OSCARS: Final Ballots Delivered, Backup Ready To Go
By Norm Schrager at February 1, 2008 | 12:36 am | Print
Are you an Academy Award voter? If yes, go look in your mailbox. The final Oscar ballots have officially been sent and the vaunted Academy is looking for you to chime in.
Will you go with the American classic style of No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood? Will you choose the so-called ”quirkiness” of Juno? The epic war stage of Atonement? The acting-driven searing drama of Michael Clayton?
Do you, Oscar voter, know who you are? No, we don’t mean individually — though if you’ve been in Hollywood long enough, your brain may be clouded enough to wonder. We mean, as a group. You are one of 5,829 voting members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (man, I love the “sciences” part).
And if you vote in any of the following categories, you have to confirm that you went to the mandatory screenings: Best Documentary, Best Documentary Short Subject, Best Foreign Language film, Best Animated Short, and Best Live Action Short. So does that mean you don’t have to confirm you’ve seen the Best Picture nominees?! What a crock. Talk about getting to “mail it in”…
THE RED CARPET… ROLL IT OUT OR
ROLL IT UP?
So after the votes are tallied — in a process exceedingly more secure and accurate than the one we’ll use to elect a President in November — what about the big show? According to the BBC, if the WGA writers’ strike halts festivities, there’s a backup show in the works. It would include lots of clips. Uh huh. Sounds like a glorified AFI special.
Academy president Sid Ganis said “there’s an obligation to the art form to present the Oscars.” Double uh huh. I say kill the show. Perhaps it’ll give those mired in the excess and self-importance of the Oscars a few hours to think of something else.
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(thanks indieWIRE)
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