Oscars create new award - " Best Picture That People Actually Went To See"

[GaryH]

I think that the movies nominated for best picture over the last few years are for the most part incredibly boring. They have a politically correct message that is sanctimonious, preachy, and riddled wtih talking point cliches ( opinions that are overused and betray a lack of original thought). "Shape of Water" - A remake of "The Creature From the Black Lagoon" except that the villain besides being mean to the creature, also is mean to women, people of color, and gays. None of the movies nominated for best picture ended up in the top 15 movies most watched last year. Are these movies really the best movies of the year if they are not the most popular?

So to correct that they will have a new category - “outstanding achievement in popular film”, which in fact is " Best Picture That People Actually Went To See '. One person's opinion -
https://nypost.com/2018/08/11/nothing-the-academy-does-will-save-the-oscars/

Your thoughts?

 

[Halloween Mike]

Exept a few times like The Dark Knight and Heath Ledger, most of the oscar awards are going to film i have zero interest for and that i find either boring or terrible if i end up watching them. One exemple is The Hurt Locker. We rented that hoping for a good war movie, and it turn out to be a dragging 2h30m long snooze fest.

Hell if anything now when i see "nominated at the oscars" or something like that im cautious to rent them because i know its probably a long boring drama.

So putting this new award may actually finally mean something. Obviously for 2018 it will be Avengers Infinity War and that would represent well. Excellent movie, a super fun time, great in every departement. Mission Impossible Fallout could be a solid contender as well, it has everything you need for a good action movie. Great actors, great stunts, passion, interesting story.

To me this could actually the "true" BEST PICTURE award.

 

[Behaved]

Exept a few times like The Dark Knight and Heath Ledger, most of the oscar awards are going to film i have zero interest for and that i find either boring or terrible if i end up watching them.

All numbers being domestic:

2017 was a bad year, the highest grossing nominee was Dunkirk, 14th with 188M, Get Out 15th with 176M are the 2 movies that people didn't go see because ''Oscar nomination''. The Post, the 3rd highest grossing nominee (39th overall), made about 40% of it's Box-Office number post-nomination and post-awards. Dunkirk and Get Out are the 2 nominees NOT released in November or December. Average Nominees gross: 78.7M

2016: Hidden Figures (14th; 169M, 50% Post-Nom+Award), then you get 19th (La La Land), 29th (Arrival), etc. Only non-November-December release were Hell or High Water (August, 27M, 95th) and eventual winner Moonlight (last October week). Average Nominees gross: 77.8M

2015: The Martian (8th, 228M), The Revenant (13th, 183M, clear Oscar Bait) and Max Max: Fury Road (21st, 153M) lead. I'd argue The Martian and specially Mad Max are not ''typical Oscar movies''. Average Nominees gross: 100.8M

2014: American Sniper was the highest domestic grosser with 350M, more than 50% of the nominees' total yearly gross, probably would have been the highest grosser even without a nomination. Grand Budapest Hotel by Wes Anderson is no surprise on the list, but it was released in March. Average Nominees gross: 83.6M

I won't keep doing it for each year, but of note are:
2010: Toy Story 3 (1st, 415M), Inception (6th, 292M), True Grit (13th, 171M), The King's Speech (18th, 135M), Black Swan (25th, 106M),The Social Network (32nd, 96M) and The Fighter (35th, 93M) were all great grossers, +3 weak. Average Nominees gross: 135M. That's the last year I'd argue most of the nominees were arguably popular movies. The Winner was The King's Speech.

2009 had 3 fantastic grossers: Avatar (1st, 750M), Up (5th, 293M) and The Blind Side (8th, 256M), the winner being The Hurt Locker (116th, 17M). Average: 170M, thanks mostly to Avatar.
2009 also has the distinction of being when the Academy allowed for more nominees. Still, the tendency since 2003 has been 2 or 3 movies between 10th and 30th highest grossers, then complete the nominees with low box-office movies.

2003 is of course the last year a the highest grosser of the year won Best Picture, with Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, after 2 nominations for the previous movies of the franchise.

I agree the Oscars are very drama-centered. I agree they love when a movie flatters Hollywood's ego.

I do not agree that because few people went to see a movie, it can't be the best. I do think some movies suffer from poor distribution, or are mismarketed, or are frankly too strange to appeal to the masses.
I can't pretend I can see all the craftsmanship that it takes to make a scene, to create a mood, to pick the camera angles or anything like that. I try my best, tho, and I'm not sure that can be said of everybody. I want an opinion on a movie, I trust film critics over ''janet789'', same way I go to a mechanic when my car's got issues.

And on the other end, not all the good grossers are liked. In 2012 the last Twilight movie was 6th yearly. Will anyone dare argue it deserved nominations? The Hobbit movies made a lot of money, but a lot of people agreed that they were waaay too long and...uneventful.


Oh, and Black Panther is going to win the Best Popular Picture. They'll want to show how inclusive they are again, and it actually outgrossed Infinity War domestically, and, y'know, America, self-centered, kinda goes together.

 

[Halloween Mike]

I trust film critics over ''janet789'', same way I go to a mechanic when my car's got issues.


Oh, and Black Panther is going to win the Best Popular Picture. They'll want to show how inclusive they are again, and it actually outgrossed Infinity War domestically, and, y'know, America, self-centered, kinda goes together.

Personally i have some reviewers i enjoy like Jeremy Jahns and Chris Stuckman, but never do i base solely my opinions of movies on them. I know especially for Jeremy he does not like pop corn flicks much, and he rarely watch (or at least review) straight to DVD movies wich i think are fairly entertaining for what they are. I am an easy pleaser usually. All i ask is that the movie is engaging enough storywise, has a decent dose of action/stuff happening. For instance i still enjoy Steven Seagal straight to DVD movies even tough they have numerous flaws and are usually very cheaply made. I do understand the average consumer will hate them and why, but for me a movie afficianado that watch usually at list 4-5 movies a week , and who enjoy action/martial arts, they do the job. But where i was originally going is that movie critics are just peoples like you and me. They are not like a mechanic who studied long to know his job. Movie critics usually started like janet1345 as you said and grew an audiance the way they write or express themselves (if on video). I find Jeremy super entertaining and enjoy his stuff like i said, but often i disagree with him on movies. What i do to get a general idea of a movie is i read plenty of reviews on imdb, usually it give a general idea. But when it comes to toilet humor movies like cheap frat/party movies or adam sandler, i know i am more than likely to enjoy them than not and know peoples in general will rank them as 3/10 or so, so i don't check the review until i watched the movies already. Same for Seagal or other DTV action flicks.

As for Avengers vs Black Panther, Avengers has been out for a couple days on dvd... give it time. It will probably outgrow it. Its also a much better movies. Black Panther is "fine", its entertaining but it got overhype because of the "black cast". I would rank it maybe middle tier in the second tier of marvel movies. In other words slightly above half in the rankings. What i disliked the most about it is the vabranium "i can do anything" side. In french we have an expression for that wich is "ta geule c'est magique" when something don't make sense but "looks cool" , kinda like when you guys in english says "roll with it" but for me it really bugged me. I can suspend my disbelief for some stuff like Superman flying or Ironman's armor even tough its something totally impossible, but when what used to be a metal kinda turn into "pate a modeler" its harder for me.

As for the rest of your post yes some movies definately deserved nomination or wins. For instance i ain't a huge lord of the ring fan but i remember the third movie especially being REALLY good. I still have to see Mad Max and The Revenants, those are movies that at first glance didn't catch my eyes "that much" but im sure ill enjoy them to a degree when i do watch them. But there is lots of movies you mentioned i didn't got to see and probably will never do it unless there on netflix in french and i dunno what to watch. But ill admit im very not fond on drama and for suspenses to catch my eyes they need to have SOME action in them. Basically i really don't enjoy watching a movie that stale...

Speaking of Twilight... lol... i ended up watching Breaking Dawn Part 1 the other day on Netflix. Exactly a case of what i said above, it was in french, i was bored, didn't knew what to watch and i had seen the first 3 cause of "circonstances" and my god was it BAD BAD BAD... NOTHING HAPPENED !!! So stale... I could resume the movie in like 1 sentence. They fuck, she get pregnant, pregnancy risk killing her so they got to make her have the baby earlier" Thats about it. This story could had been told in 90mins easily and yet it drag and drag... and they don't doing a 2 part was nessessary for this? Ok granted i have not watch the final movie, maybe that one has much more action and stuff hapenning but part 1 was almost a shell of a movie. :/

 

[Behaved]

For instance i still enjoy Steven Seagal straight to DVD movies even tough they have numerous flaws and are usually very cheaply made. I do understand the average consumer will hate them and why, but for me a movie afficianado that watch usually at list 4-5 movies a week , and who enjoy action/martial arts, they do the job.

I don't disagree with that; however, to enjoy a movie and to consider it well made is very different. I'll watch Seagal's movies, I'll have a good time, but I also know it's very formulaic and does not display a deep mastery of film making. I saw Tag recently. I felt like going to the movies and I knew exactly how I was going to be at the end of the movie. It's not a bad movie by any stretch. It's just very standard.

But where i was originally going is that movie critics are just peoples like you and me. They are not like a mechanic who studied long to know his job. Movie critics usually started like janet1345 as you said and grew an audiance the way they write or express themselves (if on video)

I'm mostly talking about the ''traditional'' critics, i.e Siskel & Ebert. And the people in the Academy HAVE studied long to know their job. They are the mechanics, they have worked for that all their life. Your Jeremy Jahns and Chris Stuckman are your stepbrothers who never went to school, but they worked to get the word out that they could fix problems, it's a looooot of branding. Your average Academy Award member in 2014 was 63 years old, and half of them are filmmakers themselves.

As for Avengers vs Black Panther, Avengers has been out for a couple days on dvd... give it time. It will probably outgrow it. Its also a much better movies. Black Panther is "fine", its entertaining but it got overhype because of the "black cast".

DVD doesn't account on box office numbers. Avengers is 22 millions away from Black Panther domestically, Disney will need to roll it out again and pair it with a movie in drive-ins, mostly. And even then, it's about 35-36% of it's total gross. More than half the money Black Panther made was in the US+Canada. I have serious doubts the Academy could look at these numbers and pass it.
I like Avengers better too (although I think Civil War was better). The bolded is why Black Panther will win, tho.


As for the rest of your post yes some movies definately deserved nomination or wins. For instance i ain't a huge lord of the ring fan but i remember the third movie especially being REALLY good. I still have to see Mad Max and The Revenants, those are movies that at first glance didn't catch my eyes "that much" but im sure ill enjoy them to a degree when i do watch them. But there is lots of movies you mentioned i didn't got to see and probably will never do it unless there on netflix in french and i dunno what to watch. But ill admit im very not fond on drama and for suspenses to catch my eyes they need to have SOME action in them. Basically i really don't enjoy watching a movie that stale...

As for the rest of your post yes some movies definately deserved nomination or wins.

The point was mostly to point that 1. Not all nominees are those obscure movies. The Academy does try to pick a few ''you probably know a few people who went to see it'' movies. 2. Not all the movies nominated are traditional Oscar bait, even if most are; even if you haven't seen Mad Max, you have heard enough to know that it's a movie that was so well received that it ''forced'' the Academy to include it, despite being a kinda genre movie.

Speaking of Twilight... Ok granted i have not watch the final movie, maybe that one has much more action and stuff hapenning but part 1 was almost a shell of a movie. :/

I can probably make part 2 in 1 sentence as well [SPOILERS]. She's a Vampire now, but Vampire babies are illegal, so the Vampires from the 2nd movie want to kill them, so they go full Avengers to get more good Vampires, also Jacob is in love with the baby so the werewolves must side with the Cullens, then there's a fight sequence where the leader of the bad guys die but it was only a vision from the one who can predict the future; therefore, the bad vampires say ''But danger!'' then another half vampire comes and say ''nah bro we half vamps are chill'' and the bad vampires leave. The end.

 

[GaryH]

There is a TV show in the U.S. called Wrecked. It is a comedy about a plane crash with survivors on a desert island. When they are gathering up supplies, they find a battery operated DVD player with two DVD's - "Selma" and "Dumb and Dumber". The DVD only has enough power to play one DVD. The survivors must choose which DVD to play. They are all excited about seeing "Dumb and Dumber" but feel obligated to watch "Selma" , because they've been told it is an important serious film. I think people who nominate best picture feel the same way - they can't nominate the films they actually like, and feel obligated to nominate films that have serious social messages. Just because a movie has a serious message doesn't mean that it is made well. There are a whole slew of Oscar winning movies from the 1980's that critics today consider to be boring and wonder how they ever won. (The Hurt Locker was indeed a dull boring movie but it had a woman director so it got a big push in Hollywood.)

 

[hungry101]

Ahh yes Gary. I remember when Shakespeare In Love was voted best picture over Saving Private Ryan.

Things are way worse now than in the past. Hollywood is so righteous, so preachy, sanctimonious and overly pious...these days they are more interested in delivering their left-wing message than entertainment. I much prefer some of the cable series such as Breaking Bad, GOT, Better Call Saul, Fargo and for comedy Curb Your Enthusiasm. I rarely consider the movies anymore. Dunkirk was OK. I remember a few years ago I really like 13 Hours which was panned for obvious reasons. Try that one Mike. It doesn't really even get into the politics.

 

[GaryH]

Ahh yes Gary. I remember when Shakespeare In Love was voted best picture over Saving Private Ryan.

Things are way worse now than in the past. Hollywood is so righteous, so preachy, sanctimonious and overly pious...these days they are more interested in delivering their left-wing message than entertainment. I much prefer some of the cable series such as Breaking Bad, GOT, Better Call Saul, Fargo and for comedy Curb Your Enthusiasm. I rarely consider the movies anymore. Dunkirk was OK. I remember a few years ago I really like 13 Hours which was panned for obvious reasons. Try that one Mike. It doesn't really even get into the politics.

Hungry , you must be reading my mind. Shakespeare in Love won and everyone was shocked. It made no sense. Even the major critics were stunned. In 1980, Ordinary People won -what a snoozefess - over Raging Bull. Has anyone gone back to watch Shakespeare in Love lately? I have given up on movies and much prefer the cable shows you mentioned - all great.
TV is actually better than the movies now.

I forgot another one - 1996 - Fargo loses to The English Patient. The English patient - almost 3 hours of a guy lying there dying looking over his past life. Someone put him and the audience out of our collective misery.

 

[Halloween Mike]

I understand your point and i totally agree with Seagal movies. I like them but i know there cheaply made and fully flawed.

But when it comes to big budget action movies, i feel they are "shy" in including movies with a lot of special effects. Yes they did at times but not that often.

I also understand a movie need to be judge on how well it was made and not only on popularity, but take for exemple the year The Dark Knight was released. This movie is awesome. And it should had won best movie period. I don't remember what released that year, hell was it not the year Hurt Locker won? I just remember it was around that time. The fact that a lady directed it should not matter ONE BIT as a factor to win.

As for Box Office i feel its weird to not include dvd sales, but whatever. It seem worldwide it made much more than Black Panther https://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/world/

Civil War for me had a weird feeling. I watched it and i felt when the movie kinda picked up, boom it ended... :/ I mean all the stuff of heroes vs heroes seem like scuffle to me and i was kinda waiting all movie to finally see the villain do something concrete and it kinda never happen. I found it disapointing a bit on that despite having some cool stuff.

As for reviewers... well i don't agree. I mean i don't need to know how beer is brew to enjoy it. A review is before anything a personal opinion on something. What count is the final product and not how its done.

 

[Kermit the Frog]

A bad movie will not draw at the box office, a good movie will draw a crowd. The higher the number of people that see the movie is a good indicator if it is good or bad.

 

[jalimon]

A bad movie will not draw at the box office, a good movie will draw a crowd. The higher the number of people that see the movie is a good indicator if it is good or bad.

Not true at all.

It only means it's a popular movie. Hence the new category. Most major blockbuster have almost no scenario, lots and lots a visual effect and are all made upon the same formula. Most people like these movies because they are easy to watch. The provide a bit of adrenaline I guess.

I hardly watch movies. Most recent great movie I saw was Molly's game. Before that? Maybe the hurt locker.

There is more quality in series now. I would watch Narcos over and over again againt's any blockbuster are that like fast food... easy to consume easy to forget

Cheers,

 

[Kermit the Frog]

To make it up into the top 10% of popularity it has to be enjoyed and recommended to others by word of mouth or by review. Certainly no bad movies have made it up to the top 10% highest grossing at the box office.

 

[Behaved]

To make it up into the top 10% of popularity it has to be enjoyed and recommended to others by word of mouth or by review. Certainly no bad movies have made it up to the top 10% highest grossing at the box office.

The Transformers series is the 13th highest grossing film franchise of all-time, Pirates of the Caribbean is 12th, Twilight is 17th and the DCEU is 14th...

 

[GaryH]

Hell if anything now when i see "nominated at the oscars" or something like that im cautious to rent them because i know its probably a long boring drama.

HM with probably the most truthful, insightful and helpful comment.