 2008. In 1986, when Parenthetical was in his/her exersaucer watching Baby Mozart videos, I was a college freshman sitting in a California movie theatre watching 9 1/2 weeks. Mickey Rourke's character was so intense, so close to the edge, so dangerous - he made me want to do naughty things.
I saw the Barbara Walter's interview of him right before the Oscars. I watched because his physical metamorphoses from a beautiful man to a surgical spectacle intrigued me - there seemed to be a disconnect from the dangerous fucked up guy whose face was destroyed in the boxing ring to the final surgical product with lip implants and botox.
Watching his interview, I saw a man who cared very, very deeply about this role, and this chance at redemption. He wanted that Oscar. It didn't seem to matter so much to Sean Penn. I am glad that he admonished the protesters, but all things being equal, I wish the award had gone to Mickey Rourke, for all the reasons that Parsimon and AWB have previously stated.
Hmm, this is probably a dead point, but just in case it wasn't clear, I really didn't care who won the Oscar. I hadn't seen any of the nominated performances. I presumed that it would be pretty fucking cool for Rourke to win, and it does seem sad that he didn't.
Parenthetical, I am not picking on you at all, only making reference to 161 to explain that I have been along for the ride and so share Parsimon's views of Mr. Rourke. I could have just as easily teased Ari in 168 for trying to make the appreciation of Mr. Rourke unthinkable, as "The dude's renowned as a world-class weirdo. Not a bad actor, mind you, but one creepy guy. What a scaredy cat! And of course, Sean Penn wins Mr. Congeniality!
190: his physical metamorphoses from a beautiful man to a surgical spectacle
This continues to pain me. I have a friend who was (still is) a beautiful man but then at age 43 had a resurgence of the herpes zoster virus -- this is chickenpox, latent in all of us who've had it -- resulting in something called Ramsay Hunt syndrome, which is partial facial paralysis. Similar to Bell's Palsy. You never know what's going to happen, do you?
(My friend is very happy and loved, so no matter, but it was tough at the time, and it certainly changed him.)
193: Gotcha. I just felt bad since it is clear that some of the people here have intense feelings about it, and I was really just commenting on my own impressions of him, which really don't matter to me.
And, sigh, I wasn't allowed to watch tv (not even Baby Einstein! (wait, did they have that then?)) in 1986. It's a pity.
Anderson, we don't know whether she would've behaved differently if confronted: whether she wants to keep the secret out of shame, or whether she's willing to take the punishment for what she's done. We don't know why Michael wimps out. Is he ashamed of his own past? Does he realize that she knows what she's doing, and is making her own choice?
I'm not asking to be spoonfed, and there are times when ambiguity is better than fine. I don't find this movie one of them. I don't care in the least that he tells his daughter.
ttaM @ 189:
No need to get snippy. Of course there were brown people on the stage at the end, but Christian Colson got the statuette.
I was trying, and apparently failing, to point out an interesting racial divide: the talent in front of the camera was almost entirely brown; the talent behind the camera was predominantly white; the Academy, probably unthinkingly, chose to attribute the picture's excellences, those that led to it's being selected best picture, to the work behind the camera, the work largely of white men. Since this is a dubious choice (the screenplay, particularly, sucked), it's likely there was some degree of unconscious racism at work.
Anderson, we don't know whether she would've behaved differently if confronted: whether she wants to keep the secret out of shame, or whether she's willing to take the punishment for what she's done.
I think it's clearly shame; she denies having written the report, until the pad and pencil are put in front of her.
We don't know why Michael wimps out. Is he ashamed of his own past? Does he realize that she knows what she's doing, and is making her own choice?
Some kind of shame or embarrassment on his part; I don't think he can say "she knows what she's doing" and get off the hook that easily, without talking to her. His timing strongly suggests that he waffles rather than acting out of principle.
Going out on a limb, I would say that he's a bit grossed out by his intimacy with someone who did monstrous things ... which has the ironic effect of his shunning her, i.e., treating her as less than human?... you see where that goes. Moral equivalency and all that. The author would've been hanged in effigy for spelling that out, but I think it's fair to suggest that the *potential* for terrible conduct is within all or most of us, even if luck means that most of us never realize that potential.
Cf. the righteous classmate who would happily shoot each of the defendants himself. Had he been born a bit earlier and in different circumstances, what do you suppose he would've ended up doing during the war?
I don't see how the movie gets much more explicit about motives without becoming preachy. Merely keeping things ambiguous in a Holocaust flick is achievement enough!
re: 198
It just seemed like an accusation of racism that I didn't think was warranted and delivered in a fairly snide way. Apologies for being overly snippy, though.
I suppose it depends on whether you think the cast deserved Oscars -- but didn't get them because they are brown -- and the director, etc didn't -- but got them because they are white.
I can't speak for the screenplay, I've not seen the movie. Nothing I've seen, however, suggests that Boyle didn't deserve an award.
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