I saw this again on TV. How in the Hell did it lose the Best Picture Oscar to Shakespeare in Love?
I know I’m in the minority, but I think the voters were actually right. There have been some past threads on this, by the way, if you’d like to see some older opinions for a bigger sample.
Moderator’s Note: Moving to Cafe Society.
I started a thread a while back about Oscars that should be revoked (and Paltrow’s winning for SIL was one I mentioned), and I forgot to mention the movie. SPR sucks me in every time I see it. Doesn’t matter where in the movie it is, or if they’re airing commercials during it. I’m transfixed.
Easily one of the best movies ever made.
Friggin’ travesty.
Aw, the Oscars drive you crazy if you look too closely at some of their picks. (How Green Was My Valley over Citizen Kane? Gladiator? Scorsese and Hitchcock never winning?) Take it for what it is – a Hollywood love-fest – and see what the critic’s boards choose if you’re interested in film awards that actually mean something.
As far as Shakespeare in Love is concerned, I think the theory goes that Hollywood loves movies about itself – show business stories.
Because Shakespear in Love was a far better movie. Sorry, I loved SPR and was outraged when it lost, but then I actually WATCHED SIL. As soon as it ended, I had to admit to myself that I was wrong about those Oscars, SIL deserved every accolade and more.
Two reasons: politics and backlash.
Shortly before the Oscars, I heard a commentator on NPR (I can’t remember his name) boldly predict Shakespeare in Love was going to win Best Picture over Saving Private Ryan. This was because, at the time, Clinton had just been dragged through impeachment by Congress due to is lying under oath about his affair with Monica Lewinsky. SIL involved the married title character having an affair with Gwyneth Paltrow’s character. According to this commentator’s theory, there was a significant block of Academy voters who wanted to send to a message to the blue nosed hypocrites in the Republican Party who had just impeached Clinton and choosing **SIL ** as Best Picture was their way of doing it. I didn’t think much of the prediction at the time but, sure enough, he turned out to be right.
Also, when it was released, **Saving Private Ryan ** had been hailed by many critics as one of the best war movies ever. When a film is praised like that, it only invites backlash. By the time the Oscars rolled around, the movie had already been out for six months and that gave people more time to pick it apart for its flaws. In contrast, SIL had only recently gone into wide release so it was fresher and thus had the momentum in its favor.
Well, when I examine Saving Private Ryan I see nothiing but a routine Western in different clothing.
The wagon train is formed and travels through hostile country. Eventually the wagon train is circled with the hostiles all around it. At the last minute the cavalry comes over the hill to save it, but John Wayne’s character dies.
Wait wait wait. His prediction was right, but that doesn’t mean you can conclude his reasoning was sound.
PS. For a really good war movie, check out Paths of Glory.
Much like my experience. I didn’t see Shakespeare in Love at the movies at all - I assumed it wouldn’t interest me. I had seen Saving Private Ryan at the movies and, after the buildup, had been quite underwhelmed by it finding many elements mawkish, derivative and very Hollywood. I however assumed it would win Best Picture. Later when I saw Shakespeare in Love I realised that SPR had merely been the overblown outsider, the rightful winner got up - better story, better script, better acting and predictable that it would do better with the Academy than with the Saturday night Googleplex crowd.
I thought Saving Private Ryan was very good. It has special significance for me as when it came out, I knew it was something my father (a war film buff) would like to see. So I took him to the movie theater to see it. It was the first time he had been to a movie theater in ages and was in shock at the price of popcorn and drinks! However, as I expected, he just loved the film. It was also that last time he was ever in a movie theater as he died a few years later.
That said, there was a recent thread about this same subject and I have to admit, SIL was a better film. Really.
To a certain extent, this is comparing apples to oranges, but if I had to award the Best Film of the year, I still thin Shakespeare In Love deserved it.
Now, the fact that Gandhi won Best Film over E.T. - well, that was inexcusable.
I agree with the decisions. SPR won for directing, editing, cinematography, sound and effects and deserved them for the complexity and detail of the final product. But SIL was a better movie with a better, more complex story.
That said, I’m not sure if Judi Dench deserved her Oscar, considering how little screen time she had. At least she didn’t overplay the role, and the temptation must have been high.
I should explain that I had doubts about both the prediction and his reasoning when I heard it. **Saving Private Ryan ** was considered the front runner and its chances for victory looked even better when Steven Spielberg won the Director’s Guild Award–usually a reliable indicator about what movie will win for Best Picture. It was true that Saving Private Ryan wasn’t considered a mortal lock, but I believe people thought it was more likely that the upset would come from Elizabeth, Life Is Beautiful, or **The Thin Red Line ** than SIL.
Saving Private Ryan is nothing but the baldest prowar propaganda. If it had won Best Picture, my cynicism about the Oscars would have deepened just that much more.
If you’re not obsessed with hating Steve Spielberg, like some noted SDMB members, it’s actually one of the more interesting Best Picture rivalries in the history of the awards.
There’s very little doubt, if you watch the movies honestly and without any preconceived auteur theory opinions about the directors, that “Saving Private Ryan” is a more technically impressive film - it’s one of the most technically impressive war films ever made. It’s also vastly more emotionally involving than “Shakespeare in Love,” and the subject matter is a bit more serious. Tom Hanks’s understated performance is terrific. Few movies have ever presented the audience with such a visceral and honest look at the horror of combat. THAT was the point of the movie, and it did it awfully well.
On the other hand, there’s also no doubt that “Shakespeare in Love” has a near-perfect script (by script I mean the way the entire thing is written; not just the dialogue, which is what people often mean by “script”) and is a remarkably original and clever movie. “Saving Private Ryan” did have some questionable script decisions, IMHO. I can’t really think of any other movie like it, to be honest; it’s a costume drama, but it’s not really a historical one, but it is. The plotting’s as tight as a drum, the dialogue’s great and often hilarious. It’s also a more impressive cast acting effort; not that there’s anything wrong with anyone’s performance in “Ryan,” but overall there’s a lot more for the cast to do in “Shakespeare in Love” and a lot of gems. Geoffrey Rush is hysterical.
I think this comparison really illustrates why the Oscars are kind of silly. I respect the opinions of everyone who compares the two films and honestly thinks one is better, but I just don’t agree that such a distinction is possible; they’re very, very different films, with different purposes. Obviously it’s easy to say some movies are better than some other movies; “The Godfather” was better than “Battlefield Earth.” But in a comparison between two close and very different movies, I can’t see the point in giving an award to one over the other.
(Well, I DO see the point, which is to provide publicity for the movie industry.)
because when the elder Miller loks out over the vista and horizon, and the music cues in, and the camera shows his face in the Spielberg cliche, the voters were sickened with disgust at the unnecessary attempt to appeal to their emotions…
At the time, I thought Saving Private Ryan was a shoo-in. With time, though, I’ve come to see that Saving Private Ryan had script problems serious enough that it wasn’t the best choice. At the same time, I think Shakespeare in Love was just too lightweight to deserve the Best Picture Oscar.
So what movie should have won? Beats me; I don’t even remember what other movies came out that year. But I’ve stopped paying any attention to the Oscars. (Actually, I think I stopped when Titanic won.)
Ummmm . . . that was Ryan in that scene (although we think it’s Miller until the end).
Emotions? When I left SPR after seeing it in the theater, there were three older ladies about the right age for having spouses in WWII sitting there crying. Did SIL have that powerful of an impact on the audience? SPR also started the push for a WWII memorial. Can SIL claim something similar?
Actually, I had heard that the voters (almost none of which had experienced a war) were digusted by the gratuitious bloodiness and length of the opening scene. Veterans that they had talked to applauded the realism of that same scene and love that everyone could see how terrible war truly is.
No, it can’t, but why would you assume that emotional impact is the only yardstick by which a movie’s quality can be judged? “Shakespeare in Love” was more clever, less emotionally wringing; why’s one better than the other?
The same voters awarded Best Picture in 1995 to “Braveheart,” which is about blood and gore and little else.