Massacre Justified!

So. I thought I'd flesh out my approach to the whole oscar nomination business. Given that I tend to react somewhat viscerally when viewing certain productions, I've spent the last little while analyzing my whole critiquing process (yeah, like I have a process), and I think I've traced the roots back to my limited knowledge of the always-chaotic movie making process. Here it is - bear with me.

There are three big stages that happen when creating a film. First stage is pre-production, i.e. everything that needs happen in order to actually film the movie. This means a script writer needs to write a script, the set designer needs to locate and/or build all the sets in the script, the art director needs to design/find/buy everything that's actually going to be in the scenes, and the costume designer needs to make/buy every item of clothing worn in the film. More importantly, perhaps, is the producer, who hires all these people to do all these things (and more) and simultaneously secures the financing and the distribution of the film.

Production (the next stage) starts when the cameras start to roll. This is when the actors do their acting thing, the cinematographer and lighting crew make the whole thing look pretty (or at least visible), and the continuity supervisor makes sure that each scene is reset properly (ex: ties are untied so they can be re-tied, water glasses are refilled so they can be drunk, new cigarettes are lit so they can be smoked...). All of this is supervised by the director, who must make sure all of these people are performing adequately while staying "true" to the "essence" of whatever story is in the process of being told, without going over budget or pissing off the producer(s) or scaring away the financiers.

When the editors get their grimy, sun-light deprived hands on the film and start splicing the whole thing together, Post-production has officially begun. The sound designers step in and start adding sounds to fill in the sound vacuum, the composer scores all the emotional moments to really drive home the "point", and maybe the CGI geeks will get to create some "cool" graphics. Slap on the end credits and then its off to the ad agencies to get the trailer(s) completed, and off to the distributors to get the film, well, distributed. Then everyone goes home and prays that something good will come from all that madness.

Of course, in most cases, none of those events happen in the order just described, nor are the jobs necessarily done by different people. Get an Auteur on board and suddenly your writer, producer, director, sound designer, editor, art director, music supervisor, etc. is all the same person. Which can be an amazing thing (Citizen Kane) or a very bad thing (The Room).

All of this to say that when sitting in a theater and watching a movie, I'm always a little amazed that the final product affects me in any way at all. Given all that craziness that happens behind the scenes, and all those people with their creative hands in the movie pot, its a small miracle that anything cohesive ever makes it to the big screen, let alone something that resonates on any kind of emotional level. So, in someways, I can often forgive cheesy music, shoddy acting, and clunky dialogue, because really I just want to applaud everyone involved for trying their darnedest.

But, in most ways, I am not forgiving. What usually sets me off is when mediocre, formulaic slop starts to get praised for more then what it is, or worse, for what it tries to be (but falls short of). Obviously, not every movie can be a work of genius, but let's not gush over something we've seen a thousand times before and are going to forget in six months. Nor should we get carried away and start handing out "best director" and "best cinematography" nominations just because a movie has really cool special effects. (That's right, JC. I'm talking to you.)

Now, the Academy Awards are the absolute worst for this kind of behavior. They are supposed to be picking the "best" movies of all the movies that were released over the past year. Not the pretty-good movies, not the better-than-average movies. They purport to be naming the absolute best performance, sound design, art direction, etc that anyone has seen in 365 days. So why settle for anything short of genius? Given the amount of talent that emerges amidst all that aforementioned chaos, only the very best should be awarded. I've gotta get picky, harsh, and right down to the nitty gritty. No holds barred. If they are going to advertise all this hoopla as awarding The Best the film industry has to offer, then it better damn well blow me away.

Thus, my justification for my massacre.

E

PS - I will still be maintaining a positive attitude, however... In case there was any confusion... *sigh*.