Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Adapted Screenplay 1986

The Contenders:

Children of a Lesser God
The Color of Money
Crimes of the Heart
A Room with a View (winner)
Stand by Me

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Director 1986

The Contenders:
David Lynch: Blue Velvet
Woody Allen: Hannah and Her Sisters
Roland Joffe: The Mission
Oliver Stone: Platoon
James Ivory: A Room with a View

Oscar Got It Wrong!: Best Picture 1986

The Contenders:
Children of a Lesser God
Hannah and Her Sisters
The Mission
Platoon (winner)
A Room with a View

A Very Proper Romance

Film: A Room with a View
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on laptop

After yesterday’s zombie bacchanalia, I thought it best to go as far in the opposite direction as I could. A Merchant Ivory production seems to fit that bill pretty nicely. Rather than flesh rending and the devouring of our heroes, we get a romance of excessive manners and proper breeding. I can’t call myself an aficionado of the company nor of the genre, but still, A Room with a View awaits and must be watched.

This is a difficult film for me to judge. I’ll be the first to say (okay, not really since I’m watching this 27 years after it was released) that it’s filled with excellent performances, in some cases by actors who have gone on to tremendous careers and a great deal of acclaim. I also understand very much that the things that annoy me here are supposed to annoy me. The characters I find infuriating are infuriating by design. I get that, but there’s still the fact that I have to spend time with them in the first place.