Monday 26 February 2007

Fucking Oscars

Just a friendly warning ~ it seems it’s been a looooong time since I swore much in me posts. But never fear: simply put the words ‘The Departed’ and ‘Infernal Affairs’ int same sentence, and off I go! Instant vitriol!


So there I am, on me way to work, and I happen to look up at the MTR bulletin thingy. You know, the wee electronic announcement things in the panelling above the opposite passengers’ heads. Looks like a baby scoreboard nicked from some little-league baseball ground somewhere. Anyway, the point is, I happen to pan right and yawn, and see the results (in Chinese):

’The Departed’ wins Best Picture Oscar

And that were about the moment I went: “Woah woah woah! Is it me, or has the world gone fucking nuts?”

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t actually care so much who wins, cos after all, they’re just foreign awards. I care more about BAFTAs, but they still come a looooong way behind the Hong Kong Film Awards. What I do object to is other films, namely ‘Little Miss Sunshine’ getting screwed over cos we’re all fawning over ourselves to lick Mr I’ve been working like a fucking dog and never got a fucking Oscar for it, neither Scorsese. I like Mr S. I do. But, really? REALLY?


Winning Best Director is one thing. He might have bought the story, lock stock and both fucking barrels, from Media Asia or whoever slipped up and let it out of the DVD masters cupboard that afternoon, but he still would have had to work hard to direct the fucker. Fair do’s, after all. He still had to think of amazing ways to motivate Leo De Craprio into pretending he could act fer more than 90 seconds. Come on, the man worked hard an’ all that.

But what does this say about Hollywood? That they buy a story, already made, filmed, and a winner at the Berlin Film Festival (among others) and then re-write (AND I USE THE TERM LOOSELY) it a tad to fit it into the USA way of doing things, and then win a fucking Oscar fer it. Oh, fuck me, could this possibly mean that the story was good enough to win Oscars BEFORE it was ‘re-written’ to make it easier fer American (and to some extent, all English-speaking) audiences to digest? Why people didn’t just watch the original and read the fucking subtitles is beyond me. I didn’t demand ‘Le fabuleux destin d’ Amélie Poulain’ in English, did I? I didn’t demand ‘Battle Royale’ or ‘Deathnote’ in English, did I? Oh, and while we’re on the subject, modern American and English are so far removed from one another, don’t even call em the same fucking language. Oh yes, and while we’re on that subject, let me pass judgement on the fucking appalling fucking use of fucking bad fucking language in the fucking film ‘The Fucking Departed’. Did the little script-monkey get paid per F-word to write that? Does he lack an imagination where vocabulary is concerned?

Right. I’ve railed against this not once, not twice, but three times already, so I’ll leave it there. Suffice to say I am less than impressed wi the whole sorry fucking mess.

Hope you enjoyed the pics. They're from some small-time Hong Kong film called ‘Infernal Affairs’. You might have heard of it. It were clever, well-acted and executed, a nice taut thriller with fantastic performances and a heart-stopping ending. But seems the rest of't world wouldn't be interested in that, dunt it?

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7 comments:

weenie said...

Yep, twas a fix - was a sympathy oscar for Scorsese, mebbe before he pops his clogs or summat. I'm just glad Dame Mirren got awarded at long last.

moonlustie said...

I take it that you're a tad upset then :P - I can never understand how they can give awards to films that people have hardly heard of let alone seen. *shakes head*.

Never mind hun - have a large vodka and you'll feel better!

Hugs
Sue

Anonymous said...

Have another Ribenka, it's my round.....

........of apocalpytic applause for The Departed getting an Oscar, bravo, bravo, most splendid!

Only joking, keep yer kegs on:)

Anonymous said...

by the way, what crafty clever trick verifies my special web pages now?

FOUR DINNERS said...

not unless Scorsese directed it

* (asterisk) said...

It's not just you. It's me and you. That's all. Just us two. Like you, I like Mr S, but puh-leeeze.

And... get this: on the shitty highlights show that Sky One showed the next night, when they awarded William Monaghan the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, the dumb-fuck English voiceover man said, "William Monaghan based the screenplay on his book Infernal Affairs." I went fucking spare!

At least Marty acknowledged the original film's makers in his speech.

Still, I think remakes should be ineligible for awards.

Anonymous said...

are you on? do you need some chocolate? are your shoes pinching? are you wearing stroppy knickers again??????