You are currently browsing all entries tagged with 'Oscars'

R.I.P. Ralph McQuarrie

  • March 4, 2012 12:42 am

Conceptual artist Ralph McQuarrie has died, at the age of 82. He was the guy, instrumental in realizing the world of Star Wars for George Lucas. With his concept drawings for the likes of Darth Vader, Chewbacca, C-3PO, and pretty much the whole shebang of the Star Wars universe, his work sold 20th Century Fox in giving a young Lucas a chance in directing a film that pretty much changed everything in Hollywood.

When I was a kid, I was amazed to see these “not really Star Wars” art floating around in magazines like Starlog, especially art depicting a more slender Darth Vader with a different type of helmet or a more feminine looking C-3PO trekking through the desert, as if it walked off the Metropolis set. What I would later learn is that these were early concept drawings of Star Wars, which made it cooler because to me, they were now alternate universes of what Star Wars could be and just opened up that world for me even more. Check out some of the early concept art:  Read more...

Building Blocks of a Great Story (and All Forms of Art)

  • February 27, 2012 3:03 pm

Happy Monday, compadres. Since it’s a chilly, grey, post-Oscars Monday here in LA, I’ve been in a contemplative mood about great films, and art in general. As the dust settles after Hollywood’s biggest prom event (i.e. the Oscars) and the winners are sleeping off their champagne fueled hangovers all nuzzled next to their Oscar statuettes, and the countless entertainment peons go back to work, one cannot be reticent that it’s so hard to make a good, or even great, film. And for those countless dreamers who come here, straight off the bus from Kansas, ala Axl Rose in the Welcome to the Jungle music video, to realize their dreams as storytellers and content makers, how do you cut through all the bullshit and just make good art? It’s tough. It’s all a numbers game and frankly, 1 in a million will make it. That’s why there are so many jaded waiters in LA, because they’ve slogged through it all. It can get pretty depressing.  Read more...

No Love for Asians at the Oscars? So What?

  • February 28, 2011 12:34 am

Firstly, I should point out that contrary to what some might think, there were Asian nominees at this year’s Oscars: Cinematographer Matthew Libatique, composer A.R. Rahman, actor Hailee Steinfeld (who’s part Filipina), illustrator Shaun Tan (who won) and documentarian Ruby Yang. My hats off to all of them!

OK, now for the real issue at hand:

Yeah, I get it that the Oscars were pretty white-washed and there was no diversity and that sucks, blah, blah, blah. And my reaction to that is—so fucking what? Come on, this isn’t exactly breaking news, but more importantly, focusing on the Academy Awards as a target of our ire–while symbolic in many ways–doesn’t really do us any good. Why? Because the Oscars are largely reactionary and it’s always more effective to go directly to the problem rather than the reaction to the problem.  Read more...

FUCK “The Real Story of K-Pop brought to the Silver Screen”! and FUCK THIS BLOG! I”m Outta here!…I got Offered the Role of a life time!

  • April 1, 2010 3:09 am

As MGM mulls its future, the show goes on

Four movies are slated for release in the next year, including ‘Hot Tub Time Machine’ with John Cusack and Oliver Stone helmed ‘The American Dream the Tom Vue biopic’ with Sung Kang. The studio’s owners hope to sell MGM by next month.

LA Times. April 1st 2010 . By Claud Schtuss

If it were a movie, it might be called “Hollywood Parallel Universe.” This nail-biting thriller would center on a group of harried movie executives scrambling to push pictures out the door while their studio teeters on bankruptcy and is sold to the highest bidder.  Read more...

Academy Award Winning Movie Trailer

  • March 27, 2010 1:10 am

This is a little late since the Academy Awards has already past, but whatever. I’m sharing this pretty funny ode to all the cliches in a Hollywood movie trailer that is trying way too hard for awards love, by presenting them in “placeholder” speak, ranging from the prerequisite mental illness, to the hotshot who is on a spiritual journey, to even a little gayness. It’s pretty spot on, especially with the use of the theme from Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. Enjoy, and have a good weekend, YOMYOMFers!  YouTube Preview Image Check out comedy duo Britanick’s channel for more funny videos. “Laugh, laugh, laugh, laugh, laugh,laugh…….”

(Via Thompson on Hollywood)

Honest Movie Titles: Oscars 2010 Edition

  • March 7, 2010 11:42 am

Courtesy of our friends at CollegeHumor, a look at the posters of some of this year’s Oscar nominees and what these films really should have been titled. Happy Oscar viewing!

 Read more...

My Two Brushes With Oscar

  • February 19, 2010 8:31 am

Some years ago I had the good fortune to win a screenwriting contest called the Nicholl Fellowship. It was a nail biting six months of waiting for letters, phone calls, then a trip to Los Angeles, and it all culminated with me standing on a stage in the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, making an ass of myself, flanked by two ten foot tall statues of Oscar. The Fellowship is administered by the Academy Award people, so Oscar made an appearance. I remember his skin was more beautiful than I expected: it wasn’t shiny and cheap looking, but rather, had an elegant, brushed sheen to it. And since those two statues may be as close to the Academy Awards as I’ll ever get (assuming my application for a last minute seat filler goes unanswered), I better jump on this week’s flavah.  Read more...

SHOULD HAVE BEEN NOMINATED (#1)

  • February 8, 2010 3:47 pm

With the 82nd Academy Awards quickly approaching, I thought I would write a series of blogs on my favorite movies that were never nominated for an Oscar in any category.

I have to say that most of the time, the Oscars do recognize good movies in some form or fashion, even if it’s just for great sound. That’s not to say that I always agree with the outcomes or that they haven’t left out a movie that deserved to be in a certain category, but for the most part, the best made movies can boast at least 1 Oscar nomination. Still, I am amazed at how some really deserving films slipped completely from the minds of the members of the Academy.

After perusing my list of outcast movies, I decided that they generally fall into 1 of 3 categories: 1. The film is a genre film (Horror, Action, Thriller, etc.) 2. The film is foreign or 3. The film is just too indie (and therefore probably didn’t have the right Oscar campaign budget.)

So my first pick in the series is a very familiar one and perhaps one of the most iconic films ever made in the genre of Horror:  Read more...

My Father’s Night at the Oscars

  • January 20, 2010 12:27 am

It was about 3 years ago today that I was having dinner with my father and he declared to me that he had already bought his suit. “What suit?” I asked? “For the Academy Awards,” he said. “You’re going to get nominated.”

I was flattered, but so far, while the film itself was doing well with award nominations, Letters from Iwo Jima had not garnered a single screenplay nomination. Not by the WGA, not by the Golden Globes, not by any other major award. So I told him, “I hope you can return it.”

But he insisted that the Rafu Shimpo said I was likely to be nominated, and the word of the Rafu Shimpo was like the word of God. “Well, OK, if I get to go, you can be my date,” I said, not really expecting to have to live up to the promise.

The 79th Academy Award Nominations were announced on Jan. 27, 2007, and The Rafu Shimpo was right after all and my date to the Oscars would be my father.  Read more...