Posted on 12/09/2012 5:13:44 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Dinesh D'Souza's documentary "2016: Obama's America" failed to earn an Oscar nomination despite earning $33.4 million at the box office, and becoming the fourth highest grossing documentary in history. Of course, there isn't much an outcry inside liberal Hollywood. However, D'Souza didn't keep quiet about the Academy Awards committee snub.
"I want to thank the Academy for not nominating our film," D'Souza joked, according to the Hollywood Reporter. "By ignoring 2016, the top-performing box-office hit of 2012, and pretending that films like 'Searching for Sugar Man' and 'This Is Not a Film' are more deserving of an Oscar, our friends in Hollywood have removed any doubt average Americans may have had that liberal political ideology, not excellence, is the true standard of what receives awards."
The film's producer, Gerald Molen, isn't keeping silent either.
"I was surprised," Molen, who won an Oscar for "Schindler's List," told FOX411's Pop Tarts column. "'2016' was never made with any particular award in mind nor [was it] looking for specific accolades from anyone. But as an industry practice it was submitted along with a number of other documentaries."
The film, which was released late last summer, examines the question: "If Obama wins a second term, where will we be in 2016?" It shows D'Souza "immersed in exotic locales across four continents" as he "races against time to find answers to Obama's past and reveal where America will be in 2016."
Filmmakers say that during D'Souza's journey "he discovers how Hope and Change became radically misunderstood, and identifies new flashpoints for hot wars in mankind's greatest struggle. The journey moves quickly over the arc of the old colonial empires, into America's empire of liberty, and we see the unfolding realignment of nations and the shape of the global future."
The film made more money than all 15 short-listed films such as "Searching for Sugar Man," "Ethel" and "Bully." Molen told the Hollywood Reporter, "Dinesh warned me this might happen. The action confirms my opinion that the bias against anything from a conservative point of view is dead on arrival in Hollywood circles. The film's outstanding success means that America went to see the documentary in spite of how Hollywood feels about it." He added, "'2016' loses an opportunity to compete in what most always perceived to be a fair business atmosphere. But no way, it is totally unbalanced and unfair... The left rules – for now."
FoxNews.com in its Pop Tarts section reports that while Molen was somewhat surprised, others in the media industry were not.
"Hollywood is seldom just about money. It's about propaganda. And if you defy the party line, you stand no chance of winning. So when Dinesh D'Souza's movie got passed over, I wasn't even vaguely surprised," noted Dan Gainor, VP of Business and Culture at the Media Research Institute. "Is that bias? Of course. Jack Nicholson was close: Hollywood can't handle the truth. And they can't handle disagreement. Their one-sided view of what deserves awards underlines that."
When D'Souza was asked by The Christian Post at the time of the film's release whether "2016" would have an impact on the presidential election, he said, "Well, the film is intended to [offer] a debate about what's the future of America. Nowhere in the film do we mention the election.
We certainly don't tell people how to vote.
"The film is about the American dream and Obama's dream. In some ways it's about my dream, which is the immigrants' dream," he said. "Also worked in there is Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream an¬d the dream of the founders. In that sense it's very different. In some ways I was inspired to do this by Michael Moore. I feel embarrassed to say that because Michael Moore's 'Fahrenheit 9/11' is an intellectual disaster, but nevertheless that film was about a controversial president and it was received at a time when one half of the country was for the president and one half was against him and it was dropped in the middle of an election.
"So that gave me the idea to make a film under similar conditions – controversial president, one half of the country is for him, one half is against him, and drop it in the middle of this year's debate," he explained. "But I wanted to make and have made a very different kind of a film that is not fast with the facts and is intellectually and factually very sound. So far, no one has alleged the contrary."
The Academy Awards is a glorified trade show. He should consider it an honor to be excluded.
Meanwhile, AlGore’s Mockumentary won the gold-flake award for a hilarious movie by a failed ministry student who switched to law and barley passed and who then became a senator because of his daddy’s political ties, who purchased a mansion that consumes as much electricity as a small town, and who decided, after so much success that he was, after all, a prophet of meteorology who had to save the world and make a few billion dollars on the Chicago “carbon credits” exchange in the process.
If all of the Conservative working in Hollywood in back of the camera or ‘below the line’ would speak up, these prancing bigmouthed Progressive Liberals would never come out of their from door. How come all these Progressive or Socialist actor’s union members will travel to foreign countries to participate in killing their own occupation with such disgusting run-away production? I am sure the talented production union members see this as a sick double standard worth earning their disgust. Being a unethical Progressive means union actors never have to say, “I’m sorry or I made a mistake”. When they clearly and obviously have.
Box office numbers irrelevant.
I agree. The movie said all the right things but it just wasn't very well done.
Passion of the Christ which saved the industry years ago did not get a nomination, and we expect this?
LINCOLN. Movie of the year. It was PERFECT.
I think the Oscar has become some kind of foreign commie award that Americans are not allowed to win. This would explain why D’Souza is not eligible to win one.
I no longer care at all to watch as these overpaid morons who pretend for a living pretend to be happy that someone else won the award they’d sell their souls for. Clap clap clap...with tight little smiles. LOL
However, I really liked the Life of Pi.
RE: , I really liked the Life of Pi.
Ang Lee, the director of the above movie also gave us BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN.
RE: , I really liked the Life of Pi.
Ang Lee, the director of the above movie also gave us BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN.
Didn’t see Brokeback because of the subject matter but Life of Pi was wonderful IMO.
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