Online Research Project

While many writers offer opinions of the Academy Award nominees, and even the show itself, it seems that no one has addressed this issue. Small budget, independent films are beating out the Hollywood blockbusters for awards. This is becoming a very popular trend, and in my opinion, it’s unjust.
Mainstream films are becoming less likely to win an Academy Award in a major category. This year’s best picture, “Slumdog Millionaire,” was nominated alongside “Milk,” “The Reader,” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” and “Frost/Nixon.” Most of the nominees had an “A-list” name attached to them. For example, Brad Pitt starred in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Pitt has been nominated for two Academy Awards in his career. He also has starred in a string of Hollywood blockbusters and critically acclaimed films such as “Fight Club.” I find it strange that such a Hollywood darling has never received an Oscar. Other Hollywood stars such as Josh Brolin and Leonardo DiCaprio have never won an Academy Award. Both have had parts in major Hollywood films, and are often considered to be two of the best actors ever. How is it that neither of them have been recognized? After all, shouldn’t the Oscars recognize the best?

Mainstream films such as “The Dark Knight” should get a better chance at receiving an Academy Award. The televised portion of the Oscar ceremony has experienced decreasing ratings in previous years. Over the past three years, ratings have been steadily increasing. I think that certain nominees could affect TV ratings. If “The Dark Knight” was in running for best picture, would the ratings increase? I would think so. After all, “The Dark Knight” made $1 billion in worldwide box office sales, and received acclaim from notable critics such as Richard Roeper and Peter Travers. Therefore, it’s safe to say that it’s a popular film. When the news broke that “TDK” was not in the running for best picture, I think it turned a lot of people off. If the Academy wants to continue to increase TV ratings, they need to listen to the people. I know it’s not fair, but it’s business. The current state of the economy has taken a toll on the movie industry. “The Dark Knight,” in terms of revenue, single handedly kept the industry afloat last year, amid Writer’s Union strikes and other work stoppages. Why wasn’t it nominated?

I don’t want make it sound like I am disregarding the efforts of independent filmmakers. This article shows how smaller films like “Slumdog Millionaire” are financed, and they stack against films like “TDK.” In terms of quality, a lot of people felt that “Slumdog Millionaire” was a better movie. The story of the film was very poignant and deep, which probably influenced the Academy’s decision to nominate and later award the film. “The Dark Knight,” despite very positive reviews, was seen by many as another superhero flick, lumped in with the likes of “Spider-Man.” Despite it being action packed and full of mystery, the story of the film was a lot less relatable to real life.

Films such as “Slumdog Millionaire” are art-house films, in that they are marketed toward a certain group of people. The subject matter of these films is generally serious, and is considered to be noncommercial. “Slumdog Millionaire” was nearly unnoticed before its release. It was shifted around from studio to studio, and nearly went direct to DVD, because of the studios felt that the film had little marketability. “The Dark Knight” was meant to be a blockbuster, and it was. The film was purposely made to make money. It was marketed to everyone. There was no specified audience. However, I feel that the audience to which a film is marketed to should not matter when discussing Oscar nominations. I feel that the Academy probably nominated “Slumdog Millionaire” because of that. It was one of the underdogs in the industry, and eventually became a success story. “TDK” was a success from the beginning. I think the Academy should revaluate their nomination decisions.

2009 Academy Awards

The 2009 Academy Awards took place on Sunday February 22 in Los Angeles, California. The ceremony this year was a little different in more ways than one. First, actor Hugh Jackman was selected to be this year's host. His selection for the job seemed to signify a change in direction for the Oscar ceremony, which had a record low audience of 32 million viewers last year. Jackman, who has prior experience hosting award shows, brought his singing and dancing talents to the stage.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/oscars/4784073/Oscars-2009-Academy-hopes-revamped-show-will-boost-ratings.html

Going into the show, there was a lot of controversy surrounding the nominees. "The Dark Knight," a major blockbuster from last year, did not recieve any major nominations beside best supporting actor for Heath Ledger's portrayal of the Joker. The film overall, recieved eight nominations, but they were for technical achievements such as cinematography and editing. This had many critics up in arms, criticizing the awards for not giving mainstream films such as "TDK" more recogition. Another controversy surrounding "TDK" was when Heath Ledger, who died just days before last year's ceremony, won the award Best Supporting Actor. Initially, it was unknown who would accept his award. His family would go on to accept the award.
http://www.aceshowbiz.com/news/view/00022245.html

As for the winners, "Slumdog Millionaire" would win eight of its 13 nominations including best director, and best picture. Sean Penn won best actor for his portrayal of openly gay politican Harvey Milk in "Milk." Penelope Cruz won best actress, becoming the first Spanish actress to win an Academy Award, for "Vicky Cristina Barcelona."
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1503188/2009_academy_awards_in_review_slumdog.html?cat=40
Overall, I felt that this year's awards were pretty good. The show seemed to be entertaining, without feeling overloaded, or lacking. The hiring of Hugh Jackman as host was shocking to me initially, but his performance proved that not all Oscar hosts have to be comedians. The lack of recogition for "The Dark Knight" was sort of upsetting. I wish more mainstream films such as "TDK" would get more credit, but I realize that the Academy has a history of snubbing blockbusters. Not to insult films such as "Slumdog Millionaire," but realistically, who is going to see this film? "The Dark Knight" made $1 billion at the box office, and has been re-released on two occasions. "Slumdog Millionaire" has been in select cities for a couple of months, and is just now getting a shot in wide release. I'm not trying to diss the film, it's just that I thought that a film that has helped the movie industry get back on track would recieve more credit. The movie industry as a whole has been in a slump. Up until the release of "TDK," there had been declining numbers in movie audiences. Films such "TDK" and "WALL-E" changed that by becoming blockbusters in their own right.

Listservs

During the course of this assignment, I have subscribed to three listservs. All of them pertain to movies in some way, but they have little to do with my actual subject: the academy awards. This was one of the difficulties I faced during this assignment. I couldn't really find anything that was about the Academy Awards.

In fact, there were very few that pertained to movies or cinema at all. One of the listservs that I found talked about Matt Damon...a lot. Another one only talked about foreign films. The only problem with that was that it had one subscriber. A couple of listservs that I subscribed to were actually interesting. One of them talked about obscure films. That one was really interesting because I learned about some films that I never knew about. That one is known as "Cinema Obscura."

Another listserv, "Movie Mania," had very few subscribers, but it was one of the only listservs that I could actually use. It listed the titles of each subscribers favorite movie. Some of them were nominated or won Academy Awards, so it allowed me to do a little research for some of the titles. Most were simply mainstream films that little to do with my subject.

Overall, doing this assignment was fairly difficult. I had trouble after I subscribed to each listerv. For some unknown reason, after I subcribed, I was unable to find the archives for each listerv. I'm not sure if they disappeared or if I did something wrong. I would log in, and try to access the archives, but each time I got a message saying that I was unauthorized to access the archives.

Online News Evaluation Update

My subject is the 2009 Academy Awards, which is known for recognizing the best in cinema. This project was pretty difficult for me. I tried really hard to find some good information, but the search engines that I used (google, yahoo, ask jeeves) did not want give it to me. One of the major difficulties that I have faced during this assignment is finding articles that didn't repeat themselves. Every other article that I found just listed the nominees and nothing more. Seeing the same information over and over again became really frustrating, so much so that I felt like changing my topic. But I decided to stick with it, and I began to find some really interesting articles. For instance, I found one article about how "The Dark Knight" was snubbed from a best picture nomination. The article posed a good question; if "The Dark Knight was nominated for best picture, would that have a positive effect on the Oscars TV ratings?" I slowly gathered one article after another until I had enough to write about. I started finding articles that talked about the business of the awards ceremony, and the actors who were nominated. I found out about their early careers, and I even found some Oscar history. Overall, I learned a lot. Despite my difficulties, I ended up gaining some knowledge. At this point, I'm still researching for a couple more articles.

The Color of Money

What makes this story newsworthy is that it shows how banks discriminate against black people. How can banks give loan offers depending on race? This story shows how racism is evident everywhere, even in our banks. The 5 to 1 margin story discusses the practice of redlining, which effectively cuts off neighborhoods from recieving loan offers. This practice not only affects black neighborhoods, but neighborhoods with low income.

Could this have been done without the aid of computers? The answer is yes, in principle. The story could have been written out on paper, but it would have taken considerably longer. If this were a story for a newspaper, it would have to be written very quickly due to the strict deadlines of a typical newspaper operation.

Finding out what the banks were doing to remedy the problem would have made this story better. It doesn't seem like we get to really know what the banks are doing. Spokespeople from the banks mentioned in the story are talking, but there are no statistics. It makes me wonder if the problem is being solved at all.

Blog #1

My mass communication plans include obtaining a college degree from Lane College. Afterwards I hope to get a job as a sports reporter. I want to be able to travel and see sporting events from around the world.