sgilberg Reviews

The 75th Annual Academy Awards (2003 TV Special)

My favorite to date

[8/10 · 10 April 2003]

First, let me report the few things I regretted. There was no red carpet treatment, for reasons that did not make sense to me. Some awardees barely got a word in edgewise because of time limits, and I felt somewhat ashamed for them. When the host announced the presence of certain special guests, the camera did not show their faces.

But I've been watching Academy Awards shows every year since 1995, and no other has entertained me as *consistently* as this one. As they go, this one was not too long. Only Adrien Brody's speech seemed endless, and that at least was more touching than self-indulgent. News sites had warned me with dismay that the fun would be toned down, but it turned out not to put a crimp in Steve Martin's routine at all. Martin doesn't do smashing openings like Billy Crystal or Whoopi Goldberg, but his jokes thereafter produce better than tired chuckles. I did not think any awards grossly misplaced. Musical performances, albeit not the complete list, had a fine effect. And as a pacifistic Democrat, I took pleasure in Michael Moore's controversial message.

For those who wish that "Gangs of New York" had won at least one of its 10 nominations, I imagine that Martin Scorsese will someday get a Lifetime Achievement Award to make up for his Oscar deficit.

What Women Want (2000)

The quintessence of what I don't want in a comedy

[4/10 · 31 March 2003]

The idea of reading the minds of females offered so much potential sexism that I immediately wrote this off, but my family wanted to see it, so I came along. A friend had said to watch it for one particular part. We never figured out what the one part was, but no combination of parts made it worth the ticket price to us.

Mel Gibson does a fine job as usual; his early attempts to understand women without supernatural aid made my mom and sister laugh the most. I don't fault any of the other actors either. The problem was in the sequence of events. Now, I must have been doofy to expect any logic to the absurd premise, or any realism to the characters' actions. Maybe I'm silly for hating that deficit. But I had greater reason to abhor the predictability of it all -- how many times have I seen that formula, with only the main premise to differentiate the movies? Certain parts went on too long for comfort, the ending especially being a drag. And maybe this had to happen, but the makers barely touched on some of the humongous implications of female mindreading (e.g., it applies to female animals as well).

There was filmmaker prejudice even aside from the sexism, like in the thoughts of the one black woman in the movie. On the rare occasions that I laughed, I felt ashamed of it because the jokes were far from clever.

Despite the title, men left the theater saying they still didn't know what women want. My family was not convinced that Gibson's character had learned much either. The title may hark back to the words of a psychologist nearly abandoned in the scientific community, but I suspect the makers wanted us to think of sexual intercourse. If so, we had a single non-expository scene to pander to our lecherous desires.

In short, the only basic negative elements I did not see in this movie were inappropriate violence and bad acting. It was Mel Gibson who persuaded me to give this movie as many as 2 stars out of 4.