Oscar: Doing the Wrong Thing
I'm finally getting together my invites for the Oscar party on Sunday, Feb. 26 and got distracted on the oscar.go.com site. Is that an official site of the Academy? It looks to be. There's oscars.org as well, which is definitely official, but I assume the organization runs both.
Anyway I was distracted by a “Celebrate the Movies” photo gallery that is also advertising the Oscar broadcast this year and the Oscars and the movies in general. One photos shows Tom Cruise in “Top Gun” with the line WE SHOWED YOU HOW TO BE A MAVERICK; another shows Audrey Hepburn in “Breakfast at Tiffany's” with the line WE SHOWED YOU HOW TO HAVE STYLE. Etc.
It's halfway to annoying. But it went the entire way with the following slide:
YOU showed us how to make a change? How about Spike Lee did? Or not even. He made a good, incendiary movie, which, in a weak year, didn't get nominated for best picture or director or cinematographer. It got ignored by the Academy—infamously—in favor of past pleasantries. Yet here you are using it to promote yourself.
WE SHOWED YOU HOW TO FUDGE HISTORY.
WE SHOWED YOU HOW TO USE THE ABUSED.
WE SHOWED YOU HOW TO TAKE CREDIT FOR WHAT YOU ONCE IGNORED.
All are more accurate.
COMMENTS
Alex Bradbury wrote:
Worse yet.
But maybe you should give the Academy the benefit of the doubt, their message possibly being: “We fucked up, but time has given us some perspective and we admit our error.”
Comment posted on Sat. Feb 11, 2012 at 11:45 AM
Erik wrote:
Or: “It's 20 years later. This doesn't scare us as much as it used to.”
Comment posted on Sat. Feb 11, 2012 at 11:48 AM
Extra-strength UncleVinny wrote:
It got nominated for Best Original Screenplay...that's not exactly being ignored. But I feel ya completely on all the “WE” talk. Nauseating.
Comment posted on Sat. Feb 11, 2012 at 12:45 PM
Tim wrote:
That site is ABC/Disney's site promoting the Oscar broadcast. Don't know how distinct that is from the Oscar organization itself.
Comment posted on Mon. Feb 13, 2012 at 03:06 PM
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Alex Bradbury wrote:
“Do The Right Thing” was unquestionably the best movie that year, a real standout. Am I wrong, or am I remembering that something completely banal like “Dances With Wolves” won it that year ?
Comment posted on Sat. Feb 11, 2012 at 10:12 AM