Why not?
Because the award is called “Best Picture”, not “Picture with the Most Diverse Cast”
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I think diversity can be a great aspect in a movie.
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Maybe, but it sure as shit isn’t the most important element.
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Can be great
I haven’t seen externals, however I’ve seen many films and TV shows alike use diverse characters as mascots to show how progressive the directors are.
Sometimes these diverse characters are even enveloped within woke sub-plots that are unnecessary and detract from the primary storyline.
When you use a demographic/individual as a mascot, you don’t care about that person/demographic… you care about virtue signalling over how great you are for acknowledging the struggles others have gone through whereas others ‘aren’t doing enough’.
There are plenty of individuals who do more than enough without shouting to the rooftops “look at me, look at this diversity I’m promoting! I’m so great!”.
Have you seen memberberries from South Park?
It can be, but forcing it ruins it.
I used to think all that “representation” stuff was kinda dumb, until I saw a TV show (Reservation Dogs) that I believe is made/written by Native people, and mostly starring Native people. Holy cow! It really felt super cool to see people who talked the same way I grew up hearing people talk. There’s very little “Native representation” in TV/film so it was a fairly new experience.
But that was its intention: make a show by Native people for Native people. Not a bunch of white Hollywood execs throwing a bunch of random token characters in to fulfill quotas. That’s probably the situation with what @doogie was talking about, and I agree.
Watched Ride the Eagle on Hulu a couple days ago. I think it’s an “indie” movie, so might not be very popular. Jake Johnson (I think that’s his name, plays Nick in New Girl) loses his hippy mom who he hasn’t seen in years, she leaves him her cabin as long as he completes a list of tasks. Along the way he finds himself lol. Not the greatest but it was pretty good. Kinda funny…maybe 6-7/10? I don’t have high standards for movies, haha.
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I didn’t get a “woke” vibe from watching Eternals, the movie was okay, nothing special. But, the more I look at the deviants comic book design, it makes me kinda hate the movie. I do see what you mean tho, I’ll tell you what, I do grow tired of seeing black characters used as comic relief, that’s annoying.
(I was going to respond an hour ago but a big ass roach was in one of roommate’s room.)
Ex: This dog shit movie
Watched American Ultra last night.
It was a decent way to spend 90 minutes before bed. Not a lot of real deep thinking or anything.
John Leguizamo was fucking hilarious and relatable few times.
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Watched the devil all the time today.
Now… the film within itself wasn’t a bad movie. But… what was the point of the film?
I like depressing movies, but this film encompassed Tom Holland enduring one sequence of unfortunate events after another.
By the end of the film I was surprised our protagonist was still walking, what he went through would subjectively be enough to cripple even the most strong willed of men.
The film had a few very nasty scenes and as a result of this coupled with the overall tone of the movie I can’t recommend it to most
I have seen it, and the new Matrix movie. It looks pretty good compared to that movie lol. Still pretty bad.
It seems to me that most people reject the forced diversity thing (where it is obvious there was a quota). It still is baffling to me that a lot of film makers are still trying to do it.
What movie is great because of the diversity or even something you took real notice of?
I have never thought “This movie/show is great because of the diversity”. It is not something I pay attention to unless it seems forced i.e Another Life in which case it ruins it.
Reacher series is being released on Amazon on Feb 4.
Noticed Wheel of Time series has been out since November. Read all the books written by Robert Jordan, who died before finishing, but none of the ones written by Brandon Sanderson, who finished the series. Thoughts from anyone who’s watched WOT appreciated.
(Footnote -imo George RR Martin caught Jordan’s literary disease (though not the literal one lol) so those who want to read the end of GOT will need to wait until Martin passes, no bad wishes intended.)
The gaps between the Wheel of Time novels were all less than 3 years. Jordan started the series in 1990 and had released 12 novels (including the prequel) by his death in 2007. George RR Martin started publishing in 1996 and is still alive today having published only the 5 novels with the last one being published over 10 years ago. I don’t know the reasons Martin has stopped publishing, but it’s not fair to throw Jordan into the same boat. He seems to have just gotten sick and died while actively working on the series.
In regards to the Amazon prime series, I watched it and was underwhelmed. I had not read the books before, but watching the TV version raised questions that peaked my interest. It seemed like a really interesting universe with a good story. But there was lots of baggage in the TV series that just seemed bad. I googled a bit and realized that basically everything I didn’t like in the TV series was created from whole cloth and didn’t exist in the books. So now I’m reading the books.
Also, practically all of the women in the series are made intentionally unattractive. Which is not to say that the actresses are ugly, although they aren’t stunningly beautiful either. They just make sure they don’t look good on screen. The sequel trilogy of Star Wars did the same thing. Daisy Ridley is a good looking woman, but they made sure it didn’t look like it. If the message was that not all heroes are good looking, that would perhaps be positive. But they made sure to cast literal models in the male roles in WoT. This is in addition to the obvious focus on diversity in the casting process that raises a lot of questions about the way that genetics work in WoT.
From 1990 to 1994, Jordan cranked out six (5?, it’s been too long) great novels. Then he slowed…the plots advanced marginally from book to book; iirc, Winter’s Heart was 500+ pages of absolutely nothing happening except for tedious descriptions of clothes and landscape; I think my brother who recommended the series to me, gave up after book 5 or 6; I grinded to Jordan’s last book in 2005, and the plot advancement was minimal. So essentially tons of great stuff in the first 5 years, nothing much for the next decade. If Jordan had gotten rich like Martin, I’m guessing WOT would’ve never been finished either, hence my comment.
Brother watched the first 2 episodes, was so so about it, said it was not like the books (seems to be the common consensus).
I have a “woke” female friend that loved the books, and thinks the Amazon series is awesome. She did use the “diversity” word in her review, and told me I would have to discard all my preconceptions from reading the books. lol
Btw, Rosamund Pike looks like a main character, and she was a consensus “hottie” in her prime (pun intended…).
I haven’t gotten far enough into the books to know if it falls off after 5. I see your point as far as an author losing motivation after getting rich.
To be clear, the lack of women looking attractive is no more the problem than the diversity quotas in the cast. These are both just visible symptoms of the problem. The problem is that the creators are more interested in shoe-horning a specific narrative into the show than in telling a good story, faithfully recreating the feeling and story of the book, or even making money.
And your friend has a very strange understanding of the word “preconceptions.”
I watched the series the queen’s gambit on Netflix. I liked this one. Something about the chick that plays the main character does it for me. She had eyes like Emma stone who I also find attractive. I thought they did a good job on back story and development. I’ll say 8.5/10.
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Really enjoyed fhe Reacher series and Lodge 49 on prime.
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Wow. I couldn’t get through a couple episodes. The character is completely unlikable and has terrible chess etiquette.