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Brutally Honest Oscar Ballot: 'Roma' Just an "Expensive Home Movie," "About F—ing Time" for Spike Lee

Saya

Saya

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Oct 25, 2017
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Some quotes. Lots more at the link.

Bohemian Rhapsody and A Star Is Born are films whose adulation I can't even begin to fathom — I found them to be ordinary. Bohemian Rhapsody is a standard-issue biopic with a really nice last 10 minutes; had it been a great film, I probably still wouldn't have voted for it, because I don't want to do anything to reward Bryan Singer, who is a pariah now and needs to stay that way. A Star Is Born is a fourth remake with nothing new to say — it was massively overhyped.
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After that is Roma. It's beautifully crafted and looks fantastic, but ultimately, I was wondering where the entertainment or even intellectual value is in this movie. To me, it's a very slow and rather indulgent film — the most expensive home movie ever made. As far as the Netflix thing, what is our job as Academy members? We are trying to promote great films for audiences to see. When we gave our award to The Hurt Locker or Moonlight, we were getting people to go to theaters to see them; Roma is this brilliant work, visually speaking, on a big screen, but it becomes greatly diminished when you watch it on television, which is what 95 percent of the people that want to watch it have to do. I've spoken to several of my peers who watched it at home, and they were out after 20 minutes.
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No. 3 is Black Panther. Look, it's a Marvel comic book movie, and it's not much better than any of the others, but you have to applaud it for its massive social impact and the pride it has given to so many people. I know that's not a reason to vote for a movie, so that's why it's in third place rather than second or first. For those spots, I was torn between The Favourite and BlacKkKlansman. The Favourite is an unbelievably delicious film, and I was completely entertained from beginning to end — its humor and sexuality turned me on. It's a better movie than BlacKkKlansman, but I have no idea what it was trying to say. I prefer to reward a movie that is solid and has something of social importance to say, like BlacKkKlansman. The Charlottesville footage at the end of it sealed the deal for me — it reminds us that things really haven't gotten better.
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Kmonk

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Seems sort of shitty and mean-spirited. I thought it was going to be parody, but this is just someone who hates everything.
 

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No. 3 is Black Panther. Look, it's a Marvel comic book movie, and it's not much better than any of the others, but you have to applaud it for its massive social impact and the pride it has given to so many people. I know that's not a reason to vote for a movie, so that's why it's in third place rather than second or first. For those spots, I was torn between The Favourite and BlacKkKlansman. The Favourite is an unbelievably delicious film, and I was completely entertained from beginning to end — its humor and sexuality turned me on. It's a better movie than BlacKkKlansman, but I have no idea what it was trying to say. I prefer to reward a movie that is solid and has something of social importance to say, like BlacKkKlansman. The Charlottesville footage at the end of it sealed the deal for me — it reminds us that things really haven't gotten better.
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This is just regular honest. Moderately spicy take.
 
The Adder

The Adder

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Stop using 'delicious' as an adjective for things that aren't food. It is always creepy.
 
Freedom = $1.05

Freedom = $1.05

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Eighth Grade being completely snubbed is absurd. these are the worst oscars in a long time and some of the criticism posted is on point
 
higemaru

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Kmonk said:
Seems sort of shitty and mean-spirited. I thought it was going to be parody, but this is just someone who hates everything.
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This year's nominees, with the exception of Kkklansman, Favourite, and Roma are pretty terrible. Black Panther is the best Marvel movie but that's still not saying much, it's a fun nominee but Fruitvale Station and Creed were both better.

They really fucked up by not including Beale Street, Widows, or First Reformed
 
sibarraz

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What's the deal with the sudden hate for Roma? I feel that the movie did a terrific job in portraying the social inequality that people suffer in a country like Mexico, both in the 70's and even today, while also doing a job that was obsessive in nailing every detail to make the movie feel like it was filmed 50 years ago in Mexico City, with also some of the best camera shots that I had ever seen.

Is because the movie is in netflix, too mexican, or both?
 

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See here I thought it was trying to say something along the lines of that HAROLD THEY'RE LESBIANS thing but what do I know
 
Rover

Rover

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There is a cultural element to Roma that you are either gonna get, or not get. It's easy to spot, and this reviewer falls into the latter.
 
wenis

wenis

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I agree, blackkklamsman and the Favourite are the only two films worth adulation this year.
 
Mr. Fantastic

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That person is pretty spot-on to be honest. Wouldn't give the best picture nod to BlackKlansman either but in a year of really meh nominees, sure why not?

Saya said:
This movie deserved a few oscars damnit.
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That and Hereditary/Toni Collette being snubbed shows there's no hope ever for the genre at the Oscars.
 
Mr. Fantastic

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sibarraz said:
What's the deal with the sudden hate for Roma? I feel that the movie did a terrific job in portraying the social inequality that people suffer in a country like Mexico, both in the 70's and even today, while also doing a job that was obsessive in nailing every detail to make the movie feel like it was filmed 50 years ago in Mexico City, with also some of the best camera shots that I had ever seen.

Is because the movie is in netflix, too mexican, or both?
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I like Netflix, I'm latino born and bred, and I just found the movie too mundane (which is probably precisely the point to be fair). I powered through to the end and while the climax is very good, the rest of the movie is just...whatever.
 
808s & Villainy

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The Roma quote is the only questionable one. The rest of the comments make sense. I'd probably have Favourite as my top because it was just so different from anything else I'd seen and I appreciate it for that. Although it is missing Beale Street, but knowing the reviewer, they might knock it down for similar criticisms as Bohemian Rhapsody and A Star is Born, in the sense of it being somewhat formulaic
 
Psamtik

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It's hard to take this year's nominees seriously when films like First Reformed and Wildlife were excluded in favor of actual garbage like Bohemian Rhapsody and Vice, but I'd be fine with Blackkklansman taking it, even if it's just righting the historical wrong of Do the Right Thing losing to (of all things!) Driving Miss Daisy.
 
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OP
Saya

Saya

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Oct 25, 2017
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His take on best animated feature:

Is there any doubt about what's going to win? I swore I'd never vote for a superhero film, but how can you not vote for Spider-Man? The last time I was this excited by the creativity in an animated film was when I saw [2001's] Shrek. It is a complete work of art and the other nominees aren't even in the same hemisphere: Incredibles 2 and Ralph Breaks the Internet are the same old stuff; Isle of Dogs is what Wes Anderson has done before; and I've not seen the other one [Mirai].
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Blader

Blader

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I maintain BlacKKKlansman as my dark horse choice for winning best picture


When we gave our award to The Hurt Locker or Moonlight, we were getting people to go to theaters to see them
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What a weird thing to say, especially since The Hurt Locker was long since out of theaters when the Oscars happened. If the point of the Best Picture award is to direct people to a movie theater for the last week or two of a movie's theatrical release (assuming it's still in theaters at all), then that makes the award seem even more trivial than it already is.
 
NekoNeko

NekoNeko

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Oct 26, 2017
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The Favourite is my clear no.1 with Roma as a runner up. everything else doesn't really deserve an oscar nom but who cares.
 
MMarston

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Is there any doubt about what's going to win? I swore I'd never vote for a superhero film, but how can you not vote for Spider-Man? The last time I was this excited by the creativity in an animated film was when I saw [2001's] Shrek.
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There were so many others that were ignored since then goddamnit.
 
Mercurial

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I definitely felt the same way about Bohemian Rhapsody. The entire thing felt aggressively mediocre and seemed as if everyone who praised it did so out of some weird self-imposed obligation to praise anything related to Freddie Mercury.
 
sibarraz

sibarraz

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Mr. Fantastic said:
I like Netflix, I'm latino born and bred, and I just found the movie too mundane (which is probably precisely the point to be fair). I powered through to the end and while the climax is very good, the rest of the movie is just...whatever.
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I could understand that point of view, but I feel that the best part of Roma was how mundane it was. After all, maids have arguably one of the most mundane jobs in the world, and for me that mundanity made the climax scenes feel more powerful.

Also it made the movie feel more relatable and grounded, but again I could see why some people would have disliked it
 
Zampano

Zampano

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Dec 3, 2017
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BlacKKKlansman is not very good but Lee should get the Oscar anyway.

Roma is stunning, asthetically, emotionally and intellectually.

Toni Collette not getting a nom for Hereditary is an outrage.

The Oscars suck.
 
Rackham

Rackham

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I don't think think I agree with Bohemian Rhapsody needing to be ignored cause of Singer. Lots of people worked on that movie and it was great to because of the performance of the actors
 
CopperPuppy

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Oct 25, 2017
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This crop of nominees is unusually bad, but the praise heaped on Roma is not one of the reasons. Stuff like Bohemian Rhapsody, Vice, and The Green Book don't belong anywhere near a discussion of "best" films in a given year.
 
Blader

Blader

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ZackieChan said:
He's not really comparing them at all as films, just pointing out that one would have been seen in a theater with buzz, the other at home on Netflix. He believes that's a lesser experience.
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If Roma got a wide release in 4000 theaters but you just missed it for any number of reasons people don't miss a movie in theaters, are you supposed to think less of it because your only chance to see it later is on streaming or bluray? And I say that as someone who saw Roma in theaters.

in any event, I think the lesser experience would be Roma not existing at all, which is what might have been the case had Netflix not financed the movie. It's not like all the major studios were lining up to produce Cuaron's film.
 
Carthago Delenda Est

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Blader said:
What a weird thing to say, especially since The Hurt Locker was long since out of theaters when the Oscars happened. If the point of the Best Picture award is to direct people to a movie theater for the last week or two of a movie's theatrical release (assuming it's still in theaters at all), then that makes the award seem even more trivial than it already is.
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You can see all the nominees in any major city in the US right now, I'd imagine. I certainly can here in Austin, and not just at indie theaters. When a film wins best picture, it'll almost certainly be available at least for a week.

Except, maybe, Roma.

I think that's his point, though I'll admit I don't really agree that that should be the point.
 
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