accompanied it:
Los Angeles -- He steals the show on the red carpet, his co-stars regard him as a solid actor, and his director believes he is an essential character in The Artist.
But Uggie, the Jack Russell terrier who stars in the silent movie [set at the dawn of talkies], was left out in the cold by Oscar organisers on Tuesday (24 Jan) despite having won the hearts and minds of millions of movie-goers...
In the Artist, the cute canine goes from playing dead to ultimately saving the day.
But despite a long list of previous film credits to his name, including Water for Elephants (2011), little Uggie, 10, never stood a chance...
That is because more than 80 years ago, the Academy [of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences] drafted rules that specifically exclude animals from being nominated for Oscars, all because of the success of another superstar dog of the silent era, Rin Tin Tin.
Susan Orlean, author of Rin Tin Tin: The Life And The Legend, says [the German Shepherd] was so popular with movie audiences in the silent era that he almost won the very first best actor Oscar in 1929.
"The reporting that I did, indicated that Rin Tin Tin got most votes for best actor. But... the Academy was trying to establish itself as a serious new awards programme and they thought 'We can't give awards to animals'," she said.
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Ok, back now to that other "top-dogs saga" story...
It still looks like no one in authority is willing to say why a brief statement could not be issued as soon as practicable, on each of the two occasions once arrests were made.
All the public needed to be told then, in timely fashion, was so-and-so had been arrested on such a date, on the basis of whatever alleged contravention, whether there was a suspension of duty, that bail had been offered (with all that that implied), and that investigations were still in progress. That's all!
Instead, we are now being treated to a display of assurances of a thorough investigation into the cases, of profession of no letdown in highest public service and integrity, of public service morale having to be kept up, and of a reminder not to assume guilt of the men arrested.
Hello! Singaporeans are not losing sleep overnight worrying that suddenly, all the above are now at risk. We have every confidence (and do not need reminders) in the core robustness of the structures, and we -- however we may gossip in the coffeeshops -- are not so bigoted as to forswear the "innocent until proven guilty" principle.
We also know that morale at unit level -- at the boots on the ground level -- seldom has to do with leadership at the stratospheric top level.
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Meanwhile, headline writers are still trigger-happily plugging the word "probe":
All that's needed is to recast the headline above into:
CPIB: Top
men were
arrested,
graft
probe has
kicked in
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