There were ballots, of course, and a betting pool. I opted to go with my heart. "What are you, crazy?", asked Rich, an industry veteran. And indeed, I came bottom of the pack, with a low score of 5 vs his 15. He took home the cash. I took home the realization that the Oscars, even moreso perhaps than anything we meet in the markets, is the ultimate Keynesian beauty contest.
Not that Keynes was particularly beautiful. But he sure was smart, and this is how he explained price fluctuations in equity markets. In using a hypothetical beauty contest announced in a newspaper to illustrate his point, he argues against choosing simply the prettiest face (definitely Rooney Mara, for example...).
“It is not a case of choosing those [faces] that, to the best of one’s judgment, are really the prettiest, nor even those that average opinion genuinely thinks the prettiest. We have reached the third degree where we devote our intelligences to anticipating what average opinion expects the average opinion to be. And there are some, I believe, who practice the fourth, fifth and higher degrees.” (Keynes, General Theory of Employment Interest and Money, 1936).
Does that make my opinion above or below average? Not sure. In any event, you'll guess from the thumbnails who I thought the real contenders were. Best acceptance speeches of the evening were Christopher Plummer and Asghar Farhadi. And the real winner of the evening has got to be Paris, or perhaps even France, festooned with prizes for Hugo, Midnight in Paris and of course the Artist (during which Flo and I fell asleep...). Americans love the French after all. I honestly doubt whether Paris and France are currently held in as high esteem by the French themselves.
Anyway, thanks again Eve for the screening (if not for the last 15mins), and for a wonderful dinner.
No comments:
Post a Comment