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Loading... Inside Oscar, 10th Anniversary Editionby Damien Bona
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. Inside Oscar 2 by Damien Bona (2002) chronicles the Academy Awards from 1995 to 2000. It is an excellent film reference source because it provides a useful guide in gaining an appreciation for the amount of money that is spent on advertising and publicity as part of the Oscar competition. Bona also discusses the campaigning strategy employed by the studios to win an Oscar and describes how the Academy Awards represent “The collective judgment at a particular point in time of several thousand people who work in, used to work in, or have some ties to, the film industry” (p. xii). Since demographically, “The average Oscar voter is politically liberal, well educated, and much better off financially than most Americans, [the author states that the Academy voters] tend to be drawn to movies that are aesthetically conservative, but which contain humanistic or uplifting attitudes” (p. xii). As a result, their votes do not always serve as a “mirror that reflects social, cultural, and political trends” (p. xii) in America. Inside Oscar 2 is a valuable resource in providing summary level insight into recent Academy Awards history. (  ) Code51 | Aug 14, 2009 |  Even if you aren't an Oscar history or Oscar trivia buff, you should read this book. It is fascinating and at times completely hilarious. Extremely well-written and well-researched. (  ) saskreader | Dec 11, 2005 |  no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com (ISBN 0345400534, Paperback)This huge, hefty history of the hottest night for Hollywood hotshots is everything an "unofficial" account of the Academy Awards should be: exhaustively researched, informative, catty, and packed with amazing gossip. Authors Mason Wiley and Damien Bona describe the awards and their highlights from a number of different perspectives, quoting Hollywood insiders, reporters, and other public figures as well as offering revealing insights of their own. Inside Oscar reviews every ceremony from the '20s to the '90s, dividing each year into three sections. The first gives a full account of the movies that competed for the season's honors, focusing on the hopes, dreams, and squabbles of the actors, directors, and producers who were nominated. The second section, entitled "The Big Night," recounts the ceremony in full detail, conveying the suspense of the evening, relating the funniest quips by presenters and pundits, and describing the most arresting outfits worn by the celebrities in attendance. "Aftermath" covers the press reactions to the event and follows the fates of some of the winners.Inside Oscar covers everything from the frenzy surrounding Gone with the Wind to the first televised awards to the disastrous 1994 ceremony, which was hosted by a terminally unfunny David Letterman. Each year is great fun to relive, but readers of this book may agree that the most memorable decade for Oscar was the 1970s, when the unexpected consistently prevailed. In 1970, George C. Scott, nominated for Patton, shocked the industry by declining the Best Actor Award. In '72, Marlon Brando refused his prize for The Godfather, sending a Native American woman, Sacheen Littlefeather, to chastise the astonished celebrities for their ill treatment of her people. Vanessa Redgrave accepted the statuette for Julia in 1977, delivering an anti-Zionist diatribe from the podium. And let's not forget the streaker who bolted onstage in '73. You'll find full accounts of these events and many, many others in a book that's as much fun to thumb through as it is to read from cover to cover. This volume conveys the anticipation, the glamour, the viciousness, the surprises, and the fallout of the ceremonies with tremendous detail and high enthusiasm. --Raphael Efrem Shargel (retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:01 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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