Oscars 2019 thread.

[ursus arctos]

Useful précis of Green Book's issues

"Green Book" is the worst best picture Oscar winner since “Crash,” and I don’t make the comparison lightly.

Like that 2005 movie, Peter Farrelly’s interracial buddy dramedy is insultingly glib and hucksterish, a self-satisfied crock masquerading as an olive branch. It reduces the long, barbaric and ongoing history of American racism to a problem, a formula, a dramatic equation that can be balanced and solved. “Green Book” is an embarrassment; the film industry’s unquestioning embrace of it is another.

[Aitch]

I thought the trouble with Green Book was that it was a feel good film you shouldn't want to feel good about. So all the emotions and sensitivities are watered down to make them acceptable to a comfortable audience and the clichés are played up. The resultant hackneyed bromance has two men acting as noble savages in a world that doesn't understand them. Yawn.

[ad hoc]

I ought to make it clear that saying Green Book is one tenth the film that Roma is, is actually a compliment I'd put Roma up with Citizen Kane as one of the most impressive "uses of film as an artistic medium" in the history of cinema

[San Bernardhinault]

Green Book's perfectly fine to watch. But the content is basically "We used to have racism in America, and that could be overcome with the help of a white dude." I'm not sure it should have been winning any Oscars.

[ursus arctos]

It's the film version of Roberts' opinion in the Voting Rights Act case.

Directed and produced by a guy who promoted the "Jersey City Muslims Celebrated 9/11" crap

[WOM]

I have real issues with Green Book being discounted or minimized because it isn't an accurate portrayal of the black experience, or its being inaccurate to its setting or its historical time or its source material or purported message, etc. The film is what the film is. That's not why it shouldn't have won.

By all accounts, it simply couldn't hold a candle to some of the other nominees. That's what people should be talking about.

[ursus arctos]

I don't get that at all.

If Akiro Kurosawa came back from the dead and directed a typically brilliant film apologia for the Tokyo Sarin attacks inspired by Aum Shinrikyo propaganda, I would not support it for Best Picture or any other award.

[WOM]

I don't think it's Oscar-worthiness depends on its historical / cultural accuracy. I think that's an odd measure.

[San Bernardhinault]

It's not the accuracy that's the problem with Green Book. It's that it's the black experience of racism in America all seen through the lens of white men. It's that the black man's problems are redeemed and solved by a white man. It's that it paints black identity in America as being basically about eating fried chicken. And it's that while it talks about racism in America (in a very heavy handed way), it does so in a way that makes sure that it's completely separate and unrelated to modern America with a nice safe distance of time, and we're comfortable that the racism is all in the past - Nobody needs a Green Book now.

None of this would matter very much if it was the kind of film you watched on a Thursday evening on Netflix, and were entertained by. It does matter when it's being voted as the very best film of the year.

[WOM]

Okay, I see what you're saying in that regard. Kinda like a 'Hallmark' movie of the week about love being a poor representation of a real-life marriage.

[G-Man]

Best moment of the show: Trevor Noah speaking Xhosa, translating it to mean some guff when what he said was: "The white people don't know I'm lying to them."

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Spike Lee turned his back when Green book won. I don't think he was impressed. (and I don't think it was because he didn't win)

I haven't seen any of these movies, but I'm delighted that Olivia Colman won an oscar. I don't care if she deserved it or not. They should give more oscars to people involved in peep show.

[WOM]

Spike Lee is a Grade A shit.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Admittedly my positive response to Green Book came after a number of “warnings” against it. I often find that- no-one else likes it, you find the value in it; the world loves it... meh
but I defend the pretty mediocre Bohemian Rhapsody because if you’re old enough to remember/vaguely like Queen, Mesut Ozil’s (sorry...) performance is great and it does a competent job;

I will defend GB because BOTH performances are extraordinarily good and the costumes are great and the script really gets the job done...and, yes, it’s a bit “liberal movie that Hollywood likes” but it’s also a true fucking story, one that doesn’t hide the white character’s racism whereas, much as I enjoyed Black KKK, ITS deception/artifice is far worse, presenting a black cop who infiltrated the black movement as an unambiguous hero (who gets the cool black chick) and for all Spike throws Trump’s USA at us to make it powerful and relevant, that really sticks in the throat

[G-Man]

I enjoyed Blackkklansman, but for a movie that ends with a sermon over reality footage, it seems a strange decision to alter something as basic as the timeline of the story it's based on. I can see why Lee might have liked to create a mood of Naturals, Black Panthers and early '70s soul, but doing so at the expense of reflecting the authenticity of the story you are telling? You don't get movies about Hitler set in the 1950s because you want the SS goosestep to "See You Later, Alligator".

[Bored Of Education]

Having not seen it, is Mortenson genuinely the leading actor and Ali the supporting actor?

[ad hoc]

Yes.

It's not like Philadelphia when Hanks won the leading actor award for a film in which Denzel Washington was the lead

[San Bernardhinault]

Arguably that's part of the problem - the book was written by the bloke Mortensen plays so it inevitably means that the Mortensen character is the lead and the focus of the story. But that means that it's racism looked at through the prism of a white observer

[WOM]

There was no book. The script was co-written by the son of the driver character, along with director Farrelly. And any story is seen through the lens of the teller. That's not necessarily a drawback...it's just their perspective.

[San Bernardhinault]

Fair enough. But it's clear that the story is mostly about the Mortensen character. Which...etc etc...

[Ray de Galles]

I see it as more of a genuine two-hander with co-leads. The decision to put forward Mortensen as lead and Ali as supporting actor seems to be geared towards awards politics and not splitting the vote between them in one category. The story is told from Mortenson's perspective and he's in pretty much every scene so he gets the nod.

[WOM]

Sure...and the Sopranos is mostly about Tony. I don't see the issue.

[Ray de Galles]

No, I don't have one. Just explaining why one would be terms "lead" actor and one "supporting" for awards. 'Green Book' is far more about a central duo than 'Sopranos' though, by the by.

[WOM]

Sorry...I was responding to SB. You slipped in...

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

I've heard Green book described as "Driving Miss Daisy 2: This time the white one drives"

is that fair? I remember being very uncomfortable watching that movie as a child.