We’re a bit too tired from going late into the evening watching the Oscars to say much of anything pithy today. We’ll just complain. Argo was a very good movie. But Best Picture good? Maybe, but maybe not. It’s certainly not as shaky as last year’s pick, The Artist. Cute and different doesn’t mean best. Does anyone remember Crash winning best picture for 2005? How the heck did that happen? That might not even have been a good movie, no less best. And Shakespeare In Love? How does its victory over Saving Private Ryan look in retrospect?
Against these historic mistakes, the selection of Argo isn’t bad. As we said, it really was a good movie. A historically based movie is unquestionably good when it can get your teen-aged son to look at you with wide eyes during the last 20 minutes and say, “Man, this is intense.” Its selection as Best Picture also created a second, “hey, can you believe Ben Affleck just won an Oscar” moment. Those are always fun. He’s gotten pretty good at making movies. The Town was a good one too. So we’re really not complaining about Argo.
This is more about Django Unchained. We knew it never had a chance to win. Quentin Tarantino makes unusual movies. They’re loaded with violence, cursing and one odd circumstance piled on top of or backed into another. And Tarantino himself sometimes comes off as a know-it-all when it comes to cinema. But, man, what a move that was. It must have been incredibly difficult to craft a movie about such a painful part of our history and yet have it at once be action-packed, terrifying, funny, exhausting, exhilarating, realistic, cartoonish, unpredictable and wonderfully predictable – and then to wrap it all up in a spaghetti western. Who would even think to do such a thing, no less accomplish it? For those of you who saw it, wasn’t it great to cheer Django on as he whipped the heck out of his former slave master? We bet you’d never thought you’d get that experience at a movie. Or wasn’t it a surreal movie-going moment to laugh along with the entire crowd as the KKK members complained about the guy who improperly cut the eye holes into their hoods? And then be thrilled when Django shoots the KKK leader, Big Daddy (Don Johnson), off his horse. Tarantino doesn’t make the type of movie that gets selected as Best Picture. The Academy seems more comfortable throwing him a Best Screenplay award from time to time instead. But you’ll likely never see another movie like that one again. And you’ll definitely see more Argos. Maybe Django Unchained should have been picked.
Who knows? McConnell thinks a lot about these things and sees all the Best Picture nominees. He’ll probably straighten this all out on Wednesday.
Now for your entertainment . . . . a third-party-payer case called Employer Teamsters-Local Nos. 175/505 Health and Welfare Trust Fund v. Bristol Myers Squibb Co., No. 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS...
