I, for one, will be rooting for the Hurt Locker and Kathryn Bigelow for best director. I had fun with Avatar, but I didn't see it as an oscar best picture.
But to pimp out my hometown AMC Theatres. If you want to watch all the nominated movies, try this marathon out. http://www.amcentertainment.com/bps/ On Sat, Feb 6, 2010 at 8:51 PM, PGage <[email protected]> wrote: > Variety has a small piece on the metacritic and Rottentomato scores of the > best picture nominees): *http://tinyurl.com/y9nyh3j > > *With the expanded pool of 10 nominees there was concern by some it would > water down the quality. The average metacritic score of the 10 is 80, which > seems pretty good. The Variety article does not give the average scores for > previous years, so it was hard to tell if this was good or bad, which drove > me to metacritic itself, which surprisingly had a long (and pretty good) > article on predicting the Best Picture winning from metacritic scores and > lots of other variables (this must have inspired the Variety piece, but > there was no mention of it). > > > http://features.metacritic.com/features/2010/the-oscars-how-to-predict-the-best-picture-winner/ > > The average score for all nominated films the last 10 years is 80 - which > is the same as this year. There have only been three years in the last > decade when the average was more than 82 (2008 (year of "No Country For Old > Men") 2007 (year of "The Departed) and 2004 (year of "Lord of the Rings"). > It is true that "The Blind Side" with 53 is the lowest rated film to get > nominated in the last 10 years (only one other in the 50s got nominated, > last year - I can't figure out which that was from the article) but no film > has ever won (in the decade) with scores less than 60 (lowest was Gladiator > at 64). I also note from examining the data that no winning film has ever > had a score more than 12 points lower than the average of the nominees of > that year, which means that both Blind Side (53) and Inglourious Basterds > (69) probably won't win (I can't imagine I will much like Blind Side, but I > loved Basterds - too bad). The real impact of going to 10 nominees probably > was to get a film like The Blind Side" nominated (Avatar would have been > nominated even with 5) - which, if it gets them more viewers without > diluting the overall quality of the nominees, or risk such a bad film > winning, is probably not so bad. > > The article looks at a number of other variables (and no, the Golden Globes > are not very good at picking the Oscar winner, but the Critics Choice awards > is). Overall box office not very good predictor, but there is a tendency to > give the Oscar to one of the 2 top grossing films among the nominees. > > Their conclusion was (admitted by them) the same one they had before they > looked at the numbers, and the same pretty much everyone else has had - the > Oscar will go to either Avatar or The Hurt Locker, with the edge to Avatar > (I guess on the basis that the Academy will never be able to resist not > giving the Oscar to such a huge hit that also has the cover of good critical > notices). Hurt Locker (which got the nod from the accurate Critics Choice) > has its best chance in the huge and notorious anti-sci-fi bias of the > Academy, but I think they are right that box office will trump that. I liked > both films, but The Hurt Locker is so much the better film that I will be > rooting for it, even though I would not bet on it. I just saw Up in the Air > yesterday, and really liked that too - I would have hard time picking > between Basterds and Up in the Air for second best picture, with Avatar #4 > (though I still have not seen Up or An Education among the other films > likely to be my cup of tea (I am going to have to get drunk before seeing > Precious and The Blind Side - luckily I think the latter will qualify as a > Valentines Flick for my wife, so I can kill two birds with that stone). > > Most interesting to me is that a Metacritic Score of 80 seems to be a > perfect index of the middle brow film the Oscars like to recognize. I like > having a number to represent an abstract dimension. > > > P.S. The other thing that one gets from this article is confirmation of > just what an anomaly "Crash"'s win was in 2006. It was the lowest rated > film to be nominated (the only time the nominated film with the lowest > metacritic score won in the decade), and at 69 was the second lowest rated > film to win (after Gladiator's 64). Brokeback Mountain had better boxoffice, > swept all of the critics awards, was better rated by critics and users > (general public) on metacritic alike. It was the most unlikely film to win > in that ten year period (for me I might put Gladiator as a somewhat less > deserving winner, but not a more surprising winner). All of this supports > the notion that the liberal hypocrites in the Academy were looking for an > excuse not to give it to the gay film. That, or two thirds of the voters had > either screwed, or wanted to screw (literally or otherwise) someone in > Crash. > > > > > > > -- > TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "TV or Not TV" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected] > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected] > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en -- Jason Carpio [email protected] Not sent from an iPhone -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
