'Oscar' Winners Deserving
Hollywood's biggest show of the year was staged Thursday night as the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presented its 26th annual "Oscar" awards for achievement during 1953.
The Academy fully redeemed itself for a few previous fiascos in recent years. Seldom have filmdom's highest awards been bestowed upon such a well-deserving group of actors, writers, directors, and technicians.
The event this year was witnessed by the largest audience in its history—some 2,000 of the movie world's biggest names assembled in the Pantages theater in Hollywood and the Center theater in New York, plus millions of Americans in their homes through the full radio and television facilities of NBC.
It was quite a show indeed. Not only was there the long parade of famous personalities, many of whom are household names, but the five contenders for best song were presented in lavish production number fashion for the first time. Even the commercials had class. Oldsmobile sponsored the network telecast.
Probably the most satisfying award of all went to actor William Holden for the best male performance of the year. Although the award is made on the basis of a single picture, Mr. Holden has proved himself to be Hollywood's most versatile young actor in such pictures as "Sunset Boulevard," "The Moon Is Blue," "Escape from Fort Bravo," and "Forever Female." His award-winning performance is "Stalag 17" as the tough, hard-boiled heel-turned-hero was certainly one of the all-time greatest characterizations created on the screen.
Audrey Hepburn was practically a shoo-in for best actress of the year for her restrained and completely captivating portrayal of a young princess who falls in love with a newspaper reporter in "Roman Holiday." This is the second year in a row that a great star of the Broadway stage has walked away with the screen's top feminine award in a Hollywood debut, and in both instances the award has been rightly deserved.
Probably the only legitimate argument that could be made against this year's awards on the whole was that the picture "From Here to Eternity," in receiving eight awards, got more than it really deserved. It won the awards for best motion picture, best supporting actor, best supporting actress, best director, best screenplay, best black and white photography, best editing, and best studio sound.
Frank Sinatra deserved the best supporting actor award if ever anyone did. Two other awards were also fully merited, to Fred Zinnemann for his vibrant direction and to Daniel Taradash for his sensitive, forceful script of the novel by James Jones. However, a strong argument might be made against Donna Reed as best supporting
actress and the four other awards the film captured.
A few of the other awards which were unusually gratifying went to Walt Disney for the best cartoon; "Toot, Whistle, Plunk, and Boom" and for the best two-reel shorts subject, "Bear Country;" to M-G-M for the best one-reel short subject, "The Merry Wives of Windsor Overture," performed by the M-G-M studio orchestra under Johnny Green's direction as a prelude to "Knights of the Round Table," and to Bronislaw Kaper for his superlative job of scoring for "Lili."
The Academy presented special honorary awards to Bell and Howell for its quality production of motion picture equipment, to Joseph Breen for his administration of the production code, to 20th Century-Fox studios for its foresight and gamble in converting its entire studio to the process of CinemaScope, which was commended as a tremendous shot-in-the-arm for the entire industry, and to Pete Smith for consistent quality production in the field of short subjects.
Scientific and technical awards went to the developers of the processes of Cinerama, CinemaScope, and magnetic four-track stereophonic sound.
Page 2 University Daily Kansan Monday, March 29.1954
Other major awards went to "Seeret Love" as the best song from a motion picture, to Alfred Newman for the best scoring of a musical ("Call Me Madam"), to Charles Brackett, Walter Reisch, and Richard Breen for the best story and screenplay ("Titanic"), to Ian McLellan Hunter for the best story ("Roman Holiday"), and to Loyal Griggs for the best color photography ("Shane"). "The Robe" won for best art direction, sets, and costumes in a color film, "Julius Caesar" for the best art direction and sets in a black and white film, and "Roman Holiday" for the best costumes in a black and white film.
Walt Disney's "The Living Desert" was judged the best documentary feature, his "The Alaskan Eskimo" the best documentary short subject, and Paramount's special effects department won that award for its startling work in "The War of the Worlds."
The Irving Thalberg award, given on the basis of consistent quality production over the last three years, went to Paramount's George Stevens for his productions of "A Place in the Sun" and "Shane."
And so let us say again that seldom if ever before have Hollywood's highest honors gone to such a richly-deserving group of persons. The year 1953 was one of tremendous achievement and new developments in the field of motion pictures. Thursday night Hollywood proudly and justifiably so commended and awarded all those in the industry who worked so hard and relentlessly to make it all a reality. —Court Ernst
Things 'n Stuff
By Don Tice
In his column in Friay's UDK, out-going editorial editor Chuck Morelock said adios, an uvoir, etc. Since we don't want to try to compete with this learned statement, and 10 hours of French failed to make a lasting impression, we will be content with a trite "hello." One way that an editor knows her page is being read is when he get letters of recommendation. We have heard numerous students say that the UDK editors leave "something to be desired," which may be true in some cases.
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We therefore reserve the right to say what we darn please, within limits of course. And if you, the reader, agree, disagree, or have something to add, be sure and let us know.
are provoking thought. And after all, isn't that really one of the big functions of an editorial?
To restate our policy, we will not print an unsigned letter. If you don't want your name used, request the same on your letter, but for our own protection we must have your name before we can publish your letter.
Agricultural Secretary Benson announced that he has come up with a wonderful way to save the economy of the nation. The huge quantity of dried milk that the government bought at sixteen cents is to be sold back to the farmers at three cents and fed back to the cows. Perpetual motion?
Isn't it sweet that the "cute" Kappa skit won a place in the Rock Chalk? It just had everything?
Short Ones
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS by Dick Bibler
China Problem Causes Misgivings on Geneva
While most American legislators are looking with some misgivings on the upcoming April 26 Geneva peace talks because the China question is certain to come up, the plain fact that is paramount is that both Communist and Nationalist China will continue to be in the world spotlight for some time to come.
Today the struggle there is between the Nationalist forces on Formosa of Generalissimo Chiang Kui-li and Communist masses of Mao Tse-tung.
The first was the overthrow of the ancient monarchial system with the establisment of a nominally democratic republic. This, in turn, was replaced by an anarchic era of "war lords," and then, of course, the advent of the Red regime.
Sixty-six-year-old Chiang, always a strong follower of Sun Yat-sen, the original advocate of nationalism and the inspirer of the 1911 rebellion, has been president of the Chinese Communist Party except for a brief retirement in 1949 and 1950, and has been that nation's virtual ruler since 1927.
The communism we now fear is by no means a new thing in that most-populated and "oldest" nation of the world. It was strong in the World War but was overasked by more power than all Chinese. And it had its beginnings, years before Japan attacked Manchuria in 1937.
The present struggle between this and the Communist forces is not new in China—it can be traced back to open warfare which began in 1927, when Chiang, who got some early training in 1923 in Moscow, made a sudden coup in Shanghai against the Communists and succeeded in driving them out. Concurrently similar actions were carried out by his subordinates in other provinces and cities.
In fact, the Communist successes in that country mark the third of three waves of revolution which have swept China since 1911.
Here was Chiang's big opportunity.
ity to stamp out the Red threat as an effective political force, but it already had picked up much momentum in the countryside among the long-oppressed peasants. Guerilla warfare, much the same as Nationalist forces now are employing on the mainland, continued to harass Chiang.
In the years after that open warfare sprang up with most of the attacks being Russian-inspired and coming from the north.
In 1936 Chinese Communists had made their biggest steps and even established a "capital" at the northern China town of Yenan. This in the face of the encroaching Japanese who were then in Manchuria and looking for new fields to conquer.
Communists and some Nationalists, Chiang excluded, wanted to call off the civil war and unite against the Japanese. In 1936, when Chiang made a front line inspection in the war area, he was "captured" by one of his own generals and was forced to yield and organize a united front against the invaders.
Just the next year Japan overran northern China and Chiang appeared to have gained almost undying support from his entire people. Actually Communists and Nationalists alike realized neither could survive if the country was foreign occupied.
China fought and fought well, considering that it waged almost the entire eight years without outside aid.