3rd Annual Post-Oscar Oscars

It’s that time again. Time for another piece where I hand out the Oscars for the most memorable moments of the Oscars show. Are you ready? Well too bad, here I go anyway.

(The awards are handed out in relative order of where they happened during the broadcast)

The Oscar For Most Interesting Turnabout Goes To… Ellen’s Al Gore joke during her opening monologue. In the joke, she talked about how the people voted for Al Gore but he didn’t win and the audience went crazy for it. Now you’re saying, how is this a turnabout? Hollywood folks are crazy liberal and they always were. Well let me take you back to the awards show of 2003 when Michael Moore received the Oscar for Best Documentary for Bowling For Columbine and then got booed by the audience for suggesting that George W. Bush didn’t really win the election (an event which spurned his decision to make Fahrenheit 9/11.) Now do you understand why this joke got this award? I thought so.

The Oscar For The Most Awkward Standing Goes To… All the people who stood up when Ellen marched around the room with the gospel choir at the end of her opening monologue. All ten or fifteen of them. Boy, they must have felt awkward during that moment.

The Oscar For The Best Act of Sympathy Goes To… Jack Nicholson who shaved his head, for what I can only assume was an act of sympathy with Britney Spears. Or at least I sure hope it was. (Turns out he did it for an upcoming role. What a dissapointment.)

The Oscar For The Biggest Surprise of The Night Goes To… Alan Arkin, for winning the Best Supporting Actor award that everyone knew was going to go to Eddie Murphy. I notice that I never saw Eddie again during the broadcast which leads me to two thoughts: 1. Eddie left after not winning, or 2. Every time they tried to put him on camera after that, he flicked off the camera. (Sadly it turned out that the first thought was true, and not the second one, which is almost as disappointing as finding out that Jack didn't shave his head for Britney.)

The Oscar For The Best Original Screenplay Goes To… Nope, not the real winner for Best Original Screenplay, which went to Little Miss Sunshine’s, Michael Arndt. This one goes to Ellen’s screenplay which she handed to Martin Scorsese during the broadcast. She claimed the movie was “Goodfellas meets Big Momma’s House.” I really wish I had thought of it. And I hope she also thought to get some kind of copyright on that idea, because I’m sure some poor scribe is out there working on that movie right now thinking Martin Scorsese might actually be interested in it. Or at least that Ewe Boll might be.

The Oscar For The Worst Tribute of The Night Goes To... The tribute to writers. This was one of the closest battles of the night, with the tribute to America finishing a close second, simply because it aired when the show was already ten minutes longer than originally scheduled. The reason the writers tribute grabbed the prize over the tribute to America wasn't simply due to its cliches, but rather because it was put together by Nancy Meyers, who managed to find a place for a clip from her own movie about a writer, the awful Something's Gotta Give (by the way, what gave was my patience). What a ridiculous self-promoter.

The Oscar For The Most Awkward Acceptance Speech Goes To... Best Adapted Screenplay winner, William Monahan. For some reason, the first thing that Monahan said when he got on stage was "valium does work!" Uhh. What the hell does that mean? Scratch that. I don't want to know.

The Oscar For The Best Performance By An Austin Powers Character Goes To... Best Costume Design winner, Frau Farbissina!

I thought you needed to see this to believe it. And now you have.

The Best Self Depricating Joke of The Night Goes To... Robert Downey Jr. for his joke about how the special effects in movies were like his drug induced hazes. You know, I really like Robert Downey Jr. and this joke only made me like him more. I'm really glad he's gotten cleaned up. See Britney, there is still some hope. If he can turn his life around, so can you.

The Best Live Edit of The Night Goes To... The cut to Borat star, Sacha Baron Cohen, while talking about foreign films. Just brilliant. They do know he isn't actually from Kazakhstan, right? (Yes, I know that he is British, but that still doesn't explain the cut to him.)

The Best Moment of Rubbing it in Goes To... Best Foreign Film Winning Director, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (and yes, that really is his name). FHvD managed to rub his ass against the back of the head of fellow nominee, Guillermo del Toro, after it was announced that he had won. I'm all for rubbing it in, but honestly, this may have gone too far.

The Best Performance by a Drunk Goes To... My roommate, Crayzie Chris, who's sing-along with the Best Song nominees from Dreamgirls put him over the top. (He believes now that possibly there was something wrong with the wine he had that night, and I tend to agree with him. I think it had alcohol in it.)

The Best Reference to a Movie That Is The Farthest Thing Possible From Being Oscar Worthy Goes To... It looked all night like this was going to go to Snakes on a Plane, which was referenced by the bendy dancers during one of their weird, but strangely awesome performances throughout the night. However, during the previously mentioned America montage we got to see a clip of Rocky IV, which while being one of my favorite movies ever, really is horrible. Probably not as stupid as Snakes, but since I like it more, it takes this much coveted award.

The Best "Finally" Moment of the Night Goes To... Tough call between the show ending after about 4 hours or when Scorsese took home the Best Director trophy. I'm going to go with Scorsese for two reasons though: 1. I Tivo'd the final moments of the show because it was going way too long, even for me, so I wasn't there for when it "finally" ended, and 2. If they had brought Steven Spielberg up there to present the Best Director award and then not given it to Martin Scorsese, that would probably have been worse than when that German director rubbed his ass on Guillermo del Toro's head, because you really can't rub it in any more than by having it pointed out that Steven Spielberg has won a Best Director award and the infinitely more talented Scorsese has none. (Unfortunately this win for Scorsese does end a funny joke where you could point out surprising winners and compare them to the previously shut-out, Scorsese, such as Three 6 Mafia 1, Scorsese 0, or Eminem 1, Scorsese 0, or for a brief time, Jennifer Hudson 1, Scorsese 0. However you still can do Spielberg 2, Scorsese 1.)

- Ben

More posts coming up later this week, including Lost recaps and a special tribute to a special show

Golden Globes Wrapup

Golden Globes Wrapup

There really is nothing better than getting a bunch of celebrities together in a ballroom, getting them drunk, and then handing out awards. Well okay that’s not quite true. There are actually a lot of better things. World peace for instance. But when it comes to award shows, I generally find the Golden Globes to be pretty enjoyable. Sure its just as masturbatory as any other show, but for some reason the celebrities are just a little looser for this show than say the Oscars, the SAG Awards, or the Emmys (I say some reason, but we all know, it’s the booze) and that makes things much more palatable.

I called this piece a wrapup, but in fairness, I missed the first part of the show and then didn’t pay that much attention for the parts I watched, and since it went past 11pm, I missed the last award to be handed out, Best Motion Picture Drama, because I only scheduled my Tivo to record until 11pm (you’re probably wondering how I missed the first part since I Tivo’d the show, well the answer is from 8pm-10pm I was Tivoing the second night of the TWO NIGHT, FOUR HOUR, SEASON PREMIERE OF 24 ON FOX!!, but I’ll get to that on another day). So this isn’t going to be a complete wrapup, but more a vague outline of what happened and what we learned. So here we go:

What Happened

I didn’t take notes during the broadcast like I would normally do for anything I’m going to write up in any length, so I can only give you the things that I remember today, which aren’t that numerous and probably aren’t remembered that accurately. Sorry, I had no idea I was going to start doing this last night, I just decided today that I needed to bring back my writing to the internet, so please excuse the lack of preperation.

- My favorite moment of the night was when Sacha Baron Cohen picked up the award for Best Actor in a Motion Picture Comedy or Musical and his acceptance speech brought down the house. The strange thing was, it wasn’t that funny. I’ll admit it was humorous, but you could sense his heart wasn’t in it as he spoke, but yet the celebrities ate it up. Perhaps it was because they were into their third hour of drinking and since many of them are too skinny for their own good they can’t hold their liquor as well as a group of drunken frat boys, but whatever it was, they were nuts for it. I’m pretty sure I actually saw Teri Hatcher crying because she was laughing so hard. All in all, it reminded me of the time I did my George Bush (the first one) impersonation at my Dad’s leaving the OSU Board of Trustees dinner. Considering I was ten years old and I wrote the thing myself, it was pretty impressive, but the reaction to it went way overboard. Those adults were practically falling out of their chairs, and in all honesty, I’ve seen the tape, it didn’t warrant that kind of a response.

- The tribute to Warren Beatty went on way too long. First, Tom Hanks’ introduction where he overused the term “balls” to describe Beatty’s daring artistic vision, and then second Beatty’s actual speech. I actually fast-forwarded through Beatty’s speech on my Tivo and it still took a few minutes to get it over with. That’s just not right.

- I’m pretty sure it was Peter Morgan who when accepting the award for best screenplay for The Queen was almost immediately cut off during his speech. He started talking about some time when millions of British crowded the streets in 1997 to get a stubborn 70-year-old woman to do something (I assume he meant Queen Elizabeth II, but I’m not sure) and then talked about how public protest is important. Right after finishing this semi-incoherent moment of free speech, Morgan got the “wrap it up” sign, and I’m pretty sure it was because they were afraid he might say something too controversial at any moment so they got him off-track and forced him to just thank the people who helped him. The whole thing was pretty bizarre and that’s part of the reason I can’t remember who was the one was said it all. (Someone please tell me what this protest was though. I did a quick search on Google and came up empty.)

- My second favorite moment of the night came as Ugly Betty actress, America Ferrera, winner of the Best Actress on a TV Comedy or Musical, was interviewed by some random women as they went into commercial right after America won the award. Not only was this the only time I saw that random woman all night, leading me to believe that she wasn’t actually a reporter for the broadcast, but rather a crazed fan, but this woman produced one of the most awkward interviews of all-time. One of her very first questions to Ms. Ferrera, who was still stunned by her victory, was a question that would stun her even more. She asked, “what do you say to all those people out there who didn’t want you to be Ugly Betty?,” to which America answered, “what people?” Apparently, as the random interviewer went on to explain, some people didn’t think that America Ferrera was the right person to be cast for the role, but executive producer Salma Hayek fought for her. But isn’t this something that happens for every role in every show or movie? Isn’t there always someone who says, I’m not sure such and such is right for this role, but then someone else says that they are and they get the job? Either way, horrible question.

- Last thing I want to say for what happened is this: Billy Nighy, after winning the award for Best Actor in a mini-series or TV movie, went up and apologized to Robert Duvall, who was also nominated in the category for his performance in Broken Trail (or at least that’s what he said he did when he got up on stage). I hate when actors and actresses do that. Frankly, I think it’s rude. The person just lost and somehow its okay to go up and say to them, I can’t believe I won, you should have gotten it. Isn’t that just rubbing salt in the wound? Would you go up to someone who was up for the same job as you, but didn’t get it, and tell them that it should be them who got the job that you just got, that they were better qualified for the position? Unless it was your best friend, the answer should be no.

What We Learned:

- They can go ahead and mail the Oscars for Best Actor and Best Actress out right now because Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland) and Helen Mirren (The Queen) are winning those things. Whitaker topped Hollywood heavyweights Will Smith, Leonardo DiCaprio (twice), and Peter O’Toole this time around, so is there any reason to think he won’t win the Oscar? And Mirren is just having a banner year. She picked up two Golden Globes last night for her performances as Queen Elizabeth I and Queen Elizabeth II and was nominated against herself in the Best Actress in a mini-series or TV movie for her role in Prime Suspect. There simply aren’t many strong performances in the female category this year (again), so you can be sure Mirren is going to take home her very first Oscar this year.

- If you didn’t believe Hollywood was stupid before last night, here is proof they are: The Best TV Drama – Grey’s Anatomy, The Best TV Comedy – Ugly Betty. Both very bad shows that were up against superior competition.

- Two solidly directed movies from Hollywood living legend, Clint Eastwood, won’t be enough to stop Martin Scorsese this time. He’s definitely going to get Best Director this year. Probably.

- This Dreamgirls movie is for real. Perhaps I should go see it so I can properly make fun of it rather than just be incredulous that Beyonce is receiving acclaim for this movie.

- Along those same lines, is there really any chance that Eddie Murphy’s performance was better than Jack Nicholson’s or Marky Mark’s in The Departed?

- Having a Best Foreign Language Film category is stupid if two American films can get in the race and one of them can actually win it.

- There is some justice in the world as Kyra Sedgwick won for Best Actress in a TV Drama. If Ellen Pompeo had won that award I think I would have broken my TV.

- Last but not least, last night’s award show has lead me to give you predictions for the Oscar nominees in the categories that people actually give a crap about. And just so you know, I haven’t even cracked open the issue of Entertainment Weekly which I just got where they predict the nominees, so these are all mine.

Best Picture
- Babel
- Dreamgirls
- The Queen
- The Departed
- Borat!

Best Actor
- Forest Whitaker
- Leonardo DiCaprio (for The Departed)
- Sacha Baron Cohen
- Will Smith
- Peter O’Toole

Best Actress
- Helen Mirren
- Meryl Streep
- Kate Winslet
- Perennial nominee, Dame Judi Dench
- Beyonce Knowles

Best Director
- Martin Scorsese
- Clint Eastwood (For Letters From Iwo Jima)
- Stephen Frears
- Alejandro González Iñárritu
- Bill Condon

- BEN