The Oscar nominations are out, and here’s my immediate predictions: ratings will be down dramatically this year. How do I know? Because nobody has ever seen any of these movies. Matt Drudge, who always has his finger on the pulse of American culture, normally leads the Drudge Report with pictures of the Best Picture nominees. This year, they’ve been relegated to the middle of the middle column.
Here are the Best Picture nominees, along with their box office takes:
The Artist ($12.1 million)
The Descendants ($51.3 million)
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close ($10.7 million)
The Help ($169.6 million)
Hugo ($55.9 million)
Midnight in Paris ($56.4 million)
Moneyball ($75.5 million)
The Tree of Life ($13.3 million)
War Horse ($72.3 million)
As Box Office Mojo reports, “On average the movies have made just $57.5 million prior to the nominations. That’s up on the five-nominee years from 2004–2008, but way off from ten-nominee years 2010 ($119.5 million) and 2009 ($151.5 million).” Perhaps some of these are good movies — but if a good movie is shown in a handful of cinemas and nobody comes, what is the sound of TV remotes across the nation flipping the channel?
The leaders in terms of nominations were The Artist and Hugo – a surprise showing for Hugo based largely on the fact that the vastly overrated Martin Scorsese directed it. The acting nominations are similarly anonymous: Demian Bichir in A Better Life, anyone? When Brad Pitt, known mostly for directors forcing him to chow down during scenes in order to look more lifelike (seriously), and George Clooney, whom I’ve previously derided as an affordable-housing Robert Wagner rather than a low-rent Cary Grant, became “real actors” is beyond me. Clooney’s the favorite here because he’s a massive liberal, and the voters want to reward him with what will undoubtedly be a President Obama 2012 campaign speech.
For the Actor in a Supporting Role award, Christopher Plummer is the runaway favorite because he checks two Oscar boxes: he’s playing gay, and he’s owed one (plus he was nominated last year). Jonah Hill’s nomination has excited younger audiences, although it’s not a standout by any means (Nick Nolte was far better in Warrior, an underrated crowd-pleaser). For Best Actress, Meryl Streep gets her annual nomination, and Glenn Close steals one for playing a guy, but the favorites are probably Viola Davis in The Help and Michelle Williams channeling Marilyn Monroe in My Week With Marilyn. The big surprise nomination in Best Supporting Actress goes to Melissa McCarthy in Bridesmaids. I haven’t seen the film, but I do appreciate the Oscars nominating someone from a comedy once in awhile.
This has been such a rotten year for movies that even the animated category — usually dominated by Pixar — is terrible. When the battle is between Puss in Boots and Rango, you’re in serious trouble. The only good news about the nominees this year is that J. Edgar received precisely zero nods. Good riddance.
Getting Billy Crystal to host the Oscars should return some of the faithful to the fold. But in the end, it’s the glamour of the nominees that counts. We like to root for the films we like. It’s tough to do that when we haven’t seen any of them.
>the vastly overrated Martin Scorsese directed it.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAlan Rickman was robbed. He should have received a best supporting actor nomination for his role as Professor Snape in Harry Potter. He was phenomenal, especially in the last one. Seriously.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am not a big Harry Potter movie fan, but Alan Rickman was robbed. He did a great job in that movie.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBen, the question isn't who has seen these movies-- it's who has seen ANY movies?
I recall not ten years ago I was seeing, no lie, 50-60 movies in the theater *each year*.
Last year, I saw five... *maybe*.
Beyond the abysmal theater experience (one sadly increasingly unable to compete with a decent home-theater), the movies just aren't worth going out to see anymore.
That list of nominated films is underwhelming, although some are quite good (I enjoyed Moneyball, and The Tree of Life is one I made time to see in the theater, and was rewarded for it). Likewise, I would figure that an NRO writer would know how great a movie "A Better Life" is, seeing as how it's been hyped in these very pages for a year now.
Still, the common lament that the Academy no longer nominates *popular* movies fails to note the dreck that now passes for popular. See the list below for the top ten grossing films of 2011-- some were entertaining, but no one can argue with a straight face that any of these are Best Picture material. Trust me, the Academy would LOVE to nominate a popular moneymaker for BP-- see Titanic, Avatar, etc.-- but nominating this dreck is a bridge too far.
The trouble with Hollywood is that when even the *big* movies become small, the smaller movies become miniscule.
1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse2 Transformers: Dark of the Moon
3 The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1
4 The Hangover Part II
5 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
6 Fast Five
7 Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol
8 Cars 2
9 Thor
10 Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
Dave is really onto something. This past year my wife and I went to the theater to see a movie exactly 0 (zero) times. Nothing caught our eye. Have watched a couple on pay per view and we were glad we hadn't paid the high ticket price with outrageously priced popcorn fee at a brick and mortar theater! On the other hand, the number of Kindle downloads on both our devices is going through the roof. Interesting. Don't think we are particularly unique.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot unique, no. We saw two in theater last year: Harry Potter on a date night and Cars 2 with the kids. The year before, we saw three: Harry Potter and The King's Speech for us and Toy Story 3 with the kids.
I certainly don't feel like we missed out on anything by not going more.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDave, great post.
50-60 movies a year?!!! That's 12 movies a month! Whoa, that's some serious movie-going!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI saw exactly 1 movie last year. Puss in Boots. I thoroughly enjoyed that movie even though it was 3D and 3D is hard on my eyes unless the room is bright. Nothing else really caught my eye. All the other movies I can wait until I can get them on Netflix, even if I have to wait 26 or 52 days after it is released. Netflix and Redbox are what are hurting ticket sales because most people are like me. The movies don't interest them and so instead of paying to see them in a theater, they wait until they can rent it cheaply.
The quality of movies is horrible. You cannot replace a good plot with sex, violence, cursing, and special effects. I rather see a PG movie with a good plot than a R movie with no plot. Avatar was visually stunning, but I knew what was going to happen 30 minutes before it did. It was boring and predictable and it felt like I was watching Pocahontas again. It doesn't help that too many movies are 3D. 3D makes my eyes dry if the light in the room is dark like a theater. What I have to do is take the glasses off and close my eyes for a minute several times during a movie.
Truth be told, probably the only movie I will pay to see in 2012 is the new Batman movie. If the movie is good, I will pay to see again. I saw the last Batman twice at the Imax. I regret not seeing a third time. That was a good movie. I just hope the third Batman is like the third Bourne and third original Star Wars, which were all good, instead like the third in most trilogies, which the third was really really bad. X3 and Shrek 3 are some good examples of that.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseJust saw Hugo.
In no way is this best picture material. In. NO. way.
The French dude from the Artist would get my vote for best actor. According to the choices anyway.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI've seen one. There were years in the last decade that I had seen every one. Many this year were conscious decisions to ignore, including War Horse because I am more tired of Speilberg than ever. He had a hand in how many films this year? All of them overproduced formulas having to do with unscientific fiction of one sort or another.
I also skipped The Help because it seemed redundant and the trailers were all cheap shot. Maybe the film was a bit better, but winning an Oscar won't prove anything but that Hollywood's been there, done that, and wants us to think race relations are still in the 50s.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI saw: War Horse which was soap-opery with an incredible amount of gratuitously manufactured melodrama, but magnificently shot. The Decedents was painfully morose - so much so that they should have offered Prozac topping on the popcorn rather than the butter-flavored oil. Midnight in Paris was, for a Woody Allen flick, surprisingly entertaining. Owen Wilson (no relation) did not suck. Moneyball was as good as any movie can be that has Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill in it.
I saw The Artist in the last week. It's one of the best, most interesting, imaginative and original movies I have seen in the last decade.
I thought Tome Cruse's latest MI franchise was better than any other movie (that I have seen) on that list other than The Artist. It was HIGHLY entertaining. If you're going to nominate The Decedents, which really was dreadful, then I don't know how MI4 isn't nominated.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseClooney, that's why the nomination. He's the king(little k) of Hollywood these days, and that isn't saying much(hence the little k).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBilly being back will boost the opening a lot, I believe. Then the fade out. I happened to check out the Globes, and was bored to tears...and they are usually the entertaining awards. The "union approved" acceptance speeches are beyond parody dreadful. The stars today just don't have any luster. Watching Morgan Freeman get the Cecil B DeMille award fro lifetime achievement had me agog. I like Freeman fine, and he's good at what he does, but when we're down to giving top career awards to second or third bananas(or 4th, 5th...) in their biggest movies, well...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSaw Midnight in Paris on the airplane. Other than a couple cheeseball Republican jokes, I actually enjoyed the movie.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseOkay, so if these nominations are so lame, what/who should have been nominated? Bradley Cooper in Hangover 2? Robert Pattinson in Twilight? Yet another Transformer movie?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseShake it up...loud garbage is as good as quiet garbage.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYou're probably right that the ratings will be down. But is that such a bad thing? I would prefer that Oscars honors its best rather than pulling in maximal ad revenue.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHey, now, I liked Rango. It's not Pixar, but it was fun.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHugo is not Oscar worthy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am not defending any of these films in particular, but what is the alternative--nominate only the mass appeal films? The days of films like The Godfather having mass appeal are long over--it's mostly comic book junk, sword and sorcery fables, and CGI-intensive "action" films that are extremely dimwitted.
Go back and compare the top box office films of the past with today (easily done on Wikipedia)--you'll cry. In 1971 The top ten box office films included Dirty Harry, The French Connection, The Last Picture Show, Carnal Kowledge, and A Clockwork Orange--all serious adult fare (there was also junk on the list--Billy Jack--and family films such as Fiddler on the Roof).
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Now look at 2011:
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The movie business, and movie audiences, ain't what they used to be.
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