Why isn’t there a category for “best adapted picture”?
There are already three different best picture awards, Documentary Feature, Animated Feature, and then Best Picture. But why not best adapted picture? We divide ‘screenplay’ into two categories, Original and Adapted. With all the sequels and reboots, and sequel reboots, and ‘based off comic book’ films or movies based on TV shows… it seems bananas that there isn’t a category for something like this.
Frankly I’m shocked Disney hasn’t petitioned The Academy to do this. They have the most to gain with Star Wars, the Marvel movies, and the live action re-makes of their animated classics.
The Academy increased the number of films to 10 after The Dark Knight didn’t get a nomination in 2009, because most people went into those oscars saying it was the best movie they saw. But doing 10 films still doesn’t solve their problem - as evidence by this year. And I’ll bet Black Panther doesn’t get one next year either.
The press and audiences bemoaned Wonder Woman not getting a nomination but it could if there was a category for it. Hell, you could be strategic and nominate Jumanji just to get The Rock in the building…
Viewership of the Oscars was a record low. And I bet it’s is because most people hadn’t seen the best picture nominees… something that Kimmel joked about in his opening monologue while remarking how much money Black Panther was making at the box office.
In the opening monologue this year Jimmy Kimmel said:
“Our plan is to shine a light on outstanding and inspiring films each and every one of which got crushed by Black Panther this weekend. … of the nine best picture nominees only 2 of them made more than 100 million dollars.”
I know creating new categories is tough for the academy. We didn’t even have a “best animated feature” until 2001! And it went to Shrek! I know, the whole thing is crazy. Crazier, Beauty and the Beast was so good it was nominated for best picture but lost to Silence of the Lambs. Yeah. Think about how crazy that ballot is.
It’s been 90 years. Doesn’t it make sense for Hollywood to adapt, a little? I know that audience numbers are secondary in importance to The Academy, but they do tell a story. They say that, maybe the Academy is out of touch. If Star Wars and Black Panther can make a billion dollars, but not be represented with best picture nominations?
“All roads lead to this,” to steal the tag line from Fast and Furious 6.
The infinity war is here and it looks nothing like any previous mainline avengers movie. Saturated like Guardians 2, big scale fight scenes (also like Guardians), oh and look, the Guardians of the Galaxy show up.
Previous Avengers movies (by which I am including Cap, Thor, Iron Man, Spider-Man) have been about characters first. That’s what has consistently separated the Marvel movies from, say, the DCEU. A focus on character. With this many characters. And fight scenes that look as grand as what we see, I worry that character is going to get lost.
And I really do care about the characters. I care about Tony. About how he fought to bring everyone together, only to see it torn apart (by him!) in Civil War. I do hope that the characters come through. It’s not impossible (LOTR accomplishes this) but it’s much harder.
Honestly, I’m optimistic. Marvel has given me no reason to doubt them so far.
Tumblr has always been my favorite social network (even has my participation has wained over the years). He is exactly right that it encouraged people to be more creative. That’s what made me excited about it. Facebook was not the behemoth it is today, and twitter only made sense over SMS. Tumblr was the only place I could find that was encouraging people to create and share. I loved every minute of my time here, and I have David to thank for that.
OH MAN. I love this move to genre films set in superhero worlds. first with Winter Soldier being a spy thriller, then Logan being more of a quiet western, and now New Mutants is a horror film.
It really underscores just how sad it is that the mainline X-Men movies have gotten so off the rails by trying to be giant action fate-of-the-world movies. Smaller, more contained movies will always be more believable, and have more of an impact for me.
This shift to making the superhero world the setting rather than the genre and making any kind of film you want has been my dream for Star Wars since it was acquired by Disney. I want Star Wars to get to a point where you can make, essentially, Fast Five in the Star Wars universe. I use Fast Five because it was huge at the box office, made for a broad audience, but at it’s core is a genre film. For those who haven’t seen it, a ragtag crew on the run from the local government wants to rob a drug lord who disrespected them so they break into a secure location. It’s a heist movie with family and fast cars. The story is small and very tight.
You can set this movie on Coruscant, Corellia, Nar Shadda… anywhere. Instead of fast cars, our heroes would be on swoop bikes, and wielding antigravity tech, and a couple of droids. Maybe someone is Force sensitive, that would be an interesting dynamic (not a Jedi, but just has a little extra awareness). Not a single story beat, or character, would have any connection to any of the previous Star Wars films and certainly no one with Skywalker lineage.
Star Wars becomes the setting, not the genre. I was hoping for a heist movie with Rogue One, but didn’t quite get it. (Don’t get me wrong, I did like it.) I was excited for a Han / Chewie / Lando buddy comedy for the Han Solo movie… but with the Phil Lord and Chris Miller fired I don’t know what we’re going to get.
But just to get back to the superhero thing. Smaller movies don’t have to be genre films. The first two X-Men and Spider-Man movies were ‘traditional’ superhero movies. Sure X-Men ended with a high profile fight at the statue of liberty, but New York City wasn’t destroyed. In Spider-Man 2 (arguably the best superhero movie of all time) A battle with Dr Octopus plays out across the city, but the story is personal for Peter. And while he stops a train from derailing and saves hundreds of lives, it’s earned because we saw Peter’s struggle thought the entire film.
The wide net that recent X-Men movies have cast make it completely devoid of personality. And as they’ve gone back in time (First Class, Days of Future Past, Apocalypse) the’ve destroyed any canon they may have been holding on to so there isn’t even a sense of wonder for the characters I liked.
I didn’t mean for this to end on a down note. I’m excited for New Mutants. I think doing genre films instead of traditional superhero movies is the right way to go, especially for the X-Films because there are just so many characters. I’m into it, and I hope the success of Logan and the (hopefully) success of New Mutants can elevate the story telling across all of the X-Men films.
I Want Microsoft To Build Kinect Into Their Controllers
Paul Miller just wrote a piece over at The Verge pointing out the similarities between the Kinect and the Notch in the new iPhone X. He notes that this is from June 2009:
And this is from September 2017:
It got me thinking about Kinect and the possibilities for an updated Kinect within the Xbox ecosystem. If you can shrink the technology to be so small that it fits in a cell phone, you can basically put it anywhere.
I applauded Microsoft for including Kinect with every Xbox One (at launch) and then mourned it’s death when it was ripped out of the bundle so Microsoft could compete with Sony on price. I loved how it had the potential to change gaming… but people didn’t want another box below their TV and they found navigation with voice sometimes slower than with a controller.
As voice assistants have gotten better, and more prevalent thanks to the Amazon Echo and Google Home devices there is even more of an opportunity for the Xbox to own voice on your TV. But I don’t think they’re going to sell people a 60-80 dollar camera/microphone array like the one from 2009.
They should build it into the bottom of every new Xbox One controller.
Seriously. Right there, next to the headphone jack and data port should be everything in the iPhone Notch. And build a microphone into the top somewhere. Maybe near the Xbox button.
“But how does it work?” you’re asking. It’s simple. You just put the controller down. Put it down on the coffee table in front of you, or put it down at the base of the TV on the TV stand (exactly where a Kinect would be).
You can pick up the controller to start playing a game and then put it down on your coffee table and say “Xbox open Kinectimles” (or whatever game you want to play) and then just start moving around. When you’re done, pick up the controller and use it like a controller.
Yes, I’ve thought about the power needed. And this probably isn’t something an Xbox One or Xbox One S could do. But I think the Xbox One X could pull this off. By all accounts it has extra overhead power even while running games at 4K 60FPS . It could dedicate some of that power to interpreting the Kinect information coming from the controller. And by offloading those processes you won’t have to build in a new chipset into the controller, just the sensors.
Just a thought. I’d love to see the Kinect come back. I think the technology is too good to let die. Maybe the Xbox One Z will be able to do something like this.
It’s been more than 2 full months since I’ve posted. I’m sorry about that. I love tumblr, I love the people on tumblr, and I really just can’t figure out how to quit you.
I’ve had some work and life changes which kept me away, but I promise I’ll be back. I mean… there are three (3) new iPhones and a Google event in early October… How could I possibly stay away!