How is There Will Be Blood "clearly" of a superior make? You sound like a National Socialist doctor.
Easy. The actors give better performances, it's a more layered film, the script is perfectly crafted, the score is both noteworthy and unique while still fitting with the film, and the themes are more fleshed out and various than those in No Country.
Also, FroHam, I get that you consider The Hurt Locker a better film than Avatar. It's not, but I get that. However, you continue to insist that it somehow is more entitled to a market than other films, or that what it can gain from a Best Picture win is of any relevance in how the award should be decided. It seems fairly obvious that no one would contest that Best Picture is always, if ever, awarded to the best film from any given year. Yet when you use the word deserving, a word that implies possessing some worth of merit, it is completely ill placed. The Hurt Locker has done little worthy of merit, especially in regard to Avatar. What more could Avatar have done to make it
deserving of the Best Picture Oscar. You can say that The Hurt Locker should win the award, but that is hardly the same as saying that it is more deserving than Avatar. You can say that The Hurt Locker is a better film than Avatar. It's not true, but you can say that. However, there is nary a film released last year more
deserving of the accolades it is primed to receive than Avatar. Hell, in many ways District 9, despite being a pretty terrible film, is more
deserving of a victory than The Hurt Locker. That film has a ton of accomplishments worthy of merit, which The Hurt Locker still lacks.
As for the numbers thing, there is an underlying sense in all of your posts, as I mentioned earlier, that The Hurt Locker is somehow entitled to an audience more than any other film. It's not going to be re-released theatrically, so the only impact such a victory would have, aside from DVD sales, would be found in future films. We don't get films like No Country or Slumdog Millionaire on a massive basis because, despite the awards, the Hollywood system is too hard coded to be changed. Is it so important that The Hurt Locker be seen by as many people as possible? Is this the type of film that can or will spark a film-making revolution? No. It's just a pretty good thrill ride that is mostly forgettable outside of one major scene. You admit that it is going to help this one individual film, it will, by precedent, have no future ramifications on the way the public consumes film, so sacrificing the most deserving film simply so this small piece of fluff can make a bit more money on DVD, a medium that is nearly as adverse to its effect as it is to Avatar's, is that important?