Academy Award nominations came out today. Your humble blog critic only had a few requirements of the Academy this year - that "Master and Commander" be nominated for Best Director; that "Lord of the Rings" be nominated for Best Picture & Director; and that Lost in Translation be nominated for Best Picture, Director and Actor.
Thankfully, all of those came to be.
It was good to see Bill Murray already win a Golden Globe for his performance in "Lost In Translation", though there is one embarrassing thing about it. The Golden Globes is under some delusion that "Lost In Translation" is a comedy.
I don't know what film they saw, but it was obviously a different "Lost In Translation" than I saw. There are several funny moments in the film to be sure - but they are all laced with a deep sense of poignancy.
Unfortunately, people figure if that if the laughs are coming from Bill Murray, then it must be ok to label the film as a "comedy". This is a bad case of intellectual laziness on the part of critics and marketers of this powerful and affecting human drama.
Posted by Justin Levine at January 27, 2004 12:28 PM | TrackBackAwards shows exist to serve themselves and rarely have any outside metric. Recall, Jethro Tull won a Grammy for Best Heavy Metal Performance (Jethro Tull!). I like Jethro Tull, but unless there's an English-Art Rock category, it ought not be winning no awards.
Academy Awards not embarrassing themselves? Heh -- I guess anything can happen once.
When they choose the winners, that's when we'll see whether they've managed not to embarrass themselves.
Posted by: McGehee at January 29, 2004 04:14 AM (Permalink)No expectations for 21 grams? Justin!
Posted by: Cameron Keys at February 17, 2004 01:45 PM (Permalink)