I haven't seen either movie, so let me say that up front. But - didn't Meryl win the Golden Globe also? So, there were 2 roles that both won major awards, and the Oscars had to pick one or the other.

I sometimes do think that race does have to do with these decisions, but I'm not sure the academy is biased. For example, I love Denzel Washington. I think he's done very fine work and probably should have earned a lead actor award for something. However, the year he earned it for Training Day, I think Russel Crowe deserved that award for Beautiful Mind. I don't think the academy wanted to honor a black man then; they just decided he had a good body of work and deserved to win, even though the acting in that particular film was probably not the best of the year.

Now - in terms of who gets nominated at all and more importantly who gets meaty roles that are worthy of nomination? Yeah, there's definite bias there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am going off topic - but I think George Clooney should have won Best Actor - not the french guy. Loved The Artist and think it deserved Best Picture - but - George deserved best actor. Subtle, human, tender performance......it's his time.....

Sorry, but I disagree. Pitt should have won. Clooney already has an Oscar and his skills are not on par with the other two-timeAcademy Award winners: Penn, Day-Lewis, Washington, Spacey, Nicholson, etc. No way does he belong in that group yet. It really was Pitt's time. His performance in Moneyball was great.

+1

Minority actors get robbed all the time in Hollywood. DC folks don't know anything about it. Race, money and politics are at play. Seen it first-hand. A very ugly industry indeed and they know it.

Anonymous wrote:I am going off topic - but I think George Clooney should have won Best Actor - not the french guy. Loved The Artist and think it deserved Best Picture - but - George deserved best actor. Subtle, human, tender performance......it's his time.....

Sorry, but I disagree. Pitt should have won. Clooney already has an Oscar and his skills are not on par with the other two-timeAcademy Award winners: Penn, Day-Lewis, Washington, Spacey, Nicholson, etc. No way does he belong in that group yet. It really was Pitt's time. His performance in Moneyball was great.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Viola Davis should have won, she's brilliant and I say this as someone who adores Meryl Streep. Viola was also nominated a few years ago in the movie Doubt, along with Meryl co-incidentally. Yes she was robbed. Maybe they should just have given it to Glenn Close.

They shold have just given it to Rooney Mara. Now, that would have been quite a surpise.

Yes, yes and yes!!!!! Not that it matters, but I am AA and I thought The Help was pandering and hokey. Mara's performance was unforgetable and fearless.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Third sentence and you blame race. Jesus.

What's that about? Yes, I do think it was racist. They gave the best supporting actress award to an AA woman, but couldn't find the votes to give best actress to Viola Davis over perennial favorite Streep. Streep didn't deserve it, and she knew it. She spent half her acceptance speech thanking her hairdresser for God's sake! Why would you choose a good performance over a great one if you weren't just a teensy bit biased against AA performers? It doesn't make any sense to me if I don't include race in the equation.

The Members of the Academy vote for their choice and as many of them are AA, I don't think it is racist. Personally, I thought Glen Close should win but that VDavis would win. However, look at all the awards Streep won this year and it didn't come as a surprise that she won. Race had nothing to do with the outcome. Contrary to how your thinking, everything isn't black and white.

FYI, as recently reported, the members of the Academy are 94% white.

So what? Halle Berry, Denzel Washington, both won academy awards so the majority of the 94% whites voted for them, didn't they? The awards are over and you need to get over it, as well.

Anonymous wrote: You tell the many struggling minority actors who can't find work or even get casting calls due to no roles available for them that race has nothing to do with it. And the roles that are available are maids, drug dealers, drug attacks, and other demeaning roles. Hattie McDaniel won a Academy in 1939 for playing a slave maid and 73 years later Viola Davis is nominated for portraying the same role. I understand economics plays a significant role, as Hollywood wants to make money, but race does as well.

Hattie McDaniel also famously said when she was criticiaed for playing maid roles, "I'd rather play a maid than be a maid." I bet Viola Davis feels the same.

Race does matter, because when looking at Viola's Character and Meryl's character you have to look at the skills used for instance: Viola had to create and become her character; where as Merly only had to study the way a real person (Thatcher, who is not far removed from history) talked and moved. There was countless material for Meryl to do this, Viola displayed and showed off her true craft in the Help. With that being said character has nothing to do with acting. Lok at Denzel in Malcolm X, he became Malcolm X and won an Oscar for Training Day for playing a crooked cop. Race does matter in the perception of the Oscar Show. Viola lost and a guy from France who spoke only 2 words even won. Case and point.

Anonymous wrote:Nope.

The Help put me to sleep.

I did think the other movies were robbed of best picture and it was a big joke that a silent artsy film won best picture. WTF?!

I loved The Help but I'm with you on that silent movie winning. Seriously.
Totally off topic: I didnt recognize Viola Davis without her wig.

Nope.

The Help put me to sleep.

I did think the other movies were robbed of best picture and it was a big joke that a silent artsy film won best picture. WTF?!

Someone says it was neck and neck, obviously someone didn't watch both movies, Viola Davis was robbed everyone knows that. Of course AA actors can win an Oscar for best supporting actress that's so you wont seem to racist when comes down to leading role...So all of you who think race doesn't play a huge role then you're crazy and most likely a republican

eh I remember when the book came out reading quite a bit of commentary from black people who found the book incredibly patronizing towards blacks and condescending towards the civil rights timeframe addressed in the book. So maybe it's more complicated. Maybe the oscar voters who are presumably very liberal didnt pay it as much attention or even bother to see it.

Anyway, I'm glad Viola didn't win.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Third sentence and you blame race. Jesus.

What's that about? Yes, I do think it was racist. They gave the best supporting actress award to an AA woman, but couldn't find the votes to give best actress to Viola Davis over perennial favorite Streep. Streep didn't deserve it, and she knew it. She spent half her acceptance speech thanking her hairdresser for God's sake! Why would you choose a good performance over a great one if you weren't just a teensy bit biased against AA performers? It doesn't make any sense to me if I don't include race in the equation.

The Members of the Academy vote for their choice and as many of them are AA, I don't think it is racist. Personally, I thought Glen Close should win but that VDavis would win. However, look at all the awards Streep won this year and it didn't come as a surprise that she won. Race had nothing to do with the outcome. Contrary to how your thinking, everything isn't black and white.

You think much of the Academy is African American?

90% of the Academy is white, 77% is male.

It's probably more about the politics of the movies than it is about the actual acting job or race. Let's say all of these actors were the same race, then you'd have a typical year in the Oscars where one movie wins big, like the artist. The academy wants to give a nod for the other great films, so the acting awards don't all go to the big winner get spread around.

You've got a great actress in a good portrayal who has been nominated 17 times but has only won twice and her last win was 30 years ago versus a relatively recently-noticed actress who has been nominated twice in two years who gives a great performance in a movie that in any other year would likely have won the oscar.

So, the academy give the award to the actress who hasn't won in 30 years and gives the consolation prize to The Help in the form of a win for Octavia. Meryl was probably surprised because she probably thought she should have won for any of the other roles she thought she was better in. Also, she mentions her make up artist all the time, not just in her award speech.

It wasn't about race, it was about movie politics.