scarey

we don't all know the oscar goes to Ledger. You can't competer with tragic accidental death. Sorry. Eventhough Robert DJ totally deserves the oscar for his amazing and bizarre characterization of an over the top method actor, he won't get the award he deserves because it was a comedy and damn it, this is a serious award! For serious actors only! Must be tragic to be art! If it's humor, then it's less than zero. Heath died (in our fabricated imagined version of the story anyway) because of the effects of his intensity as an actor. That's what the people think, so that is what the Academy will think, unoriginal yet mythical beings that they are. So give him the award. Downey survived his prescription abuse, so pan the camera on him as they announce Ledger's name, and have little Matilda accept in his honor. The people want what they want, and they want to see Ledger get an Oscar. I dare the Academny to be honest for once.

The only thing important about the Oscars is the clothes that get trotted out for the event.

I for one do look back on it fondly. The music has become a bit dated, but the performances still shine. And hey, Ian Charleson is dead!

the word is "compete" not competer. I hate when I make shitty typos!

DENIED!

was by far the most thrilling, original, profound movie of the year, in my opinion, and it was almost completely overlooked by even the so-called indie awards. Go figure.

Benjamin Button is cool and profound in its own way, but kind of a stagey, Hollywoodish snooze-fest too; (and, was it just my theater, or was the sound on that on that one below par? Half the dialogue was in a breathy whisper I had to strain to hear.) Slumdog is brilliant at the level of images, somewhat childish at the level of story and character. Frost/Nixon and Milk may be quality movies, but aren't exactly landmarks of imagination.

Glad to see someone else in the world wasn't completely bowled over by Slumdog. Not that I didn't like it at times, but it bespoke competence more than greatness.

Slumdog Millionaire was improbable, but not improbable enough to have a fairy tale quality. Instead, my credulity was being stretched just to further a meandering plot. The female lead's character was a nonentity, a completely passive recipient of her fate. And the love story had a sort of dopey, romantic comedy quality to it.

I was surprised by Downey's nomination, but not that surprised. The academy likes giving out some token nominations to comedy films (Juno/Ellen Page, Jonny Depp for Pirates of the Carribean, Little Miss Sunshine/Alan Arkin, Amy Adams for Junebug, Sideways, Lost in Translation, etc) that seldom win for anything other than Best Screenplay, though Alan Arkin is the notable exception. Occasionally, this overlaps with a blockbuster, like Juno or Pirates. I'm surprised that a film like Tropic Thunder got nominated due to its style, but it's likely that the Academy was looking to reward Downey for his return to respectability in a small way - I doubt anybody thinks he'll actually win.

The late Heath Ledger received a best supporting actor nomination for his performance in "The Dark Knight," which -- no matter how you feel about it -- you can bet the Academy would have ignored if poor Mr. Ledger were still with us.

are why Ms. Zacharek is the least relevant "movie critic" around. The certitude of her baseless belief that she knows what the Academy would have done had Ledger lived is the kind of thing one usually has to go to right-wing rags to see in its full uninformed, opinionated glory.

There's not a darn thing "surprising" about Robert Downey, Jr.'s nomination; the reasoning behind it is in fact clearly laid out *in* Tropic Thunder. I admit I was kind of expecting his to be for Iron Man, because it was incredibly successful and highly acclaimed for the type of movie it was. But I never had any doubt he'd get one either way. Sometimes the Academy's reasoning is incredibly easy to parse, as long as you know what to look at.

It would have been mandatory to award them the Oscars this year.

I might go with Jeffrey Wright or even Columbus Short but not Ms. Knowles, evidently you saw a different Cadillac Records.

As for Heath Ledger, I think he deserved the nomination and probably would have gotten it if he were alive today. Ledger for the Academy = serious actor. So I don't think they would have had a problem with his nomination since they screwed him when he didn't win for Brokeback Mountain.

So happy to see the Viola Davis nomination, very little screen time but man did she work it! Happy for Taraji P. Henson, love her work.

RDJ nomination, well I have mixed feelings but I love his work, he may be the surprise dark horse winner, just saying...

Why oh why did this movie get SO MANY nominations?

Answer: because it's the steamroller movie that Hollywood puts out every year. The one that is an overblown, over sodden mess that wants to be a great, memorable film -but isn't- despite the mega-watt stars and the heavy promotional blitz.

It happens often. Titanic was an entertaining film, but hardly a classic and it steamrolled the Oscars that year. And The English Patient? Let's face it, that movie sucked. But enough people in Hollywood bought the hype so it won every award that year.

Not to say that watching the Oscars isn't fun, it is. But it certainly has to be viewed as Hollywood's annual "Giant Pat on the Back".

If it were truly about quality a film like Slumdog Millionare or The Wrestler would take best picture. Or, a movie like Brokeback Mountain would have beaten the emotionally manipulative and forgettable Traffic. But at least they were nominated.

Does anybody know how the voting for these things goes down? Is it that they've already voted, taken the top 5 from each category and name them as "the nominations" when in fact the winner is already decided? Or is it that they take the top 5 for each category, then vote again based on those 5?

If it's the first, then there's why you see such few "dark horse" wins...theoretically you could have the 1st place winner get 100 votes, 2nd with 20, 3rd with 15, 4th with 10 and then 5th with, say 2 votes...so it looks like the Academy is going out on a limb, but it really isn't.