Tuesday, January 30, 2007
More "Dreamgirls" Fallout
Everyone loves to second-guess Oscar campaigns. And sometimes they're right -- the Weinstein's insistence that Oscar OWED Martin Scorsese a gold statue for "The Aviator" or "Gangs Of New York" was obnoxious. And yes, sometimes campaigns can seem to overbearing and confident. But that wasn't the case with "Dreamgirls." It was smart to preview 20 minutes at Cannes (it worked for "The Lord Of The Rings" and that trilogy went on to Oscar success), it was a nice nod to movie history to have a roadshow premiere where the film was screened for $25 and moviegoers got a program and other stuff, and most important of all the movie delivered and got great reviews. The only misstep was in not sending out screeners earlier for this Dec 25 wide release. But since the movie clearly plays better on a big screen than at home -- and since people are STILL applauding after musical numbers (my friends just saw it Sunday at the Ziegfeld) -- that was pretty smart too. The movie wasn't OWED a Best Picture Oscar and it got eight nominations and will gross $100 million in the US. All in all, a smart campaign.
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2 comments:
Well, I love the music. But you're right -- as I tried to say, no one "deserves" an Oscar nomination for anything so there's no reason to think of it as snubbed. The only complaint I'll ever take from someone is that if they think one performance was overlooked, they have to name another one that comes off the list. Not usually hard to do, but they get the point: only five movies get named.
As much as I enjoyed DG, I must say that I didn't think it was Oscar caliber. Also, as much as I love a "star is born" story, I'm not sure Hudson deserves a supporting actress win. I thought her singing was fantastic and she did a beautiful job in the role. But oscar worthy, not really.
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