Eric Renderking
Fisk joins Chris Rock in trashing the Oscars… For Different reasons.
February
27th, 2005
Chris Rocks The Oscars
If you’re a
movie fan like me, then the Oscars is your Super Bowl. You follow your
favorites, read all the interviews, and sit on the edge of your couch
when your category comes up on the day of the ceremony. I used to be a
special effects fanatic, following all the effects houses, download the
clips that the effects outfit was nominated for, and read all the press
releases. I was far less concerned with “Best Picture,” “Best Actor,”
and “Best Score” nonsense.
Over the years though… the last five being the
worst… I’ve become disinterested with all of it. I don’t care any more,
and I highly doubt that I’ll be watching the awards ceremony this year.
If I do… it’ll be for the ads, to watch the expressions on the losers
faces and to see what all the controversy is about revolving the man
who inspired this rant.
Fake
Or Biased?
Anyone can tell something is wrong with the awards
process just by looking back and seeing the injustices through out
history. For instance, Humphrey Bogart not winning the statue for Best
Actor for his roll as Rick Blaine in Casablanca being one of the
earliest ones. Since then there are those awards that don’t go to the
people we think they should have gone to. Often we the audience
see someone win an award and are left with this cheated feeling knowing
that our favorites should have won instead. In the years 1977 and 1981
there were two motion pictures that were so good and entertaining that
people lined up around the block and waited for hours to see them.
These two movies were phenomenons all there own, setting records that
took years (or even decades) to break. These movies were “Star Wars
(Episode IV – A New Hope)” and “Raiders Of The Lost Ark”, which lost to
Woody Allen’s “Annie Hall” and “Chariots Of Fire” respectivly…
What’s wrong with this picture? Two movies that
people obviously enjoyed so much that they would go for repeat viewings
and were willing to wait in line (like I did) to see them. Regardless
of the box-office earnings… how could these two movies that were the
most entertaining, most sought after and most adored by the ticket
paying public NOT be “The Best Picture” the years they were released?
Shouldn’t “Best Picture” go for the ones universally liked?
Those are just two examples of why I believe the
Oscars are fake… fake in the sense that it doesn’t reflect what movie
is really the best motion picture. I have more… which I won’t
post now. This is all to back up Chris Rock and his comments about the
Oscars that he made last week and kept Matt Drudge (of The Drudge
Report and the second most famous Fedora Wearing News Junkie in the
world…) name in the news for a few days. He’s right… but for the wrong
reasons.
Right
For The Wrong Reasons.
What exactly did Chris Rock say last week that had
everyone all upset?
- "What straight black man sits there and watches the Oscars? Show
me one."
- "I never watched the Oscars. Come on, it's a fashion show,"
- "Awards for art are f@#%ing idiotic."
- "Nothing against people who aren't straight, but what straight
guy that you know cares? Who gives a f@#%?"
Besides the blatant gay bashing, perpetuating the
stereotype that only homosexuals or white people watch these types of
shows and the gratuitous use of the f-word, what did Chris Rock say
that was so bad? Granted, he’s being hypocritical. If the Awards
are so “gay” and “F@#%ing idiotic,” then why host them?
The real issue I think is what he’s trying to say
about the awards in general. Award ceremonies are the essence of
Hollywood hype, self promotion of something that is in some aspects
superficial. Looking deeper, Awards shows are more superficial hype of
superfical hype… layers of pop-culture propaganda and sales pitch for
something that should essentially sell itself.
How is it that we have awards ceremonies for artists
but we don’t have them for people who make such things possible? When
was the last time they televised the award ceremonies for the Metal Of
Honor winners? We never get to see a police officer awarded for saving
someone’s life or honoring them when struck down in the line of duty.
We never see an award ceremony for a fire fighter who save a child from
a burning building, an EMT who went above and beyond to save someone
after a car wreck or a National Guardsman who saved a family after a
natural disaster?
Is that what Chris Rock means? I don’t know… but
that’s what I got out of his statements.
The
Importance of keeping Cinema in Perspective
Movies are important because they reflect our
culture, as the artists see it how the world really is, how they wish
the world could be or how they fear it might become. My concern is that
there are too many people who have shut themselves off from the real
world and become absorbed in the flickers of light, obsessed with
someone else’s version of the world.
My fear is that the audience of modern pop culture
will become the people in Plato’s Republic in his cave analogy, where
the inhabitants of the cave were more interested in the shadows on the
wall and unconcerned with the real drama in the outside world that
actually creates the shadows. And like Plato's cave analogy… someone
will indeed become angry with me when I say that interacting with the
outside world is far more fantastic and satisfying then being chained
to our couches to watch “reality TV” or whatever is in the movies.
Something I want people to remember is that these
award shows are nothing more then exhibition presented by the Hollywood
hype machine and a way for studios to promote movies that will be
released through out the rest of the year. Award shows are studio
advertisements… a means of saying “We have a track record of making
great movies and have the awards to prove it… just wait to see what we
have for you in the coming year.
In a short while very few people are going to
remember who won all the awards during this years Oscar Ceremony. Not
too many people can even name all the awards that were won last year
and the years before and I’m hard-pressed to remember every spectical
that occurred during the pre-ceremony red-carpet parade or the speaches
from years past. The intensity of this year’s awards will deminish
before the week’s out and will be almost forgotten by the time summer’s
block-buster season begins. By then It will be hard to justify the
media attention this years ceremony received while our attention and
imagination will be captured by the next big thing in the theater and
in the movie rental isles.
I’m with Chris Rock on this… the award shows are
rediculous. Movies aren’t about golden statues… they’re about something
more important; The way they make us feel. Just because a movie is
awarded “Best Picture,” doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s the best
movie of the year… just that it’s most popular with the Hollywood
crowd. Don’t feel bad if you favorites don’t win or aren’t even
nominated. The real winners are the ones that people remember and still
talk about for decades to come - treasured by people like you and me
for all time.
