[...] Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is being touted as the best installment of the series so far. Some bloggers around the net are (gasp!) even floating the notion that the film is worthy an Oscar Nom for Best Picture. Of course many said the same thing about The Dark Knight around this time last year – but now that the Academy has widened the Best Picture catergory to a whopping ten nominees, Harry Potter might actually have the chance that Batman never did. [...]

[...] Dark Knight, you may have heard of it) narrowly missing out on a Best Pic nomination last year – a snub that many felt sore about. In that sense, I can see why they’re making this change – if [...]

[...] and Best Original Score (check out fellow Screen Rant writer Rob Keyes’ great article dealing with this very thing). Even though it still nabbed an impressive eight nominations those three are the ones which [...]

Planned to watch the oscars this year for the first time in years along with a number of friends, but now none of them want to see it and nither do I.

I’ve seen all the movies nominated except for Milk, which I plan on seeing soon and while I liked Slumdog Millionare and even Frost/Nixon, the other two are just soooooo BORING! Seriously Benjamin Button is way to long and WAY to boring. One of the main accomplishments of a movie is to hold the people watching in their seats and entertian them even if it’s heavy fare. Movies I’ve loved like JFK in example have done that, but Benjamin Button is a snore fest. The Reader is actually pretty bad, and I’m a huge Ralph Finnes fan but god that movie was terrible and once again boring. Seems like you put nazis in the movie and you get an instant nomination no matter how boring the movie is…unless Tom Cruise in the movie. Movies can artful and compelling without putting everyone to sleep.

Even without the Dark knight not getting best picture and director nod how could that haunting score not get nominated? That is one of the greatest scores ever in my opinion. Also hope Wally Pfister finally wins one, all his movies are always so beautiful…it’s about time, but then again it’s also time for Chris Nolan to get some respect, but of course that didn’t happen.

My comment was intended to point out the differences of what we ‘would’ be discussing had he not died vs. what we are discussing now that he is gone.

I agree with you on the quality of his performance. It was exceptional and mezmorizing to say the least.

The most exciting thing about the Oscars this year is that Brad and Angelina are both up for an Oscar and how cute their little Oscar babies will be if at least Brad wins.

Actually, I think that Brad is a great actor. Don’t be hatin’. Just because he’s beautiful doesn’t mean he can’t act. He was terrific in Meet Joe Black and Interview with the Vampire so it’d be cool if he’d win.

But other than that? I think the Oscars credibility is crap and I’m waiting for the obligatory expose movie by Michael Moore talking about how the Oscars are fixed. Oh wait, didn’t he win one? Never mind.

I just don’t think the Oscars represents what other actors really like. Just what they think they SHOULD be voting for and that’s any movie where an actor gets to show his “craft”.

I’ll take the Reader’s Digest version the day after. Who won the main catagories? Eh, I knew it. Glad I didn’t watch.

Dude you are clearly in the vast minority with regards to your opinion on the LOTR trilogy..The source material Jackson and company had to use for the films were three books and appendices that totalled over 1500 pages..trying to get that into three films let alone one was a very daunting task for the screenplay writers (Jackson, Walsh, & Boyens)..truth be told they probably could have made it into four or five movies with the amount of material they cut out..I loved the books and the movies as well and although I was not completely impressed by some of the changes they made to Tolkien’s story (the biggest for me was how they changed the Faromir storyline..he was the only man in the trilogy to truly resist the call of the ring)..I thought that Jackson did a great job of allowing the story to flow through the three films and they were really thought of as one big epic masterpiece of film making..It was not overrated and nor was TDK and these films will stand the test of time and in 20-30 years if talk surfaces of remaking them there will be a lot of discussion on why? WHy remake something that was timeless and almost perfect in it’s scope and story..But hey my opinion may be overrated but a vast majority of comments clearly think LOTR was a great piece of cinematic art..

Again to reiterate my points:

The trilogy was nominated for 30 Academy Awards.

It won 17 Academy Awards

ROTK won 11 Awards and won in every category it was nominated in..

FOTR & ROTK won BAFTA’s for best picture.

Hugo Awards for Best Dramatic Presentation categories..

LOTR was a lighter story huh?

Did you see the death of Boromir?

The appearance of the Orcs and Uruk-Hai was very creepy?

Gollum was a very dark and pitiful aspect of the story arc…

A dark lord wanting to dominate all life in Middle Earth..

Shelob…

The Ring Wraiths..

THe battle for Minas Tirith in ROTK..

Frodo’s battle for his life and will to destroy the ring..

Yeah it wasn’t a very dark or complex story at all.

Dude you are clearly in the vast minority with regards to your opinion on the LOTR trilogy..The source material Jackson and company had to use for the films were three books and appendices that totalled over 1500 pages..trying to get that into three films let alone one was a very daunting task for the screenplay writers (Jackson, Walsh, & Boyens)..truth be told they probably could have made it into four or five movies with the amount of material they cut out..I loved the books and the movies as well and although I was not completely impressed by some of the changes they made to Tolkien’s story (the biggest for me was how they changed the Faromir storyline..he was the only man in the trilogy to truly resist the call of the ring)..I thought that Jackson did a great job of allowing the story to flow through the three films and they were really thought of as one big epic masterpiece of film making..It was not overrated and nor was TDK and these films will stand the test of time and in 20-30 years if talk surfaces of remaking them there will be a lot of discussion on why? WHy remake something that was timeless and almost perfect in it’s scope and story..But hey my opinion may be overrated but a vast majority of comments clearly think LOTR was a great piece of cinematic art..

Again to reiterate my points:

1. The trilogy was nominated for 30 Academy Awards.

2. It won 17 Academy Awards

3. ROTK won 11 Awards and won in every category it was nominated in..

4. FOTR & ROTK won BAFTA’s for best picture.

5. Hugo Awards for Best Dramatic Presentation categories..

It made almost 3 billion dollars in worldwide box office for just three movies..

LOTR was a lighter story huh?

Did you see the death of Boromir?

The appearance of the Orcs and Uruk-Hai was very creepy?

Gollum was a very dark and pitiful aspect of the story arc…

A dark lord wanting to dominate all life in Middle Earth..

Shelob…

The Ring Wraiths..

THe battle for Minas Tirith in ROTK..

Frodo’s battle for his life and will to destroy the ring..

Yeah it wasn’t a very dark or complex story at all.

[...] After seeing the nominees for this year’s Razzie Awards, I’m beginning to think that the Razzie judges need to be given jobs on the Oscar selection committee. Maybe then the Oscar noms would be a little bit more spot-on. [...]

When the “For Your Consideration” campaign launched last November, it was vying for 15 different nominations. Below are the one’s it missed out on (*), with the noms it did receive.

*Best Picture
*Best Director
*Best Adapted Screenplay
*Best Actor
Best Supporting Actor
*Best Supporting Actress
Best Cinematography
Best Art Direction
Best Film Editing
*Best Original Score
*Best Costume Design
Best Makeup
Best Sound Mixing
Best Sound Editing
Best Visual Effects

[I'd like to note the "Best Picture" nominations are the same as the "Best Director" nominations. Not a rare occurrence, seeing how the Academy did this in 2005. And went 4 "Best Director" noms of 5 "Best Picture" noms in 2007, 2006, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2000, 1999, 1998. I stopped at 10 year mark, because it was getting obscene.]

Reason said it wouldn’t receive all of the nominations, but not out of the question was the top award for directors. After recognition at DGA, chances at an Oscar for Nolan became very real. He orchestrated a note-worthy, layered film but also a blockbuster at the box office–a rare achievement only done twice before, by Peter Jackson (ROTK) and James Cameron (Titanic), respectively.

He piece wasn’t an unlikely tale like ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ or escapism as in ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.’ Nor was it a story of bringing elected officials to justice or seeing past people’s personal preference. It was more than that.

Unlike any of films that were nominated, ‘The Dark Knight’ played on the fears of terrorism that plagued its widespread audience. With a chilling antagonist, whose agenda was to “watch the world burn,” moviegoers witnessed the corruption of “decent men in an indecent time.” Civilized citizens selfishly chose to sink a boat of human beings–although criminal–to save their own lives, and a newly elected district attorney became the villain he vowed to fight. And finally, it was about a masked vigilante defeating an “unstoppable force” without “burn[ing] the forest down.” And the hero’s reward, becoming the villain, the citizens now hunt.

As exemplified by the 8 given, tied for third in highest number of nominations, it’s clear the Academy loved every aspect of this film. But they hesitated when it came to handing out the “Best Picture” and “Best Director” nomination.

Vic

It was me who mentioned the popularity contest aspect of the oscars in the article, not Vic I got that notion from listening to Kevin Smith talk about how it works as he’s part of the academy.

@ Kahless,

Vic mentioned the same thing about the absence of Gran Torino but I’m glad it’s not in there personally.

I watched that last week and thought it was very ordinary. Most of the other actors and the dialogue was horrid. Ya the redemption thing was cool, but how the film played out was not special in any way I thought and all of the stereotypes were so blatant and overplayed (made worse by the bad dialogue and acting).

Not to overly bash it, but the song at the end was rediculous too IMO.