Awards Season Journo Tries to Grit and Bear It

Movie City News mayor David Poland offers a great snapshot history of online Oscar punditry and how it has devolved from the trades, to bulletin boards, to a select group of journalists, to everyone. Since technical web know-how and even domain registration fees are no longer barriers to entry, it’s now the Mild Mild West. Just in time for something like the Coen brothers remake of True Grit.

In fact, per Poland, things may have come full corral circle, with someone bylined at The Hollywood Reporter sounding more like an everyman. Writes Poland:

I like Tim Appelo a lot… MCN has happily linked to his work for years… But his Grit screening piece had all the earmarks of someone who was new to the Oscar beat and suffering from being part of the cluster.

First, it was reporting on pundits. Weird. Then it was peevish – “For your consideration — but only if you’re one of the cool kids.” And then it went to utterly outside this box people for quotes, except Mark Harris, whose issue (media as publicists) really has nothing to do with Appelo’s story and could well be a story unto itself.

Almost makes you wish John Wayne could ride into town and set things straight. Barring that, Poland concludes that he is trying not to get engulfed in the sea of “opinions and opinions about opinions and opinions about opinions about opinions.” Good luck with that.

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