Academy Awards 2017 - Oscar Night: In the Pale Moonlight

[Week]

Just now, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

I'm sorry but what about what I said was so offensive to you? 

That moonlight might actually not be anything more than a serviceable movie?

No problem with this opinion. I really liked it, but I agree that I wasn't floored (nor was I floored by Argo, The King's Speech, The Artist, etc).

Just now, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

that terrified of controversy hollywood might give out awards based not on quality but to look good?

::roll eyes:: This is the shit.

Just now, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

That instead of trying to respond to what I said and tell me why I am wrong you instead tried to shut it down with dismissal, just shows what I'm talking about. At least it was better than a vomit emoticon 

You are welcome to your opinion. Other people have voiced that it is an ugly look and then you've complained. If you didn't whine about getting called out for an unpopular opinion (deserving so) then there would be much less furor about it. No big whoop.

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

1 minute ago, Week said:

No problem with this opinion. I really liked it, but I agree that I wasn't floored (nor was I floored by Argo, The King's Speech, The Artist, etc).

::roll eyes:: This is the shit.

You are welcome to your opinion. Other people have voiced that it is an ugly look and then you've complained. If you didn't whine about getting called out for an unpopular opinion (deserving so) then there would be much less furor about it. No big whoop.

Well you can disagree with an opinion, that's fine. But to make a suggestion it is obnoxious or ugly is making wild assumptions about it that go beyond disagreement. Its shutting someone down

[Week]

Just now, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

Well you can disagree with an opinion, that's fine. But to make a suggestion it is obnoxious or ugly is making wild assumptions about it that go beyond disagreement. Its shutting someone down

Disagree on that opinion as well. To each our own.

Agree that there is plenty that Hollywood needs to acknowledge year-round as opposed to simply at an awards ceremony. Also, it was pretty hard to watch the dancing/musical numbers while waiting to see whether The White Helmets was going to win or not.

Re: Emma Stone controversy that was mentioned earlier. She played Allison Ng in Aloha - the character was 1/4 hawaiian and 1/4 chinese - she did comment on regretting the role (although the justification offered is pretty weak move). Don't see anything about her "seeking" roles for WOC as was mentioned earlier https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jul/17/emma-stone-admits-her-casting-in-aloha-was-misguided

[Jaxom 1974]

12 minutes ago, KiDisaster said:

There was a duplicate Best Actress envelope apparently. Pricewaterhouse screwed up. 

While it was a screw up, the duplicate envelopes is apparently the SOP.  They have two depending on which side the presenters come from off stage.  This the second one.

[Cas Stark]

I kind of agree that this is Beatty and Dunaway not being able to think on their feet.  If your envelop says Emma Stone, best actress...then you need to wait a couple more beats until someone back stage can give you the correct one.  It isn't rocket science that if what is written on the envelop doesn't conform to the actual award:  Best Picture....there is a problem.  Although it did look like Beatty was trying to stall for a few seconds.  Terrible fuck up all around.

[Castel]

1 hour ago, Risto said:

Well, TBH, I don't find any of the movies of this year Oscar-worthy. Just to think that "Moonlight" or "La La Land" are considered worthy of winning and last year, "Carol" wasn't even nominated shows us a deep fault in the system. 

And, I would agree that Moonlight is a good movie, baity enough for the Oscar voters. I would have voted for "Arrival" but nonetheless, it is not unworthy winner.

That said, and I am really not dismissing it, one has to question Academy. Two years in row, we have 0/20 for POB actors, and last night we got 2 (and we could have easily went with 3 or 4). Were POB actors doing nothing those 2 years, or was it something else? 

Simply, when Hollywood wants to make a point, they make a point. And they are rarely subtle about it. It is not a diversity win, but we can't so easily dismiss the possibility that at least some members were inclined to present themselves and Academy in the best possible light.

 

Alternatively; Hollywood as a whole has an issue with diversity and there was a perfect storm of both a lean year and a lack of luck/concern from the Academy (I wouldn't write that off until I see) for the diverse roles that did exist and filtered up.

I mean, we can talk about those years and what got snubbed to see

 

This year, you had Moonlight and Denzel, who has more street cred than most people in the industry. Quelle surprise.

 

Quote

 

It is not lazy... It is just how Hollywood operates... Remember the "Birdman". These movies have a long history with Academy.

 

 

 

I mean...this is what I mean by "lazy". Any explanation for why La La Land was nominated is non-existent, and we go back to  just saying "well, it's what the Academy does!". La La Land is a nostalgic film, but not really a movie big on Hollywood. Half the movie (or half of the character motivation) is about jazz, and going back to some golden age of "jazz". Hollywood as a place and the movies as a big thing barely show up really. 

Arguably Gosling's nostalgia is a more prominent feature of the film.

It's nowhere near as Hollywood focused a film as Hail Caesar!,which is on the complete opposite end of the spectrum (now, that's a movie that loves Hollywood), made by Oscar darlings the Coens who got nothing.

But, because the narrative is framed you can easily slot LLL into that space.

Another explanation is just that it was a good movie made by an up and comer who's already been nominated a few years ago (Inarritu has similarly been nominated as far back as fifteen years ago)

[HexMachina]

Does the envelope actually say best actress? Or just Emma Stone, LaLa Land? Either way its a stupid easily avoidable error, but the former is slightly less stupid

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

51 minutes ago, Risto said:

I understand both sides... I mean, @Relic has the point. It is not fair to people who have worked very hard to get there. And knowing how difficult it can be, it is a bit tacky to destroy the pinnacle of one's career with this kind of talk.

On the other side, discussion about Hollywood presenting itself as an open, diverse place while at the same time acting differently throughout the year, is, IMHO, valid.

Was it indeed a Best Actress envelope? It seems that Emma Stone said on press conference that she was holding her envelope all night. It seems that she implied that what said on the other envelope wasn't her name. 

Risto,

Check out this CNN link it has a close up that shows clearly Beatty and Dunnaway were holding an evelope marked "Best Actress in a motion picture".

http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/entertainment/gallery/oscar-announcement-mistake/index.html

[Relic]

 

Large Mirror Brought Out Onto Oscars Stage Gets Resounding 6-Minute Standing Ovation

http://www.theonion.com/article/large-mirror-brought-out-oscars-stage-gets-resound-55387

[Cas Stark]

36 minutes ago, HelenaExMachina said:

Does the envelope actually say best actress? Or just Emma Stone, LaLa Land? Either way its a stupid easily avoidable error, but the former is slightly less stupid

I'm sure it has to say the category name, otherwise, the actors would be constantly forgetting if it was best actor or supporting actor.  So, yes, doubly stupid, although the presenters shouldn't have been put in a position to think on their feet like that by being given the wrong envelop, but good lord...come on, it's not like Emma Stone was a producer or something on LaLa Land.  Oy.

[Dr. Pepper]

2 hours ago, HelenaExMachina said:

What roles has Emma Stine gone after that should have gone to WOC? Aside from LaLa Land (which i will come to in a moment) i cant think of any, but i may be forgetting some. Was there one or more you had in mind? 

As for LaLa Land, its unfair to characterise Stone as shoeing hostility to WOC because she got the lead. From bits that have come out in the news it sounds like this was never likely to have a black lead - the problem is with the casting, not the actors/actresses that audition. 

As for whether she deserved the Oscar, well i havent seen many of the films so i cant judge fairly. But I would have given the award to Portman over Stone, based on the films i did manage to see

Emma Stone took a part in Aloha in which she played an Asian/Pacific Islander.  She's neither of those things.

Then she took a part in this movie.  It couldn't be clearer to me that she's aggressively hostile to WOC.  Whether or not La La Land was ever going to cast a black lead is beside the point.  I'm not a black woman so I would never consider taking a role that should go to a black woman.  That would be doubly true if the casting director indicates that they will not cast a black woman in a part that should go to her.  I wouldn't want to work with people like that.  It's very fair to identify Stone's hostility towards WOC because she purposely chose to audition for and accept the lead in this film, much like she purposely chose to audition for and accept leads in other films.  Sure, the casting is at fault too, but it's not like Stone is innocent here.

 

[Channel4s-JonSnow]

13 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Emma Stone took a part in Aloha in which she played an Asian/Pacific Islander.  She's neither of those things.

Then she took a part in this movie.  It couldn't be clearer to me that she's aggressively hostile to WOC.  Whether or not La La Land was ever going to cast a black lead is beside the point.  I'm not a black woman so I would never consider taking a role that should go to a black woman.  That would be doubly true if the casting director indicates that they will not cast a black woman in a part that should go to her.  I wouldn't want to work with people like that.  It's very fair to identify Stone's hostility towards WOC because she purposely chose to audition for and accept the lead in this film, much like she purposely chose to audition for and accept leads in other films.  Sure, the casting is at fault too, but it's not like Stone is innocent here.

 

So by your logic Samuel L Jackson is hostile to white people for playing Nick Fury, Idris Elba is hostile to white people for playing a norse god in Thor , and Will Smith is some sort of white hater for being in Wild Wild West, I am Legend and I Robot. 

[C Rutherford]

1 hour ago, Risto said:

I understand both sides... I mean, @Relic has the point. It is not fair to people who have worked very hard to get there. And knowing how difficult it can be, it is a bit tacky to destroy the pinnacle of one's career with this kind of talk.

On the other side, discussion about Hollywood presenting itself as an open, diverse place while at the same time acting differently throughout the year, is, IMHO, valid.

Was it indeed a Best Actress envelope? It seems that Emma Stone said on press conference that she was holding her envelope all night. It seems that she implied that what said on the other envelope wasn't her name. 

 

My understanding is that Price-Waterhouse has their two people and each has a breifcase with a full set of winning envelopes.  Each stands on either side just off stage and hands off the envelope.  So Emma got hers and then the next category got handed the same envelope.

I'm more amazed if this is the case (no pun intended), that it has not happened before this.  The release about the two briefcases makes no sense in terms of having a control or verification since they toss through both.  It would make more sense to have two briefcases with one only being the one drawn on to presenters and the other with a Price WaterHouse person using to verify what the person on stage is saying.  Also big huge glaring labels both inside and out of the envelope declaring what category it is for would go a long way towards making the process a bit less glitch friendly.  Spend 200 bucks on envelopes and maybe adjust the font size on your printer for, oh, no bucks.

More than likely the whole thing could have been avoided had Price Waterhouse not catered, well I'm assuming here but I see no other reason, to the frou frou producers who always make sure they take home Emmys for the long winded crap they put out each year.  So they could have a "wonderful" production with presenters coming from either side to keep the whole event fresh and exciting.  Because I know there is one thing an audience hates, it is presenters always entering from one side of the stage and exiting to the other.  Why it might cut in to stupid bits that aren't funny or musical montages that often have little to do with the actual nominees.  And what would the Oscars be without someone getting confused and trying to exit from the wrong side?  Instead of making it easy and having everyone enter one side and exit the other.  You could even put up huge signs that say Exit and Wrong Way just out of sight. 

I'm basing this snideness on the tweet attributed to the one Price Waterhouse guy who was there but tweeted the two briefcase thing before the snafu occured.

[dbunting]

According to Warren Beatty he said when he opened the envelop he saw Emma Stone, La La Land and he paused, which on video you see happens. He said he was trying to figure out what was wrong Faye grabbed it and read La La Land out loud and assumed it was all good. In the interview you can tell Warren doesn't want to call out Faye for not reading the whole thing.

[Fragile Bird]

12 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

 

Then she took a part in this movie.  It couldn't be clearer to me that she's aggressively hostile to WOC.  Whether or not La LaLand was ever going to cast a black lead is beside the point.  I'm not a black woman so I would never consider taking a role that should go to a black woman.  That would be doubly true if the casting director indicates that they will not cast a black woman in a part that should go to her.  I wouldn't want to work with people like that.  It's very fair to identify Stone's hostility towards WOC because she purposely chose to audition for and accept the lead in this film, much like she purposely chose to audition for and accept leads in other films.  Sure, the casting is at fault too, but it's not like Stone is innocent here.

 

I couldn't disagree more. Emma Stone is an actor, she got a casting call, she attended, she won the part. Why should she have turned it down?  Why in God's name  would you say it was a part that should have gone to a POC? The movie is Damien Chazelle's vision, not yours. He wrote it, he directed it.

[Cas Stark]

1 minute ago, Fragile Bird said:

I couldn't disagree more. Emma Stone is an actor, she got a casting call, she attended, she won the part. Why should she have turned it down?  Why in God's name  would you say it was a part that should have gone to a POC? The movie is Damien Chazelle's vision, not yours. He wrote it, he directed it.

I thought I was missing something, like maybe it was based on a novel or a play where the main character(s) were not white, but that isn't the case, it's an original work, both written and directed by Chazelle, so Emma Stone is his vision of who he wanted in the role.

[Castel]

5 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

I couldn't disagree more. Emma Stone is an actor, she got a casting call, she attended, she won the part. Why should she have turned it down?  Why in God's name  would you say it was a part that should have gone to a POC? The movie is Damien Chazelle's vision, not yours. He wrote it, he directed it.

I'm not even sure why LLL's female lead would go to a black woman. If you want to make the argument about jazz then it would be Ryan Gosling's role that would be cast with a black man, nothing about Emma Stone's role necessitates it.

Not that I even buy that criticism in the first place, given that John Legend and his mainly black band and everyone at Seb's represents Jazz as nowhere near a "white" art form.

We can argue about Aloha but I've always found the racial critiques of La La Land to be especially...perfunctory. It's like people think there should be a racial critique and work backwards.

[Dr. Pepper]

20 minutes ago, Triskan said:

That is...a very particular accusation.  Even if it's true about the roles, to say that it's coming from a place of hostility is quite pointed.

What do you mean 'even if it's true about the roles"?  It is true.  I mean, a basic google search will bring it up.

POC, especially WOC, have very few roles in Hollywood.  It's a problem with white folks are cast in those roles that should be offered to POC.  When a white woman does it not once but TWICE, that's intentional and aggressive hostility.  I don't buy her naivety the first time, but whatever, I'll pretend I do.  She was criticized widely for it so she knew better but still did it again.  

18 minutes ago, Channel4s-JonSnow said:

So by your logic Samuel L Jackson is hostile to white people for playing Nick Fury, Idris Elba is hostile to white people for playing a norse god in Thor , and Will Smith is some sort of white hater for being in Wild Wild West, I am Legend and I Robot. 

Not the same thing at all, but not surprised you don't get it.  

9 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

I couldn't disagree more. Emma Stone is an actor, she got a casting call, she attended, she won the part. Why should she have turned it down?  Why in God's name  would you say it was a part that should have gone to a POC? The movie is Damien Chazelle's vision, not yours. He wrote it, he directed it.

Um, because people should turn down jobs that are inappropriate and harmful.  

I'm a teacher.  I get a call for a teaching job.  Turns out it's a gig to indoctrinate children with an anti-science, pro-bigot agenda.  Would you express shock if I turn it down?  Would you be similarly confused if I turn around and criticize the people who created that job for doing it to begin with?

This is what I'm criticizing Stone for (and other actors who do it, including Gosling, btw)).  Whoever wrote it and directed it is worthy of condemnation, too.  It's pretty clear Hollywood is going to keep throwing money behind these stories because leading white actors and actresses will keep filling the roles despite how very wrong it is.  It needs to stop.  

[polishgenius]

2 hours ago, Relic said:

However, this snafu yesterday illustrates something pretty clearly. Most Hollywood stars are dumb as fuck.

Most Hollywood stars are dumb as fuck because two people (as has been pointed out, older people, which may or may not have made a difference) got caught off-balance, in essentially a time-pressure situation and watched by the world, by a mistake they didn't make that they couldn't have seriously been expected to predict? Come on man.


Also: while Emma Stone's casting in Aloha was a crock of shit and she has to bear her share of the responsibility of that, the idea that she's obviously aggressively hostile to WoC because she was in LaLa Land seems bonkers to me. Unless there was some message in it that I haven't heard about (since I've not seen it yet) but if that was really the case surely there'd have been a furore about it by now?

[Relic]

Just now, polishgenius said:

Most Hollywood stars are dumb as fuck because two people (as has been pointed out, older people, which may or may not have made a difference) got caught off-balance, in essentially a time-pressure situation and watched by the world, by a mistake they didn't make that they couldn't have seriously been expected to predict? Come on man.

Actually meant to say "reinforces" and not "illustrates". And yes, Hollywood A listers are dumber than a bucket of bricks, with a few exceptions.