At the Academy Awards (Oscars) last night, The Hurt Locker took home the following 6 awards:
- Best Picture
- Directing
- Film Editing
- Sound Editing
- Sound Mixing
- Writing (Original Screenplay)
I didn’t want to set aside 15 hours :P of my time yesterday to watch it, but judging by the winners list, The Hurt Locker really swept the show.
I have not seen the movie yet, but I plan on watching it very soon. I avoided it up until now because I heard from a lot of people that it was annoyingly inaccurate. I seem to enjoy other inaccurate movies anyway, so I’m not sure why I chose to listen to people and avoid this one up until now.
There are a few different versions of the movie poster. I found the one I inserted in this article especially chilling.
Any of you guys that have seen this movie, have an opinion on it?
Comments
22 responses to “The Hurt Locker”
My wife and I took part in a two-weekend best-picture fest at the local megaplex. Let me say that I was really, really looking forward to this film and very excited to see it. Also, I can admit that it was well made, and well acted. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed. There were some inaccuracies that were mildly annoying… and you will probably catch more than I did, but that was not the disappointing part.
What disappointed me deeply was how horribly insulting it was to soldiers (sailors, marines, et. al.). It depicted all officers as one of two caricatures, either “John Wayne” or an absolute idiot. There were a couple of scenes that, I felt, portrayed US soldiers as oppressors, and lacking even basic human decency. More-over, it was clear these scenes had no value to the basic story.
Still, go see it. It was a good movie, all things considered, and you can overlook most of the annoying things. I didn’t get up and walk out or anything. I probably would not have picked it for Best Picture. Having seen all 10 nominees, I have to say that “The Blind Side” stuck with me and made me think more than any of the others, and I don’t watch or understand football. “Precious” probably had the best acting, over all, and “Inglorious Basterds” was the most fun.
Thanks Gene, i’ll have to see it. It’s disappointing to hear that it doesn’t portray soldiers properly, especially considering a majority of the people watching the movie will probably believe the stereotype.
I haven’t seen Blind Side or Precious, but I really enjoyed Inglorious Basterds!
I am a 21B, an engineer, so I was looking forward to this. When I did see it, I was fairly horrified, but I came to a realization. If my job is scary or dangerous, WE ARE DOING IT WRONG.
I haven’t seen a movie this full of holes since my dad shot a VHS with a 12 gauge. It wasn’t until a day later that I realized that if that fictional idiot had done everything according to army regs, it would have been a very boring movie.
Yea it sucks how they have to stretch reality to pack enough excitement into 2 hours.
Good opinion of the movie: http://redvsblue.com/members/journal/entry.php?id=2536829
He’s an Infantry company commander, so he know his shit too.
Awesome link, thanks Ted. I’ll have to read it over again after I watch the movie and see if I missed anything.
I haven’t seen this movie yet, but I must say I’m not surprised by the comments that it isn’t realistic at all. I’m disappointed to hear it, but not surprised. Stupid Hollywood. I have to agree with some of the other sentiments in that what’s worse than the disappointment I feel when watching something inaccurate is the realization that so many people will see it and think, without knowing any better, that it’s true to reality.
In general I liked the movie a lot. The one scene that I thought was egregiously wrong was the sniper one. I don’t want to spoil the scene for you, but I thought a few aspects of it were pretty wack.
That is the scene I’ve heard people complain about most often. I’m looking forward to checking it out.
The star, the M107 rifle, had very little screen time unfortunately. Other than that, it was ok.
What a great rifle.
Good movie.
Hollywood has never made a movie that shows ANY profession in a way that reflects what that profession actually does.
Think about any movie that you have seen…… any that you can think of that are faithful to the profession or event shown.
So do not watch the movie expecting a accurate Army EOD team portrayal.
The movie is still worth watching.
Yea I guess they always need to spice it up, because showing a regular work day in any profession would be pretty boring most of the time.
As a former Naval Aviator, we have seen this over the top Hollywood portrayal of the military before, Think “Top Gun”. It was 95% fabrication also. “Maverick” did a 100+ things that would have got him FENAB’ed in the real Navy.
I guess if they are going to go over the top, they figure they might as well make it memorable.
The point the movie made about how combat can be addictive was accurate. The path that the director took the audience down with Sgt James to make this point was ridiculous at times. I like what Patrick said about the M107 being the star :-) Even that scene had some ludicrous things going on with sniping the insurgents. The movie is worth watching, but it will probably unnerve both soldiers and civilians who have any clue about combat operations.
I just watched another trailer on youtube after reading your comment and now I’m really pumped to watch it. It does seem like it has some pretty tense moments.
I’m of two minds on this. Maybe three. No, I’m not a balanced individual. :)
On the one hand, as noted above, the movie has to have a plot, the plot needs to be interesting, and it needs to tell the beginning, middle and end within the space of around two hours. Some parts need to be left out, some parts need to be exaggerated to make them interesting, and some parts need to be invented from whole cloth so that the average dweeb on the street will like it. The film, after all, is marketed to the general population, not just military personnel.
On the other hand, I often find it interesting that no one seems to complain overmuch that Tony Stark, for example, can somehow wear a heatless, wasteless nuclear reactor embedded in his chest, but plenty of people will go to great lengths to point out that the tank round could not have possibly struck Iron Man in midair like that. Apparently there are limits to the level of disbelief we are willing to suspend- though I fully admit that a “gritty, realistic” movie like Locker is supposed to require considerably less suspension.
On the third hand, I also know full well how hard it is for someone who is not part of a “scene” to grasp it. I’m a paintball enthusiast- among other things- and I’ve been watching the media’s portrayal of our sport since very early on. Everything from an early episode of LA Law (roughly 1991) to “King of the Hill” (about 2000) to whatever late-night blabbermouth needs a quick skit that involves “guns”.
They have never once, not ONCE, gotten it right. Whether it’s something simple like masks (which I can understand since they think we gotta see the actors’ faces) or more complex like the dynamics of the game, they will NOT get it right- and that’s assuming they even try, since more often than not, they’re playing for a gag or trying to pass it off as a “violent” sport.
We “know” that Top Gun wasn’t realistic, but we give it a pass because hey, Kelly McGillis and warplanes shooting at things. We know James Bond isn’t realistic, but it’s supposed to be escapism, not a documentary. It’s more fun to imagine ourselves at the baccarat table casually dropping ten thousand pounds on a hand, then knocking back a martini just before bedding the hot supermodel who also just happens to be the brilliant kung-fu master henchman, than it is to try and imagine how Bond manages to escape fifteen kinds of STDs and half a dozen paternity suits.
Bottom line? Hurt Locker, errors and all, is still miles better than that Matt Damon piece of shit about to come out.
Doc.
LOL awesome comment Doc.
I know what you mean how there seems to be different standards we will accept for realism depending on the style of movie.
It’s interesting to hear that the media screws up in portraying paintball properly.
While i enjoyed this movie alot. but really i faile to see why this movie desreved so many awards, the acting was average and the plot and story was nothing special.
I agree. I just watched this last night with my younger brother. He hated it, and I was left wondering why in the world this would have won so many awards. It was visually and aurally appealing, so I guess I can kind of see why it won Oscars for film editing and sound mixing and editing, but the plot was so-so and I didn’t think the acting was anything extraordinary.
It sucked ballz.