You're right. The people who are doing that are ANTI-FRENCH. Not anti-french foriegn policy, but blanketly anti-french.

Kurismaki is ANTI-AMERICAN.

Not sure how you see someone anti-american policy as being anti-everything-american. And if he doesn't want to visit this country, how does that equate to him being against every single thing in the country?

FIRST look at ALL my posts. I'm discussing what His behavior LOOKS LIKE. I have no way of knowing how he really feels.

SECOND I'm saying his behavior is identical to blanketly ANTI-FRENCH people in America who (nonsensicly) are boycotting EVERYTHING French. This behavior is stupid and so is he. I said it before, but I'll say it again. His anti-American-foriegn-policy reaction is to boycott the Oscars. A move that has nothing to do w/ America's foriegn policy. The Oscars are private and not given out by the government. By boycotting something (the Oscars) that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with another thing (US Foriegn policy) makes it LOOK LIKE he's boycotting only because it is American.

again, I still think you think things way too black-and-white.

It is a logical fallacy to think that just a boycott of the Academy immediately means he is Anti-American. Anti-Bush and his policies, maybe. But you are reaching by saying he is anti-American.

A good analogy is when the U.S. boycotted the Olympics in Moscow. Did they do it because they were anti-olympics or anti-russian policy?

Same situation here. Kaurismaki is boycotting the Oscars because he doesn't want to visit the U.S. - and the Oscars just happen to be here. You're pointing out the obvious when you say the Oscars have nothing to do with politics.

This is not a 'for or against' situation (despite what you may have heard) - it is possible to be against U.S. policy yet still be not Anti-American. And vice versa.

I'm Finnish and have been a huge fan of Kaurismäki (those, including my fellow countrymen, who call his films "artsy-fartsy" are deluding themselves - they're simple, humane and incredibly funny stories about life) for a long time. I'd just like to point out that he made a statement about not going to the Oscars way before the current Iraq situation. The man apparently has zero respect for Hollywood and thus has claimed he won't set foot on Californian soil even at gunpoint.

It's absolutely certain that his opinion at least contributed to his not winning the Best Foreign Feature Oscar. I don't think Kaurismäki is all-round anti-American, but when it comes to film, he sees nothing worth celebrating in modern American cinema. And as his Cannes apperance last year showed, he isn't too big on ceremonies anyway.

How open minded of him. Reminds me of Von Trier. Isolationism at its finnest

Von Trier does not go to the US because he is deathly afraid of flying. It has nothing to do with being anti-Hollywood or Anti-American.

Look, von Trier is one of my favorite directors, but I think his "fear" is a good excuse to be excentric