From: udcrusd@meaddata.com (Sylvia D'Cruz)
Subject: Oscars (1982) and Gandhi
Organization: Mead Data Central, Dayton OH
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1992 19:38:25 GMT
Distribution: soc.culture.indian

Maybe the confusion is between the british and the american awards. Both
articles are listed below:-

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               Proprietary to the United Press International 1983

                       March 22, 1983, Tuesday, PM cycle

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    The 1982 British Academy Awards honored Ben Kingsley as best actor for his
role in '' Gandhi, '' the British film that also captured best picture honors.

   Four Americans also were honored Sunday night. Katharine Hepburn took best
actress for ''On Golden Pond,'' Jack Nicholson and Maureen Stapleton won
supporting awards for ''Reds,'' and composer John Williams won best film score
for ''E.T.''

   Sir Richard Attenborough, who spent more than 20 years trying to raise
financing and get the story on the screen, won best director award for
'' Gandhi. ''

   Kingsley, a little-known British stage actor before portraying the apostle of
non-violence and liberator of India in his movie debut, also won the award for
most outstanding newcomer in a leading film role.

    Rohini  Hattangandy of '' Gandhi' ' shared the best supporting actress award
with Miss Stapleton. Other awards went to Costa-Gavras for best screenplay for
''Missing'' and the futuristic rock group Pink Floyd for best original song for
''Another Brick in the Wall.''

   The annual American and British  Oscars  nominations do not exactly coincide
because of different film release dates in the United States and United Kingdom.

   Miss Hepburn and Miss Stapleton both won 1982  Oscars.  The late Henry Fonda,
who won last year's best actor  Oscar  for ''On Golden Pond,'' was one of the
defeated nominees in this year's British ceremony.

   Among the British winners nominated for 1983  Oscars,  to be announced next
month by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, are Attenborough,
Kingsley, Williams and Costa-Gavras. '' Gandhi' ' has 11  Oscar  nominations,
followed by 10 for ''Tootsie,'' not eligible for this year's British awards, and
nine for ''E.T.''

   ''The Boys from Blackstuff,'' the gritty BBC series about life on the
unemployment dole in Merseyside, won two top British TV awards, best drama
series and writer of the year for author Alan Bleasdale.

   ''Smiley's People,'' the television adaptation of the John le Carre thriller,
took three awards -- best actor for Alec Guinness, best actress for Beryl Reid
and best original TV music for Patrick Gowers.

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                 Copyright 1983 Time Inc. All Rights Reserved
                                      Time

                          April  25, 1983, U.S. Edition

History Crunches Popcorn; Gandhi  captures the prize  Oscars  from E.T.

By Gerald Clarke.  Reported by Joseph J. Kane/Los Angeles and Janice C.
Simpson/New York

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   Americans must love the movies.  Why else would they spend 3 1/2 hours every
spring watching what may be the dullest show on earth -- the  Oscars?   But,
then, they may merely like puzzles, such as this year's: Why were the musical
numbers so bad?  Why was the multiuntalented Peter Allen chosen to sing and
dance a medley of Irving Berlin songs, when he can do neither?  Or, more to the
point, why was  Gandhi,  good as it is, chosen Best Picture over E.T., the
Extra-Terrestrial, the most popular movie of the year and the highest grosser
(more than $ 350 million) of all time?

   Except for  Gandhi,  most of the major winners were hardly surprises.Meryl
Streep was named Best Actress for her dazzling performances as the doomed
survivor of the Nazi camps in Sophie's Choice. Ben Kingsley won the Best Actor
award for his uncanny portrayal of Mahatma  Gandhi;  Louis Gossett Jr. was
chosen Best Supporting Actor for his hard-nosed drill sergeant in An Officer and
a Gentleman; and Jessica Lange, who was also running in the Best Actress
category for Frances, was picked as Best Supporting Actress for playing the girl
who gets the girl, Dustin Hoffman, in Tootsie.

   E.T., which appeared almost certain to sweep many of the top prizes just a
few months ago, managed, by contrast, to crawl away with only four minor
trophies.   Gandhi  took most of the awards E.T. was expected to get, including
Best Director (Richard Attenborough), Best Original Screenplay (John Briley),
Best Cinematography (Billy Williams and Ronnie Taylor) and Best Film Editing
(John Bloom).  All in all, the 3-hr. 5-min. epic won eight prizes, more than any
other film since Cabaret, which snatched eight in 1972.

   The triumph of  Gandhi  was so sweeping that many people in the industry
viewed it as a deliberate rebuke of E.T. and Steven Spielberg, its creator,
producer and director.  Though he is only 35, Spielberg has directed four of the
ten biggest money-makers in Hollywood history, including, besides E.T., Raiders
of the Lost Ark, Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Yet neither he nor
any of his pictures has ever won a major award.

   Even Tootsie's director, Sydney Pollack, who was competing against Spielberg,
voiced misgivings about this year's snub.  "The entire world has endorsed
everything Steven has ever done, and the academy ignored it," he said.
"Probably Steven's hair must get whiter before he can win." In an interview with
the Los Angeles Times, Spielberg openly expressed his disappointment: "I've been
around long enough to know that people who deserve  Oscars  don't always win
them.  The tendencey is for important films to win over popcorn entertainment.
History is more weightly than popcorn."

   That, even more than any backlash against Spielberg, seemed to be the reason
for  Gandhi's  success: all appearances to the contrary, the 3,953 members of
the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences like to think of themselves as
responsible citizens.  Given the choice between a serious movie and one that is
merely entertaining, they will almost always choose the former.  Examples in the
past: One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest over Jaws (1975) and Gentleman's Agreement
over Miracle on 34th Street (1947).

   This year, says Producer Lester Persky (Taxi Driver), "they voted for
everything they thought was noble.   Gandhi  was a good, safe vote for people
who wanted to look above their bellybuttons." Wrote Columnist Joe Morgenstern in
the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner: " Gandhi  was everything the voting members of
the academy would like to be: moral, tan and thin."

   Academy Awards reflect the concerns of the times as well as the merits of the
films themselves; a winner one year might be rejected the next, when the
public's mood has shifted to a different topic.  This year's dominant concern
surely is fear of war, and  Gandhi  has had a ready and receptive audience.
"People are preoccupied with destruction and nuclear war, and this story of
nonviolence is irresistible," says Pollack.  "When the academy voted, it was
saying, 'This is the most important subject in the world, and this picture must
be rewarded.'"

   That, at least, was the opinion of the winners themselves, who in speeches
that occasionally verged on the sanctimonious, continually invoked the magic
name of  Gandhi.   "I believe he had something to say to all of us everywhere in
the world," said Attenborough, as he accepted the award for Best Picture.  "In
all truth, it is not me . . . that you truly honor.  You honor Mahatma  Gandhi
and his plea to all of us to live in peace." In India, where  Gandhi  is a
smash, Prime Minister Indira  Gandhi  (no kin) used almost the same phrases,
adding that  Gandhi's  ideals are "very relevant in a world of increasing
violence."

   Peace and good will on earth are clearly what most of the voters believed in
as well.  E.T. is peaceful too, but he is sitting there in his galaxy 3 million
light years away.  He will have to be satisfied with those Reese's Pieces that
he used to munch and, if he wants it, a pot of gold awaiting him here below.
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Sylvia D. D'Cruz                                
Mead Data Central                               Systems & Product Technology
Bldg. VI, 9595 Springboro Pike                          udcrusd@meaddata.com
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