Want to Buy and Oscar?

It appears Variety is standing by to take your order.

Defamer is reporting that Variety was paid $400,000 to bury a bad review of the film, Iron Cross. This is really bad.

According to Defamer, Variety had initially put up a bad review of Iron Cross, but after receiving $400,000 from the film’s producers and making a deal to help them make an Oscar push for the film, Variety’s bad review somehow disappeared.  But it did remain in Google’s cache, for anyone interested in reading the review.

Variety’s deal with the producers of Iron Cross also resulted in some confusion, as Variety included the film in there screening series.  For those that don’t know, Variety’s screening series is meant to help Oscar screeners see the Oscar nominated films.  But with Iron Cross not having any Oscar nominations, it was quite strange for it to be included in the screening series.

It’s really unfortunate to find out that Variety is willing to sell out.  Sure they are a business, but when you’re in any kind of journalism position, your credibility is everything.  If people know that you are willing to back track or change your opinion of a film over money, you would lose all credibility. 

From the producers of Iron Cross’s perspective, I can understand it.  An Oscar nomination is worth a lot of money for a film.  Any film that gets nominated for an Oscar receives an immediate spike in their ticket says.  And so it can be quite valuable to get on that list of films that receive a nomination.  But, if it was found out that someone was able to buy a nomination, it would devalue the whole system.

I really think that this how situation is despicable.  Variety has really lost all credibility with me.  And I have no interest in seeing Iron Cross.

So what do you think?