Sigourney Weaver's Sour Grapes

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When a famous actress delivers an unusually candid quote to a foreign news site you've never heard of, it's only fair to think that something may be lost in translation. At least, that's the only explanation I can think of for this: "Jim [Cameron] didn't have breasts, and I think that was the reason [he lost the Best Director Oscar]," Sigourney Weaver supposedly told Folha Online, a Brazilian news site. "He should have taken home that Oscar...In the past, Avatar would have won because they loved to hand out awards to big productions, like Ben-Hur. Today it's fashionable to give the Oscar to a small movie that nobody saw." [HuffPo]



Comments

  • sweetbiscuit says:

    Oh Sigourney, in "the past," actresses your age would have been put out to pasture, not to mention the fact that most award-winning "big productions" also had actual story-telling going on. And while we're at it, these award shows were invented to sell tickets, so just shut it and go count your cash.

  • snickers says:

    I love Sigourney (especially a blue, 10-foot tall version), but the Avatar campaign is over.

  • Sebastian says:

    That's really hilarious.

  • James says:

    She's absolutely right. So true. Honestly, what was so great about 'The Hurt Locker'? Did anybody walk out of that oohing and aahing the way they did at Avatar? No, the Oscars is quickly going the way of Miss Universe, where the crown is carefully rotated among contestants of various races and countries to make everything less un-PC. The chance to give a woman the best picture prize was just too tempting for the Academy to pass up.

  • Greg Jones says:

    Sigourney Weaver is right!!!!! Nobody is in counseling because they can't live in the world of Inglorious Basterds. Inglorious Basterds didn't set any records. True, many good movies don't set records. Even so, this wasn't just any award. Either Inglorious Basterds was the overall best picture of the year, or it wasn't, and it doesn't take a genius to see that Avatar changed the way we, the public, see movies. It raised the bar. What bar did Inglorious Basterds raise? Beyond being entertaining, what else did Inglorious Basterds do? Will it, as a movie, have a legacy? No. But Avatar will, and that legacy, those records it has broken, 3-D movies and the discovery that people will pay more, and see the same movie repeatedly, are things Inglorious Basterds, and movies like it, can never do.
    Avatar should have won best picture, simply because it is.

  • PG says:

    She may be partly right. That is, in the Oscar voting, everyone in the Academy gets to vote for a category (as opposed to nominate for it). The Academy has a stronger female influence than the world and the business at large- in case you're still wondering how "Shakespeare In Love" beat out "Saving Private Ryan". I have no doubt that a bunch of female members voted for Kathyrn Bigelow just to see a woman win the Best Director award after 80-some years.
    However, that would be SOME voters. Bigelow already won the DGA Best Director Award at that point- and that's just the directors voting. I can make a case that she won because she actually did a BETTER job than James Cameron, and the DGA award points to that as well.
    And guys, both "The Hurt Locker" and "Inglorious Basterds" are better movies, and better-directed, than "Avatar". End of story.