Academy Awards Wrap

February 25, 2013

Grant Heslov, from left, Ben Affleck, and George Clooney pose with their award for best picture for “Argo” during the Oscars at the Dolby Theatre on Sunday Feb. 24, 2013, in Los Angeles. (Photo by John Shearer/Invision/AP)

Guests

Wesley Morris, film critic for Grantland.

Here’s a trailer for last night’s big winner Argo.

Daniel Day-Lewis’ presidental portrayal in Lincoln added a third Oscar to his mantel.

Jennifer Lawrence fell into the Academy’s good graces with Sliver Linings Playbook.

Ang Lee won Best Director for the visually stunning Life of Pi.

Despite a storm of controversy, Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained nabbed the award for Best Original Screenplay.

On the same night the Academy celebrated 50 years of James Bond, Adele won Best Song for Skfall. Check out the music video below.

Other stories from this show:

J__o__h__n

The ending of Lincoln would have been more dramatic if Lincoln and Booth engaged in hand to hand combat.
andreawilder

Hey, that “tiny little detail” is very important, and it is your view and I think it is bogus.
Here is the most important amendment of the 19th century and that reality wasn’t enough
for Tony Kushner, well, I bet a lot of us went to the movie to see what really happened, what Lincoln was like, what Thaddeus Stevens was like, and that little detail casts doubt on everything else in the film. A real screw-up, my opinion.
- J__o__h__n
  
  I didn’t mind the Hollywood ending to Argo as you can kind of tell when it switched from reality to fiction, but I was annoyed by the false claim that only Canada helped shelter them when NZ and the UK did. It didn’t add to the drama any more than the false CT votes did to Lincoln. Composite characters and simplifications are to be expected but facts shouldn’t be changed.
MAK

Yes, dramatic tension and artistic freedom are important for movies BUT an outright inaccuracy that might have been produced by showing that Lincoln’s home state of Illinois voted “NO” ! And I am not even from CT- originally from NY and now in Boston area but at still very irritated and surprised that Steven Spielberg and his history consultants could not create “dramatic tension” other than to lie about the facts of exactly how CT Congressmen voted….
PaulfromHydeParkMA

Hi Anthony (Megna wasn’t on air today that I heard),

I wanted to THANK YOU for your common sense, real person, real world opinion about the ridiculous obsession with factual exactitude regarding Argo and Zero Dark Thirty. Haven’t these people ever heard of artistic license? It’s just absurd to insist that these terrific movies, both of which are close enough to exact, are not worth the accolades they’ve been getting. It’s very similar to the loss of a sense of humor that has struck so many people as they see everything in black and white. It’s a real shame. SO, thank you for bringing a sense of intelligence, and just loving to go to the movies back to the evaluation of the many fine films made in 2012. Best, Paul Levinson, Hyde Park
- andreawilder
  
  I so disagree with you! Accuracy is not a “real shame.” I read a lot about “Lincoln,”
  accuracy in lighting, clothing, furniture, the whole deal–and the center piece was
  THE VOTE. And there was a screw-up. Kushner read all those books about Lincoln to get the language just right, and he blew it here. I don’t give a hoot about Argo, it will pass from the screen very quickly. The torture stuff? Do you remember when the pictures of the hooded figure were published? A firestorm across the country. Some things are more important than other things, that’s all there is to it.
  - PaulfromHydeParkMA
    
    Hi Andrea – There’s accuracy, and there’s obsessive compulsion to deny quality because the VOTE of the Illinois delegation was misrepresented. Kushner didn’t blow it; he made a very conscious decision to show it differently than it occured. If you’ve read a lot about Lincoln, you know he was a man who understood the value of the greater good. It simply doesn’t matter in a MOVIE whether Kushner and Spielberg take license with one state’s vote on the issue of Slavery to make an artistic piece flow. There is no way in a biopic about AL to capture all of the debate about the Slavery issue. It cannot be done in the constraints of an artistic vehicle. If that issue kept you from seeing the excellence of the film as a whole, I do think that’s a shame. I, and I’d posit most people, do not go to the movies to get history lessons, at least not to the degree that we go to school to get those lessons. If Daniel Day Lewis’ performance is made less effective to you by the VOTE issue, you are missing the point of the movie, which was to celebrate the Greatness that was Abraham Lincoln. In re: Argo, I didn’t buy into the firestorm about the “torture” either. War is hell, as a famous general once said. The permissable limits of capture get extended to find a man who killed 3,000 innocent people, and I feel that’s OK. If what the movie showed is what water-boarding is “normally,” I don’t understand the uproar. Definitely, we agree that some things are more important than others….we just disagree apparently about which ones deserve to be important. Which is fine…we can agree to disagree. I go to be entertained, and I love the entire period of the Civil War. Lincoln was a giant…and an artistic decision about a vote in Congress is never going to change that reality.
    - andreawilder
      
      I will continue to disagree. I do not think it is up to you to tell me the point of the movie. Fine, love Lincoln, but that is not a reason to�
      dismiss what I say, and lump me in with all other movie goers, so
      please, change your note of condescension. Or don’t, up to you.
      
      It’s NOT a “shame.” That’s nonsense. You and I are very different
      people. We have different definitions of “entertainment.”
      
      As someone else said, you have a right to your own opinions but not your own facts.
      
      No evidence of water boarding, and torture is a huge issue in this country, so a little bit to make a phony artistic point is off-key�
      “artistic” choice. It was stupid. Reality is so much more interesting than what movie directors chose to alter.
      
      The “famous general” was Lee.
      - PaulfromHydeParkMA
        
        Sorry you feel condescended to by virtue of someone having the gall to disagree with you.
        I’m not choosing my facts. Nor is Stephen Spielberg in any substantive way to folks who choose not to demand complete historical accuracy from a movie.
        
        I’m not sure why you would disclaim being a member of the group that has seen Lincoln when you are in that group.
        
        The general who said War is Hell was Sherman, not Lee. You can read it in Sherman’s biography. Best to you.
        When You Lose What You Are,
        You Find Out Who You Are
andreawilder

Nope, Lee, check your sources.

ah….the condescension continues.
I doubt that “best to you” is said with a full and warm feeling toward me.
- PaulfromHydeParkMA
  
  Can’t say “full” and “warm” but can say genuine. I don’t have trouble debating people who disagree with me, Andrea. You do, at least insofar as they don’t agree with your rebuttals to their points. I’m not being condescending to you in any way…I’m just disagreeing with confidence. The overwhelming misuse of the word condescension in the 21st Century since certain Presidents made it close to treason to question their governmental wisdom is just hypersensitivity on the part of people who feel condescended to. You are giving me way too much power in this by saying you feel condescended to. I’m one who doesn’t mince words, and in the milquetoast environment of public discourse these days, such clarity of feeling pisses a lot of people off, you included. You’re so sure that I’m intending to insult you when in fact I have no such intention. And, no, it wasn’t Lee who said War is Hell…of course, he might also have said it, since it could be a shared feeling between those two iconic generals. In any case, it’s silly to argue the point. The world isn’t going to stop spinning for either of us while we debate who said “War is Hell” first.
  - Andreawilder
    
    Oh, nonsense, Paul, just drop it.
    - PaulfromHydeParkMA
      
      Glad to see your mind is as closed as ever. Would you like me to send you one of those bumper stickers that read “A mind is like a parachute: it functions best when open?” Oh, and BTW, if you Google “War is Hell,” you’ll see hundreds of cites of attribution to Sherman….and not a single one of attribution to Lee.
      
      Any time you want to tell me what’s so condescending about my comments, you’re welcome to do so. Otherwise, have a nice life, and try not to give yourself a coronary by getting so upset over minor scripting issues that most anyone else would file under “artistic license.” Have a nice day.

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