It's a publicity stunt designed to bring celebrities, directors, producers and clothes designers more money. Trust me.

Got it in one

"A good pun is its own reword"

The best view of how good a movie is, is in the sales. Theator, and DVD/Video sales tell weather the movie was any good. Some that sold really well did not win any awards yet other that did mediocer, won lots? Strange thing, our sociaties are.

Finalday

Habaq Mot / Aspazomai Thanatos / Capere Obitus... /Keith Green\ (1953-1983)

The awards judge stuff like skill of the actors, director etc etc. But like Finalday said, that's not a measure of how good the film is - only the sales are

"A good pun is its own reword"

I don't think film sales are an indicator of how good a film is either. Titanic took vast quantities of money, but the film is terrible (women like it cause its a soppy love story, but everything else about the film was bad as well).

Also - under seige with good old Steven Segal - that took several hundred million in the cinemas..........but it doesn't mean its a good film at all. Its entertaining, but not good. Basically people have taste. Some have good taste, some have horrific taste. The best films for acting, direction, cinematography are nearly never the same as the best selling movies at all. Cinema ticket sales do require a film to be okay or so, but its more important upon who is in the film rather than how well its directed. A couple of top notch stars can garuntee a good opening weekend and decent sales of near any movie. however - this has started to change. Nowadays notice the action heroes films are decreasing, cause the public want to see a film that engages them rather than just make them sit there wanting to shout "kick his mother f......... ass!!". Maybe it is turning to the point where quality is more important than body count.....but who knows

Some films that win go against what the public think - but remember - the public in general don't pick up on every issue of a film as we are not critiques, but merely the audience. However, the poeple who do choose it are more in line with choosing down to quality.......and we are going to disagree as our favourite films lose out to less known arty farty films that really are great in cinematography, sound, editing, and boring as hell

Just to make a case in point. Starwars films should have cleaned up at the oscars if it was reliant upon cinema tickets (popularity) cause lets face it, they got massive viewing figures..BUT then we sit and critise it instead

This all depends on what you define as a "good" film. A good film in the eyes of the general public is one that sells lots of tickets. But you as an individual might have completely different opinions on which films are masterpieces

"A good pun is its own reword"

Even if a film is said to be bad, if it made a profit for the studio, they would likely make another. As long as people vote with their wallets, films that ARE bad, will continue to be made.

Finalday

Habaq Mot / Aspazomai Thanatos / Capere Obitus... /Keith Green\ (1953-1983)

It's all a sham. We all know that the movies are judged by a select and "secret" panel. I think that the Illuminati are acting up again...

nice one Esq!

Thanks, Taw! Finally I have proof that my sense of humour is improving!

In most cases my taste does not correspond to film popularity or sales, so I don't giva a darn for all Oscars etc. European awards, however, seem to be more trustworthy, since European cinema is not THAT commercialized (though such trend can already be seen).

@esq you were joking? humpf...I'll take any opportunity to blame those damn lizards...

Im actually going to go against the grain here and say that I am quite fond of the academy awards. I personally find them to be a generally fair awards ceremony that does award excellence rather than sheer volume sales. You cannot tell me that Peter Jackson or Sean Penn were undeserving winners this year?
Sure there are plenty of awards ceremonies that are purely backslapping excuses to get drunk and show off my pretty new dress that could feed a starving nation for a week. However, if you seperate all the glitz and glamour crap, 9 time out of 10 if you go to watch an Academy Award winning movie you're going to see a pretty darn good flick.

Mustang - I agree, its true, I argued the point that ticket sales do NOT reflect a good movie at all. Case in point being Harry Potter. Harry Potter holds the 3rd and 7th highest grocing films of all time i think it is...........but they aren't good at all - in fact, that goes for most of the top ten.

Any Oscar awards film is great (upon its award, so good editing does not mean a great storyline of course), and i do think they are a reflection - but Lord of the Rings was a masterpiece - and they did seem to reward all three in one go. However - previous winners like Titanic seem to be more in line with public viewing rather than actual decent film

Penn winning best actor - yes, his role was exceedingly accomplished, but i cannot help but feel sorry for Bill Murray.

Bill was great - and i think he should have won. Just for the fact that HE turned a performance that no-one would have believed possible for him. He really acted a good part excellently. Penn on the other hand acted an excellent part well....... I cannot explain my distinction here apart from saying Penns role had all the emotion, circumstance and opportunities to be an oscar nomination role. Basically - slap many many actors into that role with the material that the role is about, and you would have got oscar nominations in for them too......the role was almost "oscar" defined by the material for the role.

You could almost say the same about Bills role as well - but to a much LESSER extent. For me his performance outstrips Penn just for the fact that his role had less "oscar" potential to work with basically.....and also that Bill gave such an unexpectedly great role from a man that was never chosen for his acting ability over Sean Penn who has always had great acclaim to his ability.

Mind you - I wanted to see Mr Depp win it, just for the fact that i still think the other two roles had Mr Oscar in mind when acted/cast from the start. However, Johnny Depps excellent pirate would not - it would have been an amusing win - cause at last a film that didn't have the thought of oscar winning would have got it instead . Mind you - these are just my views - i know others will contend.

It was a great show though - i only cringed a few times.......and mainly as they play the music during someones speach.......which although necessary i fear is intolerably rude.......