Count Dooku

You didn't come away from TSN feeling sorry for the world's youngest billionaire?

PopcornTreeCt

Sheesh, I hope it wasn't that realistic. Very scary that there are people that live that way. In the scene where Lawrence is teaching her younger siblings to fire a rifle, she says a line like "kneel down like you're praying" It sent a chill up my spine like this is America --guns and Jesus.

Count Dooku

If it wasn't realistic, I think this reviewer would have been complaining.

http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/...heartache-in/#

dino88

You should check out the documentary The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia. Now that's scary.

FantasticVSDoom

Scary and probably the best movie I saw last year...

hardercore

Tom Hooper just won the DGA award over David Fincher, who alongside Bale and Sorkin has up til now dominated his category. I think we need to all start resigning ourselves to a King's Speech sweep come oscar night, folks. If it takes SAG it'll be pretty much over, as it does not compete with The Social Network at WGA (original, versus adapted).

Count Dooku

Just the people who didn't think The King's Speech was even one of the ten best films of the year.

I thought the conventional wisdom was that the Best Picture race was always between The Social Network and The King's Speech, so if TKS came out on top it wouldn't be too shocking.

Will support for TKS carry into the Supporting Acting categories where (I think) The Fighter was favored? Guess we will find out tonight.

Dr. DVD

Does anyone else think the Academy will wind up giving the Best Actress Oscar to Annette Benning as a lifetime achievement award?

RichC2

Yes. It's very possible.

It's unfortunate Hooper won over Fincher. Hooper's direction was the only thing I could actually fault with The King's Speech.

Bale did better than Rush, but Rush carried TKS (imo) and if it's a favored movie it's possible they will give it to him instead of Bale.

Mr. Cinema

The Old Farts have spoken! We like to play it safe and we are going to make sure that the non-formulaic movie for those young hippies will fail! Long live the safe, heart tugging standard fare!

Mr. Cinema

I'm sure The King's Speech is good, but I really thought this might be the year where the voters who actually know what technology is, might...just might....vote for the hip movie. But no.

I still hold out some hope for Social Network, but it's not looking good now. The DGA loss was a huge blow. So if things don't change, it appears King's Speech takes Picture, Director, Actor, likely Editing now as a throw in, probably Screenplay too. I'm sure it'll win something else.

Poor Social Network might just end up with Screenplay and Score. That is truly a shame.

PopcornTreeCt

I really don't think any of that will happen. It's nearly February and the majority of Americans still have not even heard of The King's Speech.

RichC2

Yeah, again I didn't like a number of directorial choices in The King's Speech but it further proves the academy prefers things remain the same. TKS is a total traditional movie with standard "overcoming the odds" fare. It's by no means bad, but it's rather forgettable.

Mr. Cinema

I hope this will be a similar year when the DGA picked Rob Marshall over Scorsese and Polanski, but Polanski took the Oscar. But I have a feeling it won't be. Usually, out of all the groups, the directors make a good choice on Oscar night. They also rewarded Soderberg for "Traffic" which was a somewhat surprise.

hardercore

+1. If I were handing it out Directing would go to Aronofsky, but it should really be between Aronofsky and Fincher and, well, Nolan, but we won't go there.

Mr. Cinema

This was posted on Hollywood Elsewhere from a member who said they were at the DGA:

being in the room last night for the DGA Awards..I can tell you the audience was stunned over the Hooper win..Kathryn Bigelow (who read the winner) was visibly shocked..one of the other directors (not Fincher) couldn't contain himself and let out a howl of laughter. Having been to a lot of these award shows this season a bit...I'm sure all of the directors want to win themselves, but get the feeling they don't mind losing to Fincher...I think they *do mind losing to Hooper considering the direction was the weakest part of King's Speech.

Finisher

It's about 50-50 for best picture. King's Speech is safer, more Oscar-baity. Social Network is young and hip. Academy skews older though.

PopcornTreeCt

This has become sort of a myth. Recent examples include:

Gladiator winning over Gosford Park
Crash winning over everything
The Departed winning over The Queen
No Country for Old Men winning over everything
Slumdog Millionaire winning over The Reader
The Hurt Locker winning over everything

None of those films are Oscar bait.

Dr. DVD

Gladiator didn't win over Gosford Park; the latter wasn't even nominated that year.

RichC2

Yeah, the only thing that was even somewhat competitive with Gladiator that year was Traffic. Chocolat, Crouching Tiger, and Erin Brockovich didn't really seem so high and mighty.

Funny that Soderbergh had two Best Pic and two Best Director noms that year

Gosford Park was nominated the year after Gladiator won and lost to A Beautiful Mind.

Patman

Never considered "The Reader" as a legitimate contender for BP that year (or really any year).

"The Departed" felt like a lifetime achievement win for Scorsese (along with his BD win). (Then again, I didn't really love that movie, and was surprised it won BP that year).

PopcornTreeCt

Oops. But yeah still counts... Gladiator was a bit of a surprise and not really Oscar bait.

Mr. Cinema

2000 was a crazy year. According to the Academy, Traffic was the best edited, best written, and best directed movie, yet it wasn't good enough to win Picture. And Del Toro nabbed Supporting Actor. Very strange year.

conscience

Wait a minute. You're up in arms and you haven't even seen The King's Speech? I expected more from you.

DonTHX1378

Here's my major problem with King's Speech, and I know that others feel the same way, it feels like a big screen version of Masterpiece Theater. I've seen the film twice now and it feels like something you would turn into on PBS, it doesn't feel like something made for seeing a movie theater. Don't get me wrong, it's good, but no where near the level of film that Inception, Social Network, True Grit, The Fighter, Black Swan, or hell even Toy Story 3 is. I can't still get around why Inception isn't the front runner and why Nolan can't get a break with the Oscars.