FEB 12 – Even those of us who’ll gladly clamber on rooftops to decry the uselessness of awards for art will have to bow before the cultural cachet of the Oscars — they’re an institution, dammit, even if that gives the sense of those who swear by it needing to be institutionalised. So come Oscar morning, and I’ll be in front of the telly — simultaneously attempting to pin down the Hindu crossword, which will hopefully not be constructed by Neyartha — rooting for The Social Network over The King’s Speech, which I found extraordinarily well-performed but otherwise extremely generic. I suppose what bothered me about the film was that it felt like it could have been put together by anyone, even the machine cutter at the assembly line who’s seen Driving Miss Daisy and heart-warmers of that ilk. Awards are meaningless, yes, but if the world’s most recognised, most coveted awards had to bestow legitimacy on a piece of filmmaking, should this be the chosen one?
That said, I found this an interesting way to postpone getting round to revising my review for Patiala House:
“But the Academy Awards have never been about daring. Thankfully, we have the Independent Spirit Awards, the Gotham Awards, and Cannes’ Camera d’Or, among others, to honor such achievements. The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, despite its portentous name, is not composed of film theory professors and alternative weekly critics.”
PS: I suppose there are things to be grateful for. Avatar, for instance, isn’t making claims for Best Picture. (Best Touchy-feely 3-D Remake of Dances With Wolves? Oh, most certainly.)
PPS: That wasn’t to knock Neyartha, who — by all evidence — is a fiendishly clever cruciverbalist. But he/she does make you struggle, and struggle, sometimes, is not what you’re looking for. You’re just looking for a spot of memory-spiking distraction while dropping the kids off at the pool.
Baradwaj Rangan 
rameshram
February 12, 2011
Social network is going to win everything although I have an unshakable faith that it was greenlighted by executives inspired by 3 idiots success.
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Rahul Tyagi
February 12, 2011
Avatar was making its claims this time last year, no? Or did I not get your point?
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Rahul Tyagi
February 12, 2011
@rameshram, er… 3 idiots??
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kanishk
February 12, 2011
Social Network all the way! Its toppling regimes across the thorniest region in the world. Winning an oscar sees rather elementary whilst compared!
Rangan – No Patiala House why?
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rameshram
February 12, 2011
Yeah! the facebook movie is an americanization of three Idiots.
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Hari
February 12, 2011
Digression alert
Quite an interesting take on ‘dabangg’
Click to access 15680.pdf
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Arun
February 13, 2011
Who’re ya rooting for wrt acting honors?
and how’d you like the new True Grit?
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Venkatesh
February 13, 2011
@Hari: That pdf is load of b*llocks. Is that what passes as informed discourse now ?
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Hari
February 13, 2011
@Venkatesh
I quite enjoyed reading it….not sure whether it can be called ‘informed discourse’ but was quite truthful from a socio-economic perspective…the author MK Raghavendra is surely among the most erudite voices around when it comes to film discussion.
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Venkatesh
February 14, 2011
@Hari : “Horses for courses” i take it – Erudite yes , Correct , No.
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munimma
February 14, 2011
I am still catching up on last year’s Oscar contenders. Hurt Locker was my favorite among that lot.
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bran1gan
February 15, 2011
Rahul Tyagi: As in, thank heavens there’s no Avatar-style “look-at-me-I’m-a-derivative-special-effects-spectacle-masquerading-as-a-great-movie.” I’m not in love with all of this year’s contenders but there’s at least some merit to each one of them.
Arun: I loved the new True Grit. I like the new course the Coens have set out on. Loved A Serious Man too (especially the closing portions). With their recent films, there’s a strong sense of — I don’t know the right word for it… spirituality? destiny? It’s not that they’ve stopped winking at the audience (see the strong and reliably eccentric caricature of the merchant that the girl bargains with early on, or the twosome holed up in the cabin). But there’s a lot of graveness and genuine emotion now.
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