Gone With The Wind - Page 10

Hardly.
What about Kramer vs Kramer, Ordinary People, Out of Africa, Forrest Gump, The English Patient, Titanic, American Beauty, Crash.

(waiting for the inevitable onslaught to ensue)

I agree with you on all of those with the exception of American Beauty and, to a lesser extent, Titanic.

I admit though that American Beauty does not hold up that well.

Holy Cow, somebody somewhat agrees with me and not just anybody but Rob!
I'm not used to this at all here.
Now if we can just get you over that Titanic thing.......
About American Beauty, if I may, it's been a long time but as I remember it was the movie when it came out, Kevin Spacey was the cool actor as was Annette Bening.
It started off ok but everyone in the film was such a caricature and the plot outcomes were so predictable that it boring real fast. It tried to make some big statement about how empty and fake our lives are and ended being a parody of itself.

Crash, started off great. It had all these different big time actors in small roles, working for free or scale. It was one those uber-faceted, seemingly unconnected but connected scripts that were in vogue in the early 2000's.
I got into Matt Dillon's character and the self-realization he goes through but then it seems that everyone else goes postal in a nano-second.
The entirety of L.A. is on a short fuse ready to explode with pent-up frustrations from years of injustice, prejudice, hate, inequity and blah, blah blah.
Contrived.

I find Titanic to be very "watchable". Even "re-watchable". Sure, it is easy to criticize parts of the story, but the bottom line for me is that it was interesting enough to watch to make it a good movie overall. I found the way the different "classes" were treated to be very interesting. And the special effects/set design were pretty amazing.

I really loved American Beauty when it came out. Thought it was a GREAT movie. I don't feel that way anymore though, as it just hasn't held up that well. Still, that year and at that time...it was a good movie, if that makes sense.

Anyway, Milt, I still disagree with most everything else that you say, so there!

Several years later? The terrible jokes had me cringing through it the whole way. I couldn't believe people were taking it seriously even though it was just a silly light satire of Shakespeare. Suddenly it swept the Oscars like a hurricane right over Saving Private Ryan, The Thin Red Line, and Pleasantville.

1939 was probably the toughest year ever to get an Academy award. Other best picture nominees are still regulars on cable television: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Ninotchka (Greta Garbo's American debut), Of Mice and Men, Wuthering Heights, and of course, Wizard of Oz.

I agree, even during its release it was made fun of.

However, looking back many years later on it, it even seems more comical.

Truly an embarrassing decision for it to win best picture.

I think Life is Beautiful was best picture of the year.

That really was an amazing year! And two films directed by Fleming were nominated for best picture. Not bad.

None of these come even close to being as bad as SIL.

And a few of these films you listed are definite classics (whether you like them or not).

The other thing is for many of these films, there was not much else choice unlike the year SIL won.

Kramer vs Kramer? A very good film, but Apocalypse Now should have won that year.

Ordinary People? Not one of my favorites, but what do you suggest should have won in its place that year?

Out of Africa? Again, which should have won? The color purple?

Forrest Gump is a classic whether you like it or not. I'm not a fan, but it is one of the most memorable films of the 90's. Though I think Pulp Fiction should have won.

The English Patient, I agree bad film. I wanted Shine to win personally.

Titanic is a classic for sure. And I think it deserved the win (though I personally wanted LA Confidential).

American Beauty was a very good film. What would you suggest replace it that year?

Crash wasn't one of my favorites, but there really wasn't much that year to replace it for the win. Brokeback Mountain? Please.

Other mistakes I see -- I don't think A Beautiful Mind should have won in 2001 (though it was a good flick). LOTR should have won that year. Goodfellas should have won instead of Dances with Wolves. Raiders of the Lost Ark should have won over Chariots of Fire.

All you have really done is illustrate how irrelevant the Oscars are as to how good or bad a film is.

I actually think SIL is a pretty good film. One thing it has going against it, particularly for posterity, is that it is a comedy. Sure it it is romantic and a love story and has a great production design, but it is mainly a comedy. Comedies hold up the least of all movie styles, IMO. They are based on setting up jokes or gags, and once you have memorized the gag or punchline, the effect is negated. Maybe SIL's appeal is more for its romantic aspects?

I seldom revisit comedy on home video, unless it is the work of one of the great silent comedians, like Keaton, Chaplin, Lloyd, et al. I saw SIL in the theater and bought the DVD, but I have never gotten around to watching it a second time.

Funny, I don't have a problem with Shakespeare in Love (not my favorite movie ever, but certainly not the disaster you make it out to be either). However, I consider Life is Beautiful a truly terrible movie.

I cringed in my seat when Roberto Begnini (who actually speaks perfectly fluent English) accepted his acting Oscar with that embarrassing "Lookata me-a. I'm-a big-a clown-a Italiano! Mama mia! Pizza pie-a!" speech.

Am I in the wrong thread? I thought this was "Gone with the Wind"? LOL Jk!

I see they have the non-boxed set coming out, hopefully the transfer will be the same as this is a classic and another one I love is Lawrence of Arabia!

Wow, you're probably the only person I've heard that didn't like this film. To each their own, I guess. I thought it was a remarkable film and a classic.



Whew!


With that, we have derailed this thread and I apologize for that. I have a copy of Gone with the Wind on Blu-Ray ordered, can't wait to view it!

Whew, thanks. I feel better now.
And actually, I do know what you mean about American Beauty.


Ya got that right. So many factors affect who wins.
Like Scorsese winning for The Departed. He was given that award because he was way overdue.
I thought Leonardo gave his usual great performance in that one.
And since we're careening OT here, where the hell is This Boy's Life on blu-ray. Huh?


You mean that old chick-flick?


Now you're just sucking up to Tomlin.

Actually, I remember liking SIL.
As I remember a lot of people on AVS were raving about the PQ and the "reds".
I think what's-her-face got an Oscar as well, right?

It was actually quite controversial when it was released (only 56% favorable from the "Top Critics" on Rotten Tomatoes) for sentimentalizing the Holocaust. It also suffered a wider backlash in later years.

I personally found it to be in really poor taste.

For some reason, I cannot find the new 70th anniversary one-disc Blu-ray on Amazon. It shows a release on Jan 1, 2009, but that is "not in stock".
The collector's edition is available, but I don't want all the extras, just the movie. Anyone else experience this?

Thanks!
I saw that listing, and thought it might be a different release as it's dated January 2009. I was under the impression that a different release was scheduled for this week.

For about $25 US, you can probably get Gone With The Wind from Amazon UK and get a second disc full of extras unlike the 'movie only' US disc. It also has a better cover (same as the UCE).

Will the UK version play in North America, or is it region-locked? Any idea?

All Warner Bros. BDs are region-free. I have the UK GWTW and it plays fine in my (US) BDP-83.

Thanks Cheld, I think I'll go ahead and order the UK version!

The UK is a better deal, especially if you already bought the Wizard of Oz UCE or Emerald Edition. I bought the latter of that one, and didn't want to pay for another copy of that 'When The Lion Roars' DVD which they included with both WoO and GWTW. The UK just has the two discs from the UCE, the movie disc and the extras disc. It doesn't have the WTLR DVD and it doesn't have the soundtrack CD and trinkets.

Bought the single disk version @ COSTCO for $12.99 last week. Just finished watching the first half with my wife and we are both thrilled by the excellent picture and sound quality. A stellar transfer worth every penny!!!

....an', frankly, I thought nobody gave a damn about this thread anymore... I guess today is that another day...