10 years, 10 unforgettable Oscar moments

by Cláudio Alves

We may quibble and despair over the Oscars but we still tune in every year and love them despite it all. If we didn't, why would we obsess over predictions, rejoice at worthy victors or grimace when injustices occur? Looking back at the last decade of the awards, there are many indelible moments that energized us and made us applaud, that had us at the edge of our seats, crying through a heady mix of surprise and mirth.

Honorable mentions and a top ten list after the jump...

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"Parasite" and the other most popular foreign film hits of our lifetimes.

by Nathaniel R

In lieu of the traditional box office charts for the holiday weekend, it's time to marvel yet again at how leggy Parasite (2019) continues to be. After its Oscar win a week ago it doubled its screen count and is expected to take in over $5 million this weekend once the actual money has been counted. So let's take a look at the very biggest international hits since box office stats began to be a commonly reported thing. Which foreign films were the all time biggest hits (since the late 80s)? For clarity we're talking about films that weren't in English but also weren't from the US which removes Mel Gibson's weird dead language projects like Passion of the Christ and Apocalypto, Clint Eastwood's Iwo Jima, and the recent Lulu Wang hit The Farewell among a few others. 

THE 25 HIGHEST-GROSSING INTERNATIONAL
FOREIGN-LANGUAGE FILMS
IN DOMESTIC RELEASE (1987-2019)

01 Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (Taiwan, 2000) $128
10 Oscar nominations including Best Picture. 4 wins. There will never be another subtitled hit as big as this one but what a glorious film to find up top. 

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Is the "One-Inch Barrier" Falling?

by Eric Blume

Since Parasite's historic Best Picture win this past Sunday, the heat surrounding it has not let up. Though the movie is already available on DVD and Blu-Ray, it will expand to 2000 screens this weekend in US theaters and a Criterion Collection release has also been announced (along with Memories of Murder, Bong's original breakthrough title). Given the hoopla, the industry trade magazines are falling over themselves to write stories about the change that may come for international titles.  The Hollywood Reporter has an interesting article proclaiming that we'll be seeing many more foreign film titles in the American marketplace in the next few years.

This article gives big credit to Netflix for "global programming" that is helping people get over the "one-inch barrier" (i.e., subtitles) that has plagued marketing of foreign product over the decades.  It's an interesting take...

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Podcast: For our season finale, Oscar night, naturally!

with Nathaniel R, Murtada Elfadl, and Nick Davis

On this week's podcast, we three Oscarphiles unite to talk about the big night: Parasite's win, Brad's speech, Bong Joon Ho mania, Fonda's magnificence, the musical performances, our hopeful takeaways from the big night... and who we are rooting for among the nominees for a next great Oscar winning act. 

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. Continue the conversations in the comments, won't you? 

92nd Oscars in Review - Season Finale

The 92nd Oscars Afterthoughts and the Complete Winners List

by Nathaniel R

You know how we do at The Film Experience. We'll have a few days of post-mortem on the 92nd Academy Awards, honoring the films of 2019. So it's not quite over yet but the rest is the after-party if you will. And we think you will feel like partying. We sure do. Parasite won 55% of your votes in our readers poll for who SHOULD win (with Hollywood and 1917 fighting for a distant second place on the Best Picture chart) and it also took the top prize at both the Team Experience Awards and my own prizes right here. And then it actually went and won Hollywood's top honor, too, defying all odds (again) to become the first Foreign Language picture ever to triumph at the Oscars. It will go down as history as one of the best choices the Academy ever made in the top category along with films like Moonlight, Silence of the Lambs, Amadeus, All About Eve, and other classics...

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