posted 09-30-2003 12:18 AM                    

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MPAA Seeks Oscar Home Movie Ban
by Bridget Byrne
Sep 25, 2003, 3:00 PM PT

No more home-alone screenings of Oscar contenders?

Screening tapes--and more recently DVDs--for award-eligible films have been a given for Academy voters for several years. It's been a combo perk/privilege to be able to sit home in bed and decide whether Tom did a better job than Jack, or Gwyneth was more effective than Meryl.

But this year, those who skip out on the showings at their neighborhood multiplex in favor of their home theaters may be SOL. That's because the Motion Picture Association of America is trying to get the major studios to stop mailing out DVD and video screeners, claiming the practice leads to piracy.

Tinseltown has been in a tizzy ever since late Tuesday, when, according to Daily Variety, the MPAA sent studio honchos a draft of a proposal recommended a ban on screeners. Now, the suits are reportedly discussing whether such a move would be advisable, or even possible.

Although purists would like the mailings ended, believing it a disservice to any filmmaker to have his or her big-screen project viewed on the boob tube, turning the clock back is considered unlikely -- at least for this season. One studio source suggests to E! Online that stopping screeners is "a perfectly rational" concept, which might be possible to implement next year, but not in the few weeks remaining before campaigning begins in earnest for the upcoming February 29 Oscar ceremony.

It stands to reason that the studios' major releases, which are afforded splashy premieres and wide release -- wouldn't be as harmed by a screener ban as the companies' art-house divisions, whose films are only given limited releases, or those truly independent studios, who have used to mass-mailing of screeners to help level the playing field.

The MPAA proposal is directed not just at major distributors, such as Fox or Disney, but also those giant's subdivisions, i.e., Fox Searchlight and Miramax. Even DreamWorks, a MPAA nonsignatory, is involved. But, according Variety report, it is not yet know whether the watchdog group has also approached real independents like Lions Gate, Newmarket, Magnolia and ThinkFilm, none of which is an MPAA signatories.

Some conspiracy theorists see the maneuver as a way to guarantee Oscar goes to major studios at the expense of the little guy, who really needs the exposure brought by home screenings bring.

Other show-biz types question the parameters of the award season. We know when it ends -- Oscar nomination ballots have to be turned by 5 p.m. on January 17, and the final ballots returned by 5 p.m. February 24 -- but when does it officially begin?

Finally, there is the battle for eyeballs between the freebie screeners -- which are forbidden from having anything other than the movie -- and the consumer DVDs, which can have oodles of viewer-friendly extras. For example, likely Oscar player Seabiscuit will be out on video in time for the holidays. While voters would have to pony up some cash for the horse opera, its availability could give it an edge over other films that won't be out until months later.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which moved up the Oscar ceremony to attempt to regain some of the luster stolen by the numerous other award shows, has declined to comment. The Academy does not supply its membership list to the studios sending out screeners, has always proselytized for films to be seen on the big screen, either in theaters or at arranged studio screenings, and has, in its never-ending effort to halt excessive campaigning , managed to curtail the elaborate packaging and accompanying gift books that at one time accompanied the screeners.

The practice of sending screeners has also ballooned beyond just Oscar voters. The Directors, Writers and Screen Actors Guild all get screeners, as does the Golden Globe-selecting Hollywood Foreign Press Association and various critics' groups, among others. At the same time, theaters owners have taken a stance against the long-held practice of providing free admittance to members of these guilds and associations.

The MPAA, which is desperately trying to keep the movie biz from following the path of the piracy-ravaged recording industry, has already floated several other proposals to curtail copying. But the studios haven't backed such measures as disposable DVDs or discs with on-screen imprinting, designed to make the source of any illegally dubbed or distributed copies more easy to trace.

Calls to the MPAA were not returned, and studios contacted had no official comment.

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posted 10-03-2003 06:06 PM                    

Geez, Miramax admits it's gonna have to play by the rules. The screeners must have been the Weinstein family's way of currying favor with the Oscar voters.

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Some conspiracy theorists see the maneuver as a way to guarantee Oscar goes to major studios at the expense of the little guy, who really needs the exposure brought by home screenings bring.

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• Play a cripple, win an Oscar
• Play a junkie, win an Oscar
• Play a retard, win an Oscar
• Possible last role, win an Oscar

posted 10-21-2003 05:28 PM                    

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Geez, Miramax admits it's gonna have to play by the rules. The screeners must have been the Weinstein family's way of currying favor with the Oscar voters.

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As does EVERY OTHER studio in Hollywood, plus the independents. ALL of them send out the screeners, Charles (or did).

posted 10-21-2003 06:19 PM                 

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"...Nacho Heaven" sounds good to me..."

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Yeah, to me too... but I "just had to" get a dig at Daryl...

>>> Phil