I'll find that for you -- it was in the Guardian, UK.
By Stephen Farber, Special to The Times
IS "Crash" the worst movie ever to win the Oscar for best picture? Probably not, though it definitely reeks. Academy members had a chance to make history by honoring "Brokeback Mountain," a trailblazing gay love story that also happened to be the best movie of 2005. Instead, they voted for arguably the worst of the five films nominated ?- a ham-fisted exposé of racial tensions in Los Angeles that pulled its punches by ending on an incongruous note of communion and redemption.
Disappointing as this decision was, however, it wasn't the first time the academy got it all wrong. Indeed, in the 78 years that Oscars have been awarded, there are only a dozen or so times when the statuette was awarded to an undisputed classic such as "It Happened One Night," "Gone With the Wind," "Casablanca," "All About Eve," "On the Waterfront," "The Bridge on the River Kwai," "Lawrence of Arabia," "The Godfather" and "The Godfather Part II."
In other cases, the academy honored a good movie that wasn't quite the best of the year ?- the Oscar did not go to 1941's "Citizen Kane," frequently cited as the greatest movie in history, but "How Green Was My Valley" ?- or hugely popular films that may have been kitschy but were still enormously entertaining, such as "The Sound of Music," "Titanic" or "Gladiator."
But in a surprising number of cases, the Oscar has gone to films that were mediocre or just plain bad.
To provide a little context for readers who are still perplexed or angry over this year's upset, I've come up with an admittedly subjective list of the 10 worst movies to be voted best picture. It wasn't an easy list to compile ?- not because there were so few possibilities but because there were so many.
These first two really take the booby prize:
"The Greatest Show on Earth" (1952) was criticized even at the time for its cornucopia of clichés. Perhaps this circus-themed soap opera can be enjoyed as a guilty pleasure, full of unintended howlers, but is that what the Oscar was meant to signify? The Oscar that year might have gone to "High Noon," "Moulin Rouge" (the good version, directed by John Huston), or to "Singin' in the Rain," which wasn't even nominated but is now widely regarded as the greatest movie musical ever made.
"Around the World in 80 Days" (1956) also sits at the bottom of the barrel. Producer Mike Todd was the Harvey Weinstein of his day, a cunning showman who knew how to court Oscar voters. He also managed to attract a legion of stars to do cameos, a novelty at the time, but the movie is nothing more than a 167-minute travelogue, with inane and insulting comic relief provided by Mexican actor Cantinflas.
Grandiosity is a regrettable hallmark of several of the other worst movies to be named best picture:
"The Great Ziegfeld" (1936) first epitomized this trend. It's a three-hour biopic with a few eye-popping production numbers and a couple of hours of padding.
"Ben-Hur" (1959) won a mind-boggling 11 Oscars. The chariot race is worth the price of admission, but the rest of this 212-minute epic is drenched in syrupy religiosity reminiscent of a Hallmark Christmas card. The movie was the weakest of the five nominees that year; "Anatomy of a Murder," "The Diary of Anne Frank," "The Nun's Story" and "Room at the Top" are all more watchable today. And two movies that are more enduring than any of them ?- "Some Like It Hot" and "North by Northwest" ?- weren't even nominated.
"The English Patient" (1996) is well photographed and well edited, but it's also emotionally desiccated and downright ponderous (as "Seinfeld" fans well know). Director Anthony Minghella crafted a far more involving movie three years later, "The Talented Mr. Ripley," which won exactly zero Oscars.
"Forrest Gump" (1994). Robert Zemeckis made a terrific piece of entertainment in "Back to the Future," but he won his Oscar for this bloated, soft-headed trip though a few decades of American history. That year, the academy might have honored the electrifying "Pulp Fiction" but chose to play it safe. Quentin Tarantino and co-writer Roger Avary did win for best screenplay, but that was merely a consolation prize, like "Brokeback Mountain's" directing and screenplay Oscars this year.
"You Can't Take It With You" (1938). Some argue that the academy is a sucker for swollen, overlong epics. But in several instances, the Oscar went to small, quirky movies that were just as stupefying. This one is a case in point. Seen today, the antics of the world's wackiest family seem about as engaging as the sound of fingernails raking a blackboard. Consider all the classic comedies of the '30s and early '40s that didn't win Oscars ?- such as "My Man Godfrey," "Ninotchka" and "His Girl Friday" ?- and then try to justify this one's victory.
"Rocky" (1976) ladles on the whimsy as well. This is one of the most ridiculous of all Oscar choices, first because of the movies it beat: "Taxi Driver" and "Network." It's also hard to forgive the picture for spawning all those dreadful sequels, with yet another installment, "Rocky Balboa," still to come.
"American Beauty" (1999) is a precious satire of suburbia (now there's a fresh topic) that mustered the courage to criticize real estate agents and gun nuts. Overlooked that year: "The Insider" and "The Cider House Rules," the latter of which took on a genuinely controversial subject ?- abortion. On the plus side, the Oscar victory gave writer Alan Ball the clout to create HBO's "Six Feet Under," a far more incisive look at American mores.
Finally, there is space for one more movie on the list, and that belongs to:
"Crash" (2005). This jeremiad bemoaning our society's intolerance is filtered through a fanciful plot built on a heap of outlandish coincidences. Can you really imagine audiences in another decade or two giving this movie, which somehow combines grandiosity and whimsical eccentricity, any more respect than they give "Rocky" or "The Greatest Show on Earth" today? Like all of these prize-winning embarrassments, "Crash" is destined to be remembered as just one more footnote in the annals of Oscar blunders.
do you really think "crash" was that bad?
I don't but I can appreciate the critcism. It was, however, just one of those films that caught my attention immediately and then fizzled out. I watched it a second time and the seams were showing. I don't really care to see it again.
see I agree that there's some well how do you say- cliches or better eyecatchers- man i can't think! Anyway yes to me crash was good but relied heavily on it's instamatic value.
I thought on the second viewing that the editing was superb but the often kinetic camera work was distracting. The film had an impact when I first saw it than didn't hold up.
that's what I mean by instamatic, it's instantly abrasive and awesome but that's all glittering lights underneath it all there's not much... well much of real substance or originality.
We are on the same track and yet when I first saw it I think I was actually in reverse bias -- I had only read a couple of good reviews and it was recommended by a client friend. After seeing it the first time, I kept wondering why I was still confused about the quality of the movie. It was sure an eye-opener sitting through it the second time.
Someone pointed out to me that we discuss the Academy of Film whatever its complete name is as though the members were also involved in some giant conspiracy when they probably don't know or talk to most other members.
We also talk about people getting Oscars a year later for a lesser work after their masterpiece was overlooked the year(s) before their victory.
Now, this may happen because actors, writers and directors -- like the rest of us -- have second thoughts. Sometimes, the more you think about something, the more apt you are to see it in a different light.
Sometimes, two performers in the same movie deserve an Oscar, so it goes to someone else, perhaps because members of the Academy feel to vote for "A" over "B" is too slight "B," so they vote for "C" who appears in a completely different film.
I thought that both Judi Dench and Kate Winslet deserved Best Actress awards for both playing Iris Murdoch. Dench and Winslet are nothing alike physically and Winslet's voice does not resemble the more familiar voice of Dench, yet, somehow, these two women found a common ground.
Both were nominated. Neither won.
Ironically, or, perhaps, not, their co-star Jim Broadbent did for a performance that was so-so in a rather uninteresting role. Some said he deserved the Oscar for Moulin Rouge for which I believe he was nominated (which I did not see).
There is a lot of human in the Oscars.
You gave that some really good thought and I mostly agree. The favorite of the majority of the film critics is not that likely to win either. That's rarely been true, even though many film critics play the "what will Oscar like" game. That we see all the films and have our favorite performances, cinematography, music, direction and on that basis come up with a best picture that the film doesn't get the Oscar doesn't make it any less of a film (especially with "Brokeback's" string of awards -- it can give the impression of greed although I don't think that is the case). The editing Oscar is really perculiar as that is where the artistic really bridges over into the technical. The best picture, even if it doesn't get the most awards has not won the Oscar without winning the editing prize is an extraodinary precedent.
Although there has been some suspicious tactics surrounding this year's award, it might happen every year without anyone trying to expose it. Members of the academy confessing they did not see all the films, stating they will not see a film for some personal reason that remains superficially explained, strong rumors in the industry that there was a campaign to actually contact voting members to lobby against a film. Ebert and Roeper being associated with the actual show and Ebert especially campaigning for the film -- all of this has a funny smell.
I don't know where this will end up but in the end, Oscar will likely remain omnipotent even if it now seems impotent to many people. Not that we ever want to see the statue get a hard-on.
(Ooops, wait, is that a sword or are you just happy to see me).
BTW, Jim Broadbent won for his incredible performance in "Iris" and partly, I'm sure, for his performance in "Topsy-Turvy." Awards are often given for a series of performances even if the film they are in is only one of them.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0280778/
My favorite best film slate was "Elizabeth," "Shakespeare in Love," "The Thin Red Line," "Life is Beautiful" and "Saving Private Ryan." That was the only year that my former boyfriend, my older son and my daughter and I saw all the nominated movies prior to the Oscars.
Then, there was the year that I was blown away by the cinematography. I think "Amastad" won that year. I found myself enthralled by the way the cinematography advanced the storytelling and -- coincedence -- I was in a doctor's waiting room and found a copy of a magazine for cinematographers in which the Amastad man had written an essay on how he put the camera work together for that film.
"Amistad" was nominated for cinematography but did not win. Not sure which film did that year.
Finally saw about 45 minutes worth of Crash -- without knowing what I was watching until I recognized one of the leads -- and Goodnight and Good Luck.
Let me explain about Crash. I was assigned one period in one of the special needs classrooms -- probably in error -- by the time I got there (really long and unnecessary story), the regular teacher had three of the kids (its a drop-in sort of arrangement) set in front of the movie as a social studies assignment/day before vacation starts assignment. I thought the production values were cheesy and the script about human hatred.
Later, I could see there was a theme of connectedness underlying the whole thing but, basically, I felt it was an unwatchable picture. In fact, even under those circumstances, I thought it fine that I had a sudoku to work.
As for Goodnight, I thought it splendid. Clooney has hidden depths. Has the making of an actor's director. Particularly like the way the acting foreshadowed the suicide of Don Whateverhisnamewas.
"Crash" wasn't filmed to look like the slick production one normally expects out of Hollywood as it was meant to look like a docu-drama even though there is virtually no documentary quality other than stealing a few headlines. It fails on close examination and especially in aping two much greater films, Anderson's "Magnolia" and Altman's "Short Cuts." Clooney is superb, and won the Oscar for "Syriana," although the convoluted plot is a little off-putting. He was the central reason that the remaked of "Solaris" succeeded which did have very high production values -- one of the handsomest looking sci-fi flicks since "Blade Runner."
I didn't see Magnolia because of the mixed reviews it received. I loved Short Cuts. A friend of mine -- a graduate of one of America's leading colleges -- couldn't figure out what it was about. To me, the film was about personal responsibility.
I couldn't see anything of that sort in Crash, but, then I saw less than an hour of the film. I thought it was some sort of television series. I did, however, see something of a theme of connectedness, as I wrote above.
Two or three years ago, a woman remarked to me that Clooney was growing as an actor. After seeing Goodnight, I thought how talented he is as a director. He's the first person to be nominated in a single year for directing, writing and acting (in a role outside of the movie he directed).
The only person to receive both acting and writing awards is Emma Thompson.
On the strength of Goodnight, if Clooney choses to continue to write, he may be the second.
"Magnolia" received 86% favorable reviews:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/magnolia/
So I'm not sure how it could be perceived as "mixed." That usually means close to half bad and half good reviews.
Clooney shared the writing nomination with Grant Heslov but I'm wondering if he will, in fact, create a screenplay on his own now.
Finally saw BBM last night.
The movie was okay but I don't get the big to-do about it except that two major actors were playing gay characters and having sex onscreen. It also didn't strike me as being very emotional. I don't think I really cared about the two men that much to become emotionally invested.
The cinematography was gorgeous and I liked that it was slow-moving but all-in-all, it wasn't that great of a film, to me.
I do have some questions tho...
Ennis sure knew how to 'wet his whistle' during their first big sex scene. That indicated to me that this was not his first time with a man. Had Ennis engaged in sexual relations with other men before meeting Jack?
Also, did Jack's wife know about him? The story she told Ennis of how he died was, of course, not how he died. Did she know that he was murdered and why he was murdered but covering it up with the exploding tire story?
Proulx line in the story went something like "no instruction manual needed" as far as Ennis taking advantage of the situation. I don't detect any kind of inference that, especially at his age, Ennis had any previous sex with a male.
There's been and will always be an ongoing debate whether the flashback on the screen on a hate crime is what actually happened or what Ennis wanted to believe happened (it would kind of help let him off the hook because it realized his fears). The ambiguity of the film is to be filled in by the viewer's mind using their own emotional intelligence. It's an analysis of character motivation that cannot be absolute.
I'm sure the impact of the film is quite varied -- perhaps having a somewhat similar experience makes the film much more potent. I've had such experiences so it's not difficult to understand the circumstance the characters are in and appreciate that they were in love with one another. But it is not unconditional love and that's the point.
Lightwizard -- I keep telling my former boyfriend that I hate rotten tomatoes. When you boil down a review, say that gives a movie 2 and 1/2 stars out of a possible 4 to a statistical favorable, well, you get where I am going. Rottentomatoes is hardly nuanced. Besides, when I say mixed reviews, the Boston critics largely hated it. I prefer getting to know a critic, reading or listening to him/her over at least several months to see what their taste is and how they evaluate things. I really don't care that Sam Spade in DesMoines like a film if I know nothing of his taste and his sensibilities. How can I compare his reaction to mine if he an unknown quantity?
plainoldme wrote:Lightwizard -- I keep telling my former boyfriend that I hate rotten tomatoes. When you boil down a review, say that gives a movie 2 and 1/2 stars out of a possible 4 to a statistical favorable, well, you get where I am going. Rottentomatoes is hardly nuanced. Besides, when I say mixed reviews, the Boston critics largely hated it. I prefer getting to know a critic, reading or listening to him/her over at least several months to see what their taste is and how they evaluate things. I really don't care that Sam Spade in DesMoines like a film if I know nothing of his taste and his sensibilities. How can I compare his reaction to mine if he an unknown quantity?
What Boston critics? Here's the Boston Globe:
http://www.boston.com/movies/display?display=movie&id=7871
The Boston Herald:
http://theedge.bostonherald.com/movieReviews/view.bg?articleid=117254
The Boston Film Critics Name "Brokeback Mountain" Best Film:
http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2005/12/12/boston_critics_name_brokeback_best_film/
Why would I not believe you are now just resorting to bullshitting me?
Rotten Tomotoes assigns no stars themselves -- it's a compilation of all the reviews in the major and minor periodicals. It's just another guage, not the only one.
Metacritic Website with an 87% favorable review record:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/brokebackmountain
