CORRECTING OSCAR’S DUMBEST MISTAKES

So here we are with the second part of this series as promised with quite a few corrections to some bonkers Oscar decisions, most of which happened during the nineties, when really, there’s no excuse for it, we’ve all been around for quite some time and they should be more than capable of getting it right.  So here we go...

1994 BEST ORIGINAL SCORE:  REAL WINNER:  JOHN WILLIAMS -SCHINDLER’S LIST.  MY WINNER:  MICHAEL NYMAN - THE PIANO

This first one is one I am loathe to do.  I love John Williams.  In my lifetime he has been my movie soundtrack guy; “Jaws”, “Star Wars”, “Superman the Movie”, “E.T.”, “Jurassic Park” and “Harry Potter” have all benefitted from his stunning soundtracks and during all these years he has also done countless others.  But during this year there was another horse that should have been in the stalls, and, if it had, would surely have pipped the legendary Mister Williams.  As I’ve said previously with the Oscars sometimes they don’t even have the fastest horse on the track and I can certainly justify that this year.  

“The Piano” was a film were the music itself was a key component in its success.  Like Holly Hunter, Anna Paquin, Sam Neill and Harvey Keitel the music feels like a fifth performer.  “The Piano” was nominated for best picture and the music is an intrinsic part of that.  If the music had sucked then you could have blown that nomination out of your arse!  The reality is that it works and it works beautifully, it has to, and because of that it would be crazy to think that it wouldn’t get nominated, but it didn’t.  But here on my blog we are not about what did happen, we are about what could and should have happened.  So my revised Oscar for best original score goes to Michael Nyman.  Michael, over to you...

Michael Nyman:  Plink, plonk, plink, plonk.  Plo-plink, plonk, plink, plonk.  Plonk, plink, plink, plonk.  Plo-plink, plonk, plink.  Pli-plonk, plink, plonk, plink.  Plonk, plink, plonk.  Plink plonk plink.  Plink, plonk, plink.  Plink, plonk, plink.

Me:  Beautiful, Michael.  Just beautiful.

1995 BEST PICTURE.  REAL WINNER:  FORREST GUMP.  MY WINNER:  PULP FICTION.

Oh boy, it’s gonna be hard not to rant on this one but I will try.  In the past there have been many times when critics have disputed the best picture winner, “Oliver”/”2001:  A Space Odyssey”, “Annie Hall”/”Star Wars”, “Ordinary People”/”Raging Bull”, “Chariots of Fire”/”Raiders of the Lost Ark”, “Dances with Wolves”/”Goodfellas” and even “The Kings Speech”/”The Social Network”.  However in all these cases the films that did win were at least good.  This year though was arguably the first year were the best picture winner was a turd! 

Amazingly this is the year were the academy had two of the best films of all time to choose from and could’ve gone either way, but didn’t.  While “The Shawshank Redemption” was a sleeper, “Pulp Fiction” was the coolest kid on the block.  It was the bad boy at school wearing a leather jacket and sleeping with the girls in the fifth year while only on the fourth.  It was the film a thousand film students wished they’d made but only Quintin Tarentino could.  “Pulp Fiction” was and still is a powerful film with far more to say than the critics give it credit for.  Like the previously mentioned film, Pulp is a film about redemption and all the characters within the film are redeemed, save one, who is killed by the fact that they learn nothing.  Many people don’t see this as they seem to be incapable of rejigging the pieces in their head and seeing the whole story.  Now many of you might think I’m some guy who just spouts what the film critics say, but in this case it was far from.

When I saw the trailer for Pulp I was not interested, in fact I loathed the very look of it; and when I eventually went to see it I went with my arms folded and a scowl on my face.  I was sure gonna have an opinion on it but if it was going to impress me it would have to work bloody hard!  It did.  In the lobby that night there was a stand with four different Pulp posters.  Before the film nobody cared, after the film there was a mini melee to get them (I got ALL four!)  The strangest thing about Pulp though was that although the subject matter was quite harrowing sitting through Forrest Gump earlier that year was more of an ordeal (I hate those “It’s-okay-to-mock-the-disabled-oh-wait-they’re-actually-really-good-at-sports” patronising movies.  Hate them!)

So when the Oscars came round I like most people thought it would be a walk in the park for Pulp.  The first shock of the night came when Martin Landau won Best Supporting Actor for Ed Wood (leading to Samuel L Jackson’s famous mouthing “shit”.  Brilliant!)  Then of course Gump picked up awards for best actor (er...really?) and Best Director (this year Best Director must have meant best direction of badly faked film clips with celebrity voices so badly faked they looked like they should be on “The Simpsons”).  But then came the final insult of the night, the coup-de-ville or something.  Best Picture went to Forrest Gump.    The film critics were stunned, the media were stunned, the audience were stunned.  It was, even more so than Raiders/Chariots, the biggest Oscar travesty of all time.  

But on this blog we are all about making the world right, so Mr Tarentino, here is your award.  Please take to the stage.

Quentin:  Well it’s about F****** time, you M***** F******!  I couldn’t F****** believe it when they F****** said that Forrest F****** Gump had F****** won best F****** picture.  I mean for F*** sake, what do I F****** have to F****** do to F****** get the F****** Oscar I deserve.  Mike, F****** thanks!

Me:  Er ...I think the F words mean friendly.

1998 BEST ACTOR:  REAL WINNER:  JACK NICHOLSON (AS GOOD AS IT GETS)  MY WINNER:  RUSSELL CROWE (L.A. CONFIDENTIAL)

Boy, how much does the academy struggle with films that are big on ensemble acting.  It’s like there’s so much good acting going on they can’t actually tell who is doing what?  In 1999 this is what happened with Curtis Hanson’s superior thriller, “L.A. Confidential”.  The funny thing is though that it wasn’t just the academy that was bamboozled by this one.  Almost all of the principals got nominated at one ceremony or other across the globe and they did win a few, but now, looking back, it is easy to see what I could see at the time.  Russell Crowe is stunning in this film.  From the first scene teaching a parole violator a lesson through to the final frantic gun-fight.  Crowe’s Bud White is hero and villain from one minute to the next, liked by the audience and hated another in equal measure, but without it ever feeling fake.  Crowe’s White’s truth is always to himself and we are never in any doubt of that.  Having grown up in a particularly grim neighbourhood I can say with absolute certainty that his portrayal of a man with a switch in his head is frighteningly accurate.

However the Oscars are of course notoriously political and in this year Jack Nicholson just happened to appear in one of the biggest stinkers of his career, the terrible “Mars Attacks” in which he played a dual role and wasn’t particularly good in either.  However he also starred in “As good as it gets”, a mediocre comedy at best, (If ever there was proof that the universe has a sense of irony this was it,) which for some reason garnered a fair few nominations, and thanks to one of the weakest best Actor fields in years he picked up his least deserved Oscar to date.  However I am here to correct these mistakes and so it’s now my pleasure to welcome self-confessed chatter-box, Russell Crowe, Russell, here’s your award.

Russell:  Thanks.  (Leaves stage)

Mike:  Aah, you just can’t shut him up, can you?

1998 BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:  ROBIN WILLIAMS - GOOD WILL HUNTING.  MY WINNER:  ROBERT FORSTER - JACKIE BROWN.

Okay, so for many this is going to be the most contentious of all my revisions as this was a popular winner in its year but I’m not doing this just to suck up to the popular vote, ( ♬ It’s my party and I’ll award where I want to!  ��) and this is one that I do feel most passionate about.

When Robin Williams was nominated for “Good Will Hunting” it was his fourth nomination.  He had previously been nodded for “Good Morning, Vietnam”, “Dead Poets Society” and “The Fisher King” and although great in all 3 he had also been well beaten in each of the years concerned (although with that in mind we could also discuss Hopkins’ best actor award for “Silence” but lets save that for another day) so when he was nominated for “Good Will” it must have felt like the easiest decision ever for the academy (if there’s one thing they don’t like it’s multiple award nominees who don’t go on to win ...It leaves a horrible unfinished feeling in the academy’s mouth.)

But this year there was a proverbial Spaniard in the works.  This year an actor that no-one expected to do something spectacular did something spectacular.  Robert Forster in “Jackie Brown” is awe-inspiring and puts in a performance that simply gets better with age.  In “Jackie Brown” he is the emotionless middle-aged man going through life who’s unexpected meeting with a woman who smashes through his life with the force of a train crash awakens thing inside him that he is incapable of controlling (I adore him leaving about 3 different numbers for her to contact him.  It is one of the sweetest movie moments ever!) by contrast Robin Williams’ emotional range is limited in “Good Will Hunting” due to the nature of the role he is playing.  However Robert Forster’s Max Cherry is whole calvacade of emotions, but it is all topped off (Like the cherry of his name) by a stony facade that hides a lot but is still possible to see through the cracks emerging, 


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in fact the final scene where Max watches Jackie leave is like witnessing a man stepping outside his own body and watching himself die.  
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But in this year Robert had no chance of winning.  Simply put, it was Robin’s turn.  But on my blog I make the rules.  Robert step forward for your award.

Robert:  (Stony faced)  This is the proudest moment of my life.  (walks off)

Me:  Makes it all worthwhile.


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2000 BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY:  REAL WINNER:  ALAN BALL - AMERICAN BEAUTY.  MY WINNER:  CHARLIE KAUFMAN -  BEING JOHN MALKOVICH

Hollywood has in its time produced many great Jewish screenwriters.  One thinks of Billy Wilder, Mel Brooks, Neil Simon and Woody Allen instantly (well you do if you’re me!)  To that previous list another name can now be added, Charlie Kaufman.  Over the years Charlie has developed a knack for creating film scripts that challenge our ideas on identity and hat it means to be human.  His first such screenplay, amazingly, was the one here, and what a stunning debut it was.  In all my time as a film buff I have never seen anything that comes close to the inventiveness and surreality of “Being John Malkovich”.  Simply put, as a screenwriting debut it is simply unsurpassed.  But as I’ve said before the Oscars are a strange beast and if they have their favourites one year they tend to walk away with all the big prizes when perhaps sometimes the more outlandish, but also the more deserving films, get overlooked.  But not here.  I am here to amend such oversights and so it is that I say, Charlie, take the stage.

Charlie?

Oh.

I’ve just been passed a note from Charlie’s Mum saying he hates award ceremonies and isn’t coming out to play.

And you know what?  That’s it.  We are done with our revising and for my next Oscar blog I will be looking at the surprise decisions that were actually pretty bold.

Till next time.

Indiana Jones, Adieu!

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All celebrity interviews are fake and no celebrity comments are real

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