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This thread is great. Each turn in the conversation is more bewildering than the last.

To be honest I've been working on the assumption that everyone on here has Aspergers

What's next, we all find out that Domino writes a Goosebumps blog?

James Mills and mfunk are the same person, with split personality! The mods find out they comprise long lost triplets! Criterion decides to get into the mail order steak business!

Roger Ryan wrote:Was anyone else surprised that De Niro's acceptance speech was a stand-up routine? It almost felt like Rupert Pupkin was up there.

I felt pretty uncomfortable, that's for sure. It was especially weird when he started bringing up his children and their expenses considering I know of at least one child that he sent away to an underassistant therapeutic boarding school (that was closed later due to its corruptness and counterproductivity).

Edit: oh yeah, and this:

mfunk wrote:Accusing Chris Rock of not being a smart comedian is ludicrous.

double edit: sorry, I should just read the whole thread before responding to the first one I find interesting, but this really made me laugh:

swo wrote:ambrose, honest question: Are you a robot?

Ambrose is the man. All of his posts are matteroffactly yet end with exclamation points. (!)

James Mills wrote:

Roger Ryan wrote:Was anyone else surprised that De Niro's acceptance speech was a stand-up routine? It almost felt like Rupert Pupkin was up there.

I felt pretty uncomfortable, that's for sure.

The gasp from the audience when he said all the waiters had been deported was probably the best part.

Is there a video of it?

Here (scroll down)

AlexHansen wrote:

James Mills wrote:

Roger Ryan wrote:Was anyone else surprised that De Niro's acceptance speech was a stand-up routine? It almost felt like Rupert Pupkin was up there.

I felt pretty uncomfortable, that's for sure.

The gasp from the audience when he said all the waiters had been deported was probably the best part.

My favorite was his rambling about how he prefers all the shitty movies he's been in to the great ones. The entire gist of his speech seemed to be, "Sure I was in Raging Bull, but Awakenings paid for my kids' tuition."

Oscar Foreign Language Film shortlist:

Algeria (“Outside the Law”)
Canada (“Incendies”)
Denmark (“In a Better World”)
Greece (“Dogtooth”)
Japan (“Confessions”)
Mexico (“Biutiful”)
South Africa (“Life Above All”)
Spain (“Even the Rain”)
Sweden (“Simple Simon”)

imo this is going to be the worst group of nominations for Best Foreign Language Film in a long time.

edit: And where's Mother btw? Figured voters would dig Bong's Hollywood style.

Based on the Academy's past ignorance of critical darlings in the Foreign Film category, we can safely assume that Dogtooth is not going to win (alas it also means Confessions is not going to win either).

Finch wrote:Based on the Academy's past ignorance of critical darlings in the Foreign Film category, we can safely assume that Dogtooth is not going to win (alas it also means Confessions is not going to win either).

Confessions would be my choice of the allotted list. But who cares, this award hardly ever gets done right. Last year's travesty was the final straw for me.

James Mills wrote:imo this is going to be the worst group of nominations for Best Foreign Language Film in a long time.

How many of these films have you actually seen? Or are you making this comment because of what films you feel were snubbed?

James Mills wrote:edit: And where's Mother btw? Figured voters would dig Bong's Hollywood style.

South Korea submitted Mother last year. This year their submission was A Barefoot Dream.

swo17 wrote:

James Mills wrote:imo this is going to be the worst group of nominations for Best Foreign Language Film in a long time.

How many of these films have you actually seen? Or are you making this comment because of what films you feel were snubbed?

Mixture of both, plus a little admitted ignorance. I've only seen about half of the ones nominated and only a few come to mind that I think got snubbed, and the rest is more so because of the reviews I've read. For a year where films like The Social Network and The King's Speech are getting the best reviews since The Godfather, it's discouraging that no foreign films have received even half of the praise.

James Mills wrote:For a year where films like The Social Network and The King's Speech are getting the best reviews since The Godfather

James Mills wrote:For a year where films like The Social Network and The King's Speech are getting the best reviews since The Godfather, it's discouraging that no foreign films have received even half of the praise.

You must not read a lot of reviews, worthwhile ones or otherwise!

anyone seen the GG nominated russian entry The Edge? that looked pretty damned good.

James wrote:

James Mills wrote:For a year where films like The Social Network and The King's Speech are getting the best reviews since The Godfather, it's discouraging that no foreign films have received even half of the praise.

You must not read a lot of reviews, worthwhile ones or otherwise!

I think he's made that abundantly clear several times over by now.

reno dakota wrote:Oscar Foreign Language Film shortlist:

Algeria (“Outside the Law”)
Canada (“Incendies”)
Denmark (“In a Better World”)
Greece (“Dogtooth”)
Japan (“Confessions”)
Mexico (“Biutiful”)
South Africa (“Life Above All”)
Spain (“Even the Rain”)
Sweden (“Simple Simon”)

Without having seen ANY of these films, and after reading brief synopses and having a fairly good grasp of the Academy's taste, I'm going to call:

Outside the Law
Incendies
In a Better World
Biutiful
Life Above All
Possible spoiler: Even the Rain

Dogtooth is the one I've heard the most critical praise for and, based on the synopsis, is the one I'm most interested in seeing. It has no chance of being nominated.

cysiam wrote:

James wrote:

James Mills wrote:For a year where films like The Social Network and The King's Speech are getting the best reviews since The Godfather, it's discouraging that no foreign films have received even half of the praise.

You must not read a lot of reviews, worthwhile ones or otherwise!

I think he's made that abundantly clear several times over by now.

Rotten Tomatoes' aggregates an average rating out of every professionally released review (compounded to a ten point system), so it is about as encompassing as you're going to find. Social Network received an average rating of 9 out of 10 and King's Speech has an 8.7, both higher than any film I've researched (with at least 50 reviews) since the Godfather.

Perhaps you should save your condescensions for when you have your own research to refute.

For what it's worth.

The Sweet Hereafter - 8.8/10
Toy Story - 9/10
Toy Story 3 - 8.8/10

(And there are plenty of films made in the 70's/80's with similar ratings)

None of those are higher than 9, which was Social Network's rating; seeing that Social Network got twice the amount of reviews as Toy Story, it is thus considered to be rated higher by RT's standards (and thus the highest since the Godfather, like I stated). And yes, I was aware that those films were the next closest, but please show me "plenty of films made in the 70's/80's with similar ratings" that have more than 50 reviews like I stated.

Once again you make yourself as clear as a glass of Harry Knowles' colostomy overflow.