For the second year in a row, the masses' enthusiasm for the five films nominated for the Best Picture Academy Award didn't match the critics' enthusiasm. Only The Departed, of the five, eclipsed the $100 million mark, and of the five, only The Departed parted me from $10. I was entertained. It captured the Irish mob culture in Boston that is, thankfully, gone.

I didn't see the other four nominees. I am not alone. The Queen did domestic sales of $53 million, Little Miss Sunshine did $60 million, Babel did $34 million, and Letters from Iwo Jima did $13 million. In other words one film was a blockbuster, two did decent business, and two didn't do so well at the box office. The best movies aren't always the most seen movies, but it would be nice for the broadcasters of the Oscars if the audience watching the show had also watched some of the movies honored.

Whereas I am disgusted by the great unwashed's television choices, I find myself revolting against the elites when it comes to cinema. I can't comment on this year's films that I haven't seen, but I have been burnt so many times in the past by critics that I just can't muster any excitement to see all five Best Picture nominees--a ritual in which I used to partake. Critics seem to be overwhelmingly left-wing, with their politics magically transforming bad movies into good ones. By virtue of seeing so many movies, critics also tend to celebrate not what's best, but what's most unusual, what stands out from the crowd. I guess if I saw three movies a day I might get bored easily too. Occassionally, the masses get it wrong. But critics do too. Why, exactly, did they nominate Cider House Rules, for instance, a few years back? Knock Americans for seeing 2 Fast 2 Furious in droves, but dare ridicule the critics for liking The Hours and suddenly you become a rube.

Alas, as I write, Drudge reports that The Departed has won Best Picture honors. Things may not be as bad as I had thought. The critics and the filmgoers agree.

I myself are like you Dan. I only saw The Departed but I will not bring myself to watch any of the oscar nominated films especially the propoganda film "Babel". I had to stomach the train wreck "Flags of our Fathers", but I will definetly not pay to see "Letters from Iwo Jima". That movie without seeing it is purely Anti-American. The oscars lost credibility when Saving Private Ryan was robbed of it's much deserved Best Picture Oscar and the gushy spewfest Shakespeare in Love won it in it's place.

The Departed was genuinly great. So was Little Miss Sunshine, which was hilarious. The rest I haven't seen.

I agree with you, Hollywood is out of touch this the average American. There's only one nominated film that I saw this year -- Pixar's "Cars" movie. And that was only nominated for best animated film. I think it lost out to Happy Feet.

i seen flags of are fathers and also read the book. they did a good job on it. i would have went to see letters from iwo, but it never came to my small town. i guess we dont matter to hollywood.

SULLIVAN: How can you talk about musicals at a time like this, with the world committing suicide? With corpses piling up in the street, with grim death gargling at you from every corner, with people slaughtered like sheep!

HADRIAN: Maybe they'd like to forget.

SULLIVAN: Then why did they hold this one over
for a fifth week? For the ushers?

LEBRAND: It died in Pittsburgh.

HADRIAN: Like a dog.

SULLIVAN: What do they know in Pittsburgh?

HADRIAN: They know what they like.

SULLIVAN: If they knew what they liked, they wouldn't live in Pittsburgh.

Sorry, one more:

SULLIVAN: I wanted to make you something outstanding-- something you could be proud of, something that would realize the potentialities of film as the sociological and artistic medium that it is. With a little sex in it.

Best documentary feature goes to "An Inconvenient Truth". Hypocrisy at its finest:
Gore's Nashville mansion consumes more energy every month than the average American household uses in an entire year. In the documentary, Gore pushes for every American to conserve electricity at home.

Personally I was saddened that V for Vendetta didn't get nominated...Hollywood is so out of touch with...

r.c.

I thought The Departed was good but not great. Best movie in a weak field this year I would say.

In my humble opinion, the best film of the year wasn't even nominated. Stranger Than Fiction was brilliant. Perhaps too intelligent for the Academy, and certainly so for the movie-going public. It's too bad. I hope Will Ferrell doesn't give up on drama. Like Jim Carrey before him, he's got the talent to break out of the comedic mold (I'm eagerly awaiting The Number 23).

It's funny, my kids saw that and expected the wild and whacky Ferrell. When they didn't get him, they said the movie stunk. This is a good reason for me to see it.

Talladega Nights was so bad, it appears that WF is alreay making the transition from comedic to dramatic.

I do think he'll play more dramatic roles, but he'll never leave comedy. Blades of Glory is on its way. I didn't see Talladega Nights, but I think some of his comedy is great. Old School and Anchorman made me laugh.

Old school was ok. Anchorman was the best. Ferrell doing his best to not slip completely into his Robert Goulet routine. Applegate was hot.

I just got off a 12 hour flight, and even as a captive audience with time to kill, I was amazed at how Scorcesse continues to make movies that completely fall apart at the end. I'm ususally very forgiving at 39,000 feet over the Atlantic, but the ending to this movie could have been written by Monty Python. I can't say more without spoilers, but I must say this is one of the worst Best Picture picks I've ever seen. (Chariots of Fire being right up there).

Funny thing, I heard this morning that they were going to make a sequel. With who? Build around Baldwin and Wahlberg?

Granted, the ending was abrupt, but I kind of like movies that end that way. It was sort of Shakespearean.

Al Gore, who is the embodiment of the title of his fictional movie, is scrambling around now trying to explain his huge carbon footprint. This fat elitist lib wants the working poor to subsidize the Global Warming boondoggle without taking any responsibility himself. I laugh at how the hate America crowd thinks that we are the cause of everything wrong on the planet and that we are the only ones who should take responsibility.

It wansn't Shakespearean, it was stupid (IMO), and somewhat laughable. I became conciously aware of how little the violence affected me (whereas it affected me tremendously in the first part of the movie). And even if THAT was the point, it's a bad choice from a storytelling perspective, because it takes me OUT of the movie.

On the plus side, MS really nailed the Boston-thing. In fact, it was like watching Dan act out an entire movie, playing all the parts.

Hmm...I wonder if I could convince Dan to do a one man show of Marty (best picture winner of 1955 and total piece of crap)?

Talladega Nights was great. How one could like Anchorman but not T.N perplexes me. It was the same type of humor.

Have to agree, Ben-T. Loved both of them. And I'm going to have to see Blades of Glory. Now, TN didn't have anything as out there as the News team rumble, but just because it's not meant to be quite as broad as Anchorman, I don't see why people have to dismiss it all the time.

Maybe it was my frame of mind or that I expected more, but I thought that a lot more could have been done with Talladega Nights. Just didn't think it was that funny.