Emailgate?

By now you've heard of the email controversy regarding The Hurt Locker's producer, and a not so suttle shot at Avatar. I personally think it is a low shot, and the producer should have some form of punishment by the Academy. In terms of the movie winning, that's a different story. While it would be a nice "fuck you" to that dick of a producer, I would hate that Kathryn Bigelow and the incredible cast be snubbed because one of their crew is an ass.

Anyway, here is an interesting take from AwardsDaily and Sasha Stone below:

"Well, the clusterfuck has finally come full circle. The producer of The Hurt Locker blah blah blah, violated the rules by sending out an email, blah blah blah and cut to — he has had to apologize. He did finally apologize:

The academy has not yet issued a statement about how it intends to deal with this severe violation of Oscar campaign rules. Penalties could be equally harsh, including the withdrawal of some tickets to the Oscar ceremony.

This is similar to the infamous Robert Wise ad taken out by Harvey Weinstein that endorsed Martin Scorsese for the Best Director prize for The Aviator. According to the rules, you are not supposed to contact Academy members and ask for their vote. You can beg and plead on FYC ads — you can give interviews all over the place – you can invite your buddies, who also happen to be Academy members, to parties and screenings…but you may not address them and request their vote – at least not in so many words.

You gotta love an 11th hour scandal, eh? Meanwhile, I’m sure someone will tell all of those Academy members to stop telling Pete Hammond whom they’re going to vote for because if he starts saying whom they plan to vote for, isn’t that an endorsement? A slippery way of going about it, though, non?"