Oh, so you're another one of those whiny people who only watch when you get nominated and only attend if you think you'll win.
My point is this: equal opportunity is not equal outcome. Anybody in the US can make pretty much any movie they want to. That doesn't mean it's going to be a critic's darling. It might make untold millions, but not an Oscar. Sorry, there are no "participation" awards.
They should lay the blame where it rightfully belongs, on the big five: Morgan Freeman, Samuel L. Jackson, Denzel Washington, Will Smith, and Jamie Fox. In 2015 they were in, respectively, Ted 2, Avengers: Age of Ulton, absolutely nothing, Concussion, absolutely nothing. There also aren't non-participation awards.
It is supposed to be about who gAve the best performances or who wrote the best script not one of these things where everyone gets a trophy just for showing up.
No one I know does either. Someone must be watching it though because all the celebrity news sites won't shut up about them.
Jada Pinkett Smith and Spike Lee called for an Oscar boycott because black actors didn't get nominated.
Didn't a black actress win last year? Haven't several black performers won recently? I don't see a need for quotas. There are going to be years like this. #BlackActorsMatter
I can't remember the last movie JPS was in a movie and the movies she's in usual suck. Sorry your movies suck JPS, star in better movies, maybe you'll get an Oscar.
Spike Lee (pushing for a boycott) is always bitching about the Oscars. Of course Reverend Al Sharpton had to weigh in - the mortgage must be due. He said "The Oscars are like the Rocky Mountains. The higher you climb, the whiter it gets."
Yet another example of Hollywood shenanigans: here we have "shark cat on roomba chases duck" which at first look seems innocuous enough. I dug a little deeper and found out that the novel upon which the movie is loosely based is called "dolphin wolverine on Tonka Truck chases pigeon." Come on now - you're telling me Hollywood can't find one talented wolverine? Yes, they can be "difficult to work with" which is code for "acting wolverine." This kind of shit has been going on for far too long.
As one NPR piece pointed out, minorities are getting more recognition on screen. Just look at the wide cast of Orange is the New Black for example. There is, however, a lack of minority talent scouts and behind the scenes stuff, like at the studio level. Besides, we all know in the end, it's Jews running Hollywood anyway, amirite?
Other than Star Wars: The Force Awakens, was there any movie this past year that had a black and/or female lead that was actually worth a shit? Fucking Hollywood.
She was awesome as Fish Mooney in the first season of Gotham. But the whole point of the boycott is to protest the Academy's snubbing of blacks in general, not any of the participants' personal Oscar fortunes.
So should they give an Oscar to "blacks in general"? If they do, shouldn't they also give Oscars to Native Americans, South Asians, Southeast Asians, North Africans, and Arabs, just to check off all the diversity boxes?
I hadn't heard about this until today and, after doing some quick online searching, have come to the conclusion that this is much ado about nothing. The president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a black woman and thus clearly biased against black people.
Spike Lee and JPS are not boycotting the Oscars to protest their own personal lack of nominations/awards.
Correct. They're protesting it because they're fucking stupid rich assholes who won awards and made millions off the very industry they're criticizing.
Absolutely not. It's rife for criticism. But some of the messages put out by Jones and Pinkett-Smith are beyond silly by invoking Dr. King and saying things like: "There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it's right." Areyoufuckingkiddingme? It's a stupid fucking awards show. It. Doesn't. Matter. Don't make it sound noble. It's just Hollywood with its head up its own arse again.
This is something that could backfire...badly. When Will Smith turns down a script and says "No, no, no, I've gotten enough kudos for now. I don't want to be greedy. Let some other, younger, less-known actors read for this," I'll be impressed with his sincerity. As for Spike Lee...pfft! Gifted director, but with an ego as long as he is short. This puts Chris Rock on the spot and, if it doesn't "work out" (I mean, what are they expecting? That the Academy will start a quota system next year?) it'll end up dividing other actors of color and creating rifts that could last a lifetime. I'm with Hubert. This is petty and self-interested. There are better ways to accomplish genuine diversity.
A good start is to quit putting faith in the idea that rappers making movies about rappers rapping will bring in Oscars for decades. It's a transient niche, like movies about punk rock bands, not a genre. Also getting stale are movies about rappers playing cops, or movies by rappers pretending to be cops. Also no longer in contention, but at one time very big, are movies by white tap dancers playing white tap dancers tap dancing.
In the 70s and 80s the niche was athletes-turned-"actors." A novelty, a passing phase. Gotta take issue with the white tap dancers, though. *cough* Astaire, Gene Kelly *cough*. And then there's this:
