The Watercooler: ‘Slumdog’ is Oscar’s final answer
It felt like a fairly predictable year so my 18/24 in the Oscar polling is nothing to write home about. I stiffed all the short categories (maybe I should’ve at least read the synopses if I wasn’t going to actually see the shorts?) and I missed score, foreign film and sound editing. I got the big categories, but that and $3 will buy you a gallon of gas. I correctly predicted that Slumdog would win eight awards, but didn’t correctly pick all eight. That and a gallon of gas will get you from the Kodak Theater to the Queen Mary.
Over all, the acting categories were my favorite part of the night and I think the right choice was made in each case.
Some people were surprised by Sean Penn winning for Best Actor, but this was Hollywood’s big F you to Proposition 8. In my opinion it didn’t hurt that it was also the best of the nominated performances, but I think Milk’s message trumped Rourke’s (and The Wrestler’s) compelling comeback story.
As you know, I was rooting for Meryl Streep the whole way for Best Actress, but when it finally came down to it, I was happy to see Kate Winslet win. She had an amazing year and she’s been overlooked so many other times when she was deserving. Better give it to her now than later as some kind of half-assed career achievement award. Too bad they didn’t give it to her for the right film.
It was lovely to see Heath Ledger’s family accepting his Oscar and I think Penelope Cruz was a terrific choice in a difficult category.
I didn’t see Departures coming for Best Foreign Language Film, but then I haven’t seen it yet.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button will probably be looked back on as an Oscar disappointment with only three technical wins in 13 nominations, but that felt right too and I say that as an unapologetic fan of the film. Regardless of what you thought of the film itself, I don’t think you can argue the effects, production design and make up weren’t first rate.
Going in, I was rooting for Milk for Best Picture though I wasn’t expecting it to win. As a biography it remains imperfect, but as a celebration of a life lived and a lament of a life lost, it’s terrific and timely. After it racked up the Screenplay win from a tearful Dustin Lance Black (one of the highlights of a long and boring evening) and the Acting win for Penn, I was satisfied. It was enough and when they coronated Slumdog Millionaire as the Best Picture of 2008, I was fine with it. It’s not my personal favorite, but it’s perfectly likable and a far cry from some of the awful picks that Oscar is known for.
As for the show itself, I’m sure the Snark Patrol is busy right now dismantling poor Hugh Jackman and the mess he was saddled with, but I have to say it wasn’t much worse than any other year. The show itself is always a big letdown in my opinion and it boils down to a couple of good moments – a montage here, a speech there – that make the whole show. I kind of like that they tried to mix up the formula this year, but the fact that it didn’t work sadly means they’ll probably go back to doing the same old thing next year.
- Motion Picture: Slumdog Millionaire
- Director: Danny Boyle – Slumdog Millionaire
- Actor: Sean Penn – Milk
- Actress: Kate Winslet – The Reader
- Supporting Actor: Heath Ledger – The Dark Knight
- Supporting Actress: Penelope Cruz – Vicky Cristina Barcelona
- Adapted Screenplay: Simon Beaufoy - Slumdog Millionaire
- Original Screenplay: Dustin Lance Black – Milk
- Animated Film: WALL-E
- Foreign Language: Departures – Japan
- Documentary: Man on Wire
- Cinematography: Anthony Dod Mantle – Slumdog Millionaire
- Art Direction: Donald Graham Burt, Victor J. Zolfo – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
- Costume Design: Michael O’Connor - The Duchess
- Editing: Chris Dickens - Slumdog Millionaire
- Make Up: Greg Cannom - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
- Original Score: A.R. Rahman – Slumdog Millionaire
- Original Song: “Jai Ho” – Slumdog Millionaire
- Animated Short: La Maison de Petits Cubes – Kunio Kato
- Live Action Short: Spielzeugland (Toyland) – Jochen Alexander Freydank
- Documentary Short: Smile Pinki – Megan Mylan
- Sound Editing: The Dark Knight – Richard King
- Sound Mixing: Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke, Resul Pookutty – Slumdog Millionaire
- Visual Effects: Eric Barba, Steve Preeg, Burt Dalton, Craig Barron – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Just watched the Best Documentary Oscar category… I loved Petit balancing the Oscar on his chin.
I adored Penelope Cruz’s speech for the reasons I just rattled off here. Also, her accent. And eyes. Okay, I’ll stop.
She’s en fuego. No doubt about it.
As much as I appreciated Milk’s politics, I appreciated The Wrestler’s aesthetics more – Rourke should have won. But if he was going to lose to anybody, Sean Penn was a pretty good winner.
Here’s hoping Departures actually makes it to theaters now that it’s won.
Those five-person team-ups have got to go, but otherwise they kept it moving well and didn’t waste too much time – there was one musical number too many, but that’s sort of what I expect from the Oscars.
Oh, and for the Watercooler: my weekend viewings were Friday the 13th and a Luis Bunuel double feature, Viridiana and The Exterminating Angel, the latter of which was a sublime experience (to use a Sam Juliano phrase).
Well Jeff, Sean Penn (who won both the NY Film Critics prize and the LA Film Critics prize) easily gave a greater performance than Rourke’s. I was surprised Penn won, but I completely agree with Craig and so many others whose opinions I respect that Penn gave a much better performance than Rourke.
Bunuel indeed, TEA is indeed sublime….LOL! and SIMON is one of the great religious satires.
I thought the ceremony, overall, worked quite well, looked great, stayed mostly engaging and fresh. Hugh Jackman was funny, talented, suave and dreamy, an inspired choice.
I have mixed feelings about the Oscar Elders welcoming a new member from the Final Five. On the one hand, it was kinder and more gracious to the nominees than the formulaic clip-a-thon and by personalizing the remarks about each performance, made them so much more resonant and genuine than the generic laudatory line reading by a presenter usually is, and I liked that the presenters could mix it up with some laughs where appropriate. Also, I liked the new camera angle that allowed us to see the nominee’s reactions during this great moment in their lives. Still, it was a slight bit pompous, and the staging was vaugely reminiscent of the Ruling Council’s meetings in Superman (1978). It is most definitely an easy target for parody.
Among the other controllable elements, my only real beef was with the camera angles of the In Memoriam segment, which utterly disrespected the dead in favor of showing off the lovely set and Queen Latifah. Her song was lovely, but I didn’t need to SEE it, especially when there’s a tribute to the lost talent going on up on the screen. I can’t believe they made that choice. Some things don’t need daring camera angles.
I actually enjoyed the musicals number, but I don’t think it should have been in the Oscars. “The musical is back?” Because of Mama Mia? Please. More like “The UK has finally gone off its rocker!” I’d like to see a musical number about that.
Having made peace with most of the nomination snubs and replaced my rage with resignation, I thought most of the winners were appropriate. The acting noms were all solid, and I was glad Penn won, since I agree he was the best. I think the timely messaging and “real person, tragically lost” factor gave him the edge over Rourke’s own powerful performance.
Also, was it weird that there were so many clips of Space Chimps in that animation montage? There were way more of them than of Bolt, and that’s Disney/ABC. I don’t get it. Glad WALL-E got the starring turn there, though.
Among the varied, inconsistent Oscar prediction ballots I completed, my low score was something like 13 or 14 and my high score (at home) was 20.
But who actually cares any more? I’m ready for 2009’s contenders. Show me some magic already, Hollywood.
I have nothing to report. Spent the last few days in Scottsdale, AZ getting a good dose of sun and significant other family fun, which went well. As I’m soon to be headed to the airport, let me chime in with some Oscar thoughts.
Hugh Jackman sweding the Oscars was definitely the only part of the “revised” telecast I actually enjoyed all that much. Who knew he had such a great sense of humor?
The Final Five thing ended up being weird and uncomfortable more often than it was fun, which pretty much sums up just about every excursion into free-form jazz the Oscar ceremonies have attempted in the last 10 years. The formula is what it is, they should probably stick to it.
Jennybee is right, the In Memorium segment was a complete embarrassment.
My bug tasted great, Slumdog won more awards, let’s move on. Love the acting awards, otherwise kinda bored with how predictable the winners were. So glad Penn won. He really deserved it.
Please please please let 2009’s nominees be a little more engaging.
“and the staging was vaugely reminiscent of the Ruling Council’s meetings in Superman (1978). It is most definitely an easy target for parody. ”
You made my day. LOL!
Oh, and because of real-life obligations, the only films I got to see were the Douglas Sirk melodrama Written on the Wind and from my 50 Sci-Fi Classics cheapo DVD set, The Petrified World, starring John Carradine. The former was inarguably better.
Well as the resident Slumdog lover, I was obviously happy to see so many different parts of it recognized. Had it lost (or not even been nominated) it still would have been my favorite movie last year; so that it did win after all these months is more surprising than validating. I know it was all but solidified about six weeks ago, but I saw it in mid-November and expected a lot of the late December openings (Che, Rev Road, Gran Torino, etc.) to be showered with awards, and that never happened.
I love Sean Penn and he is a worthy winner here, but you could just see how badly Rourke wanted this one, and part of me still wishes he could have had it in what will almost certainly be his best and last chance.
Loved the comedy montage a lot more than any moment in Pineapple Express, but that’s just me.
I had no problems with any part of ceremony or hosting except for the musical bit. It’s actually a bit shocking to consider that Bill Condon used last night’s program as payback for not being nominated for BP or BD for Dreamgirls. Pretty sneaky.
The only movies I saw this weekend were the nominated animated shorts. The winning film was absolutely deserving – it left many people in the theater in tears and it has a beautiful score. All five of the shorts are available on line, but the winner is the hardest to find. Close the door, grab a tissue, turn up your computer speakers and click on my name to watch it.
hey jennybee, rather off topic/but whatever. was the movie you were describing awhile back about young pre teen girl pretending to be male for a swim class called no bikini ????
ok will the ben button dvd just go with three oscar wins/or will it list the categories it won ??? hmm….
Head of the Snark Patrol here, checking in.
That’s the one, glim, thanks. I liked it a lot.
Wow, Daniel, thanks for posting that. You’re dead right about it. What a beautiful little film. Completely deserving of the win.
ok,thanks for the suggestion, jennybee !. :)
and k. start snaking away. :)
Watercoolerwise, I caught a screening on friday of the un-Oscar Nominated Swedish film Everlasting Moments. It won a bunch of Swedish awards and was shortlisted for the Foreign Language Oscar but didn’t make it. It was good…the trailer for it is on LiC somewhere…but it’s strengths may actually have been weaknesses.
It gets bonus points for not following the usual Hollywood tropes…but I kinda wish it HAD followed those tropes a little bit. Anyway, it’s still good. The woman next to me said it was the bets film she’d seen in decades so take that for what it’s worth.
It’s funny, no matter what they do with the Oscar telecast, there’s always going to be a difference of opinion on whether it was good or not. I actually liked Jennybee’s Tribunal of Elders though in each case it went on a wee bit too long and I wish they’d banish Jai Ho into the phantom zone. I liked the other Slumdog number better.
I’m pretty sure everyone would hate my Oscar telecast which would be about an hour long, consist of a few montages and 24 acceptance speeches.
Luckily, I had a grand time chatting at Dorothy and K’s place so the show itself was kind of superfluous.
Craig, we loved having you there. Everyone who showed up made enduring the show so much fun.
glim, here are some snarky/horrified comments that popped up at ItG during the second musical number (with Hugh, Beyonce, Zac, etc.):
9:53 Miranda Wilding: Yesh. These ARE NOT THE TONYS
9:54 k: Please tell me they are not singing Grease
9:54 Craig Kennedy: ok K. They’re YOWLING grease
9:54 Alison Flynn: Okay okay I think I’ll take the montages over this…
9:56 Dorothy Porker: My brother just whispered to himself: “It doesn’t stop.”
9:56 Craig Kennedy: Hey everyone it’s Live Gagging the Oscars!
9:56 Pierre de Plume: In case nobody noticed, the music awards are coming up.
9:56 Craig Kennedy: Seriously, bring out Rob Lowe and Snow White. MIght as well
9:57 Ryan Adams: camp meets band camp
9:57 Dorothy Porker: This feels like a Super Bowl half-time puked on the Oscars.
9:57 Dorothy Porker: HISTORICALLY BAD.
9:58 amy wong: i mean, its like watching Cats on dvd, probably not the same…
9:58 Craig Kennedy: Cats on DVD on acid
9:58 Dorothy Porker: Gaudy gaudy gaudy.
hahaha….see? We had our own Oscar show which was pretty awesome if you ask me.
Seriously, Craig, it was so much fun. All of you had me laughing the whole way through.
I went through to mark time around the acting awards, and I’m surprised at just how long it took to announce the winners.
Damn, we had a good time, didn’t we? Thanks for the memories.
I have mixed feelings about the Oscar Elders welcoming a new member from the Final Five. On the one hand, it was kinder and more gracious to the nominees than the formulaic clip-a-thon and by personalizing the remarks about each performance, made them so much more resonant and genuine than the generic laudatory line reading by a presenter usually is, and I liked that the presenters could mix it up with some laughs where appropriate.”
I liked the new format. It works best when the actor is friends with the actor that he’s speaking of. Watching Anthony Hopkins praise Brad Pitt, for instance, along with Pitt’s reaction was moving. It’s like a banquet and everybody gets a little toast.
“Still, it was a slight bit pompous, and the staging was vaugely reminiscent of the Ruling Council’s meetings in Superman (1978). It is most definitely an easy target for parody.”
Don’t know if we thought of it independently, but I said the same thing on a couple sites last night. I was wondering when they were going to put General Zod in a pane of glass.
But I don’t think being a traget of parody is necessarily a bad thing. Many of the Oscar traditions have been targets of parody over the years. In some sense it makes them more endearing.
These are good recapping comments by all. Although the production numbers and choice of host ultimately seemed a bit dated to me, at least the show didn’t feel as interminably long as it often has in the past.
While it’s true that most everyone dressed up well, the show still lacked glamour and the feeling of importance. In the past, we at least were persuaded, for a moment at least, that this stuff is important, even if it’s not. Maybe more old clips would’ve helped; the tidbits of past winners being announced fed that urge.
I liked the new format of awarding the acting Oscars by using the “tribunal” of past winners, though some of the tributes weren’t so eloquent. The new seating arrrangement worked for me, but not the stage’s backdrop.
Queen Latifah did a great job singing.
Hugh was OK but the material didn’t help him. I found myself feeling better about the show when he wasn’t there. (Who needs endless, mindless patter in between segments?)
The Apatow film was one of the best parts of the show for me.
Finally — and as if I didn’t know this already — next time I predict foreign-language film I’ll check for the latest scuttlebut on which film is surging. Frontrunners in this category are doomed to hell as a matter of routine!
. . . and I guess we should be grateful that Slumdog provided the proceedings with some uplift — it was pretty tough last year to feel celebratory with a downbeat winner like No Country for Old Men. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad NCfOM won, but it didn’t do the 2008 Oscarcast any favors.
I loved the Apatow film. The only genuinely entertaining part of the presentation.
and the staging was vaugely reminiscent of the Ruling Council’s meetings in Superman (1978). It is most definitely an easy target for parody.
Ahaha, that’s great, jennybee.
Well, I was happy with the acting awards. The supporting awards were as I expected and very deserving. Kate finally got her long overdue Oscar and I’m glad Sean Penn won, even though I would not have argued with Mickey Rourke winning.
As someone who enjoyed Slumdog Millionaire but didn’t have it in their top 10 movies of 2008 I’m not upset with Slumdog’s wins – it’s just anticlimactic and kind of sums up how much this year paled in comparison to last year’s line-up of films.
Watercoolerwise, I caught the original non-musical film version of Pygmalion with Leslie Howard and Wendy Hiller, which is an excellent movie. I also watched on DVD an odd little movie called Habit. It’s a very very low budget film made in 1997 and I don’t know if it was ever even released in theaters, but its an interesting horror film. It’s quite slow-moving and laid-back, and the suspense doesn’t come until later; not a typical slasher/bloody horror movie. All I can say without ruining it is that it’s different.
@Alexander: Yes! I loved Petit balancing the statue on his nose!
oh wow, thanks for that tidbit k. *thank you*
Wendy Hiller is a gem, isn’t she, Alison?
I forgot to mention — finally caught up with Frozen River over the weekend. I liked it a lot. It does lack polish here and there, but the guts of it are more important to me.
She was fantastic in that movie, Pierre. I’ll have to check out her other movies now, like Major Barbara, which I’ve never seen.
I honestly don’t know how anyone can look at both Rourke and Penn, and say one “easily” gave a better performance than the other, as Sam did earlier in this thread. Personally, Penn would’ve been third on a respective ballot of mine(behind Rourke and Jenkins), but that’s not taking anything away from his performance, which was exceptional. I just thought the others were a little more deserving.
I think the animation short winner that Daniel posted “La Maison en Petits Cubes” is the best thing I’ve watched all year. Period.
That was amazing. In 12 minutes it’s so layered and each new layer is kind of a surprise of cleverness. Very beautiful. Very moving. Wow. I’m going to buy that.
http://getafilm.blogspot.com/2009/02/review-2009-oscar-nominated-animated.html
I love that a film as downbeat as No Country for Old Men won last year. Possibly the most culturally timely Best Picture winner since Annie Hall.
Friday I watched The Woman in Question, a solid little British noirish psychological thriller from 1950. I then watched, yet again, Shadow of the Vampire. One of my favorite lines from any films has to be John Malkovich’s admonishing of Willem Dafoe near the ending: “Frankly, Count, I find this composition unworkable.”
Saturday morning I was lazy so I just sat on the couch and watched From Russia With Love from Encore; after that I viewed all of Wong Kar-Wai’s films, including The Chungking Express, Ashes of Time, Fallen Angels, Happy Together, In the Mood for Love, 2046 and My Blueberry Nights. It was around 2:00 AM then so I watched the Palme d’Or winner L’Enfant, the 1952 film noir Scandal Sheet and then around 6:00 AM watched the Jane Campion film Holy Smoke, which is still remarkably flawed despite good work from Kate Winslet and Harvey Keitel.
Sunday at 10:00 AM I watched Maborosi. Afterwards, I watched several silents–Walter Worsley’s The Penalty, The Last Days of Pompeii, Albert Parker’s The Black Pirate and Charles Chaplin’s The Pilgrim.
That’ just ridiculous Alexander. :D
Alison, you might want to check this link if you’re curious about Dame Wendy. Of her earlier roles, I really liked “I Know Where I’m Going,” and of course there’s her dowager in “Murder on the Orient Express.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendy_Hiller
Alexander, are you a brain in a jar with eyes? One that doesn’t require sleep?
Ha! More or less, Jeff, more or less… And yes, Alison, it was ridiculous. :)
One day I’ll look in the mirror and see that I’ve become Christian Bale from The Machinist.
Jeff, I’m interested in a horror fan’s take on Friday the 13th. Do tell.
Glad you liked that short, Craig. It almost broke me up in the theater. And the music is just phenomenal. I was seriously preparing to pay $9 to see it in the theater again before finding it at about 2:00 AM last night. I feel kind of bad distributing the guy’s hard work like that, but these shorts live online. Still would be worth seeing again in a theater, completely free of distraction. For that matter all the shorts looked a lot better in the theater. It’s so worth the money once a year.
Oh, and the guy’s speech was brilliant – his production company is called Robot, so I think the better half of the “Mr. Roboto” joke was lost on most people (it would have been on me).
I thought it was interesting that La Maison des Petits Cubes’ director told reporters the second best part of the night was meeting Jack Black. He may aspire to be as funny as Black, but in this case, I’m very glad he went with a different aesthetic.
Thanks to Daniel and Craig, I just watched La Maison des Petits Cubes. Quite lovely, and very moving.
“As someone who enjoyed Slumdog Millionaire but didn’t have it in their top 10 movies of 2008 I’m not upset with Slumdog’s wins – it’s just anticlimactic and kind of sums up how much this year paled in comparison to last year’s line-up of films.”
Perfectly reflects my own thoughts Alison.
I thought the ceremony was reasonably enjoyable. It’s always going to have bad moments – tis the nature of the beast. Personally I have zero interest in the music and dance components – don’t care for Broadway style spectacle – and watch solely for the better jokes and speeches, and to celebrity watch. Some years I root for a given nominee or two.
Who would be a high profile woman attending the ceremony? Your hair, make-up, apparel, and figure all come under the microscope. Guys have it easy.
As the resident Anne Hathaway homer, has anyone ever had a better Oscar night without winning? Her turn was the highlight of the opening number. She got to display a lovely singing voice. She gets teary at Shirley MacLaine’s speech. She’s getting raves for her gown. The only way it could have been better was if she had won.
Oh, and Pihilippe Petit’s statue balancing act was awesome.
Craig the new Friday the 13th is just like any other Friday the 13th, except with more expensive production values. But there’s nothing special about it at all, the way that at Rob Zombie’s Halloween was re-imagined in white-trash terms, or Dawn of the Dead was given a sort of glitzy post-9/11 satiric take. This one was just another in a long chain of same-old.
Just saw La Maison en Petits Cubes. Beautiful.
What’s an ‘Ann Hathaway homer’?
An ‘Anne Hathaway homer’ is defined by the image of KB.
Congratulations jennybee for getting 21/24 correct in AD’s Oscar predictions contest!
Holy crap, jennybee. Congrats!
“What’s an ‘Ann Hathaway homer’?”
Nothing a restraining order won’t fix. :)
…
Is it one who homes?
I did? I did! Woohoo! That’s better than I thought I’d done. Monsieur Sartre was only one behind me, though.
Congratulations are certainly in order Jenny Bee!!! 21/24 is really incredible, especially since some of those relatively obscure categories were marked by upsets.
So many terrific comments on this thread. I am just beginning to thaw out from the Oscar hoopla, as is my annual tendency. I second the motion by whomever suggested it’s time to move on with the 2009 film crop.
Kudos also to Dan Getahun for the SLUMDOG celebration and to a lesser extent to Pierre, who allso carried the torch, blemishes and all.
And thank you Dorothy for that very special invitation, which I won’t ever forget. It was a lot of fun!
Craig, sir, you handled all the Oscar rhetoric over the past weeks better than any site proprietor could ever. Your talent, as everyone here has long known is ’singular’ in this regard.
Jeff: A few of my kids are begging to see FRIDAY THE 13TH. Do you think I should consider this for the two oldest?
I salute K. Bowen for his unwavering support for Anne Hathaway, who moment in the sun will surely be down the road.
I enjoyed the exhaustive and fecund recaps of the awards from sartre, Pierre and Alexander, the last of whom I see was undaunted in proceeding with his glorious backlog reviewings.
I also enjoyed Alison’s comments very much.
Needless to say, I am in extreme the minority here at LIC in feeling that Kate Winslet DID win her Oscar for the right film. I was also pleased that the ravishing THE READER came away with one of the night’s major awards.
Thanks everyone for all the fun Oscar times. Congrads to jennybee for all those correct guesses. This year it was so close you could lose an Oscar pool just by sneezing. I’ll indulge my ego a bit here to mention that sartre and I tied at 20 correct predictions.
And by the way — especially Craig — my Muze t-shirt (“Oh stewardess — I speak jive!”) arrived in the mail today, which as you may recall was the LiC prize for predicting the nominations. I’ll be ready for my close-up as soon as I slip it on.
(According to the accompanying literature, other Muze users include Jason Kidd, Matt Damon, Charlie & Martin Sheen, Juliette Lewis, Paula Abdul, the Deal or No Deal Girls, and Ryan Seacrest. Esteemed Hollywood company . . . depending on one’s point of view, of course.)
Sam, the only kids who should see Friday the 13th are the kind that are old enough to get out and see it themselves. The gore isn’t too crazy but there’s a surprising amount of sex/nudity.
Fair enough Jeff. I figured that was almost surely the case. Thank You.
I’m happy to hear that, Jeff, even though I have no interest in the remake. Not only is the sex-angle a classic aspect of these films and the entire genre, but typically pandering to a PG-13 audience causes the sex to be the first thing that’s watered down. So if they made this truly R-rated as opposed to PG-13, then good for them.
Just looked, and apparently I was also in a three-way tie for first in The Auteurs’ prediction contest, but no one’s contacted me about a $10,000 grand prize. Can’t find a link to the rules, though, so maybe only perfect scores qualify.
KB, it was totally Hathaway’s night when you look at it that way. She actually rescued the opening number for me and her response to the Tribunal of Elders was priceless.
Jeff. regarding F13, that actually kind of annoys me. As much as I disliked Zombie’s Halloween, as you say it at least established itself as something other than the original. But then, if you ask me, the F13 series has always been a crass cash-grab.
And Joel, I agree about the R-rating. Anything less would’ve robbed the franchise of what it stands for…such as it is.
WTG Jennybee!!!! You, miss, are the definition of awesomeness.
Pierre. So glad the t-shirt arrived. Sorry for the slight delay in getting it to you. I’m sure you cut a fine figure in it.
Sam. I liked Winslet in Reader quite a bit and as you know I liked the film better than Rev Road, but I do think her performance in the latter was morer gooderer. Nonetheless, as I said above, but the time it came around to giving out the statue, I was ready for her to win and happy for it. Her speech was one of the evening’s highlights.
My fav oscar moments: Hathaway, Pineapple Express, Penelope, Kate, Sean, Petit’s balancing act and best of all: Dustin Lance Black’s emotional acceptance speech.
Did I mention Jennybee is awesome??
Craig, is there really much of anything worth salvaging from the original Friday the 13th? It became a parody of itself a long time ago and the original concept, while effective back in the day through the first three movies, has been beaten into the ground by all the successive sequels.
I know horror purists are going to say it’s a classic, but I feel like the Friday the 13th franchise is one of the few out there where I have no real concern about a remake because essentially they’ve already done at least ten remakes or so already. Friday the 13th movies are more formulaic than the Godzilla pictures.
Speaking of bad horror remakes, aren’t they also remaking A Nightmare on Elm Street? *skulks away quietly*.
The Friday the 13th series is really a franchise that had no reason to exist in the first place – unlike Halloween or Texas Chainsaw or Dawn of the Dead, the original Friday the 13th is no classic – it’s a pretty dull, run-of-the-mill movie and it only persisted because of the cash value and a hungry studio. (Like the Saw series today).
So in a sense, for the new one to be repetitive and unoriginal is par for the course. That said, I still have dreams of some kind of platonic ideal summer camp/slasher movie that this one could have been if they had given a crap.
jennybee, I’ll give you my “I speak jive” t-shirt in exchange for my legwork on finding those rules to the Auteur contest — plus a percentage of your gross winnings.
Yes Joel (and Jeff) I agree. I think F13 has been a detriment to the genre. I say this as a non-Horror expert though and I know it has fans. Beyond sex and violence (which I don’t have a problem with), it doesn’t offer anything interesting.
As Jeff said though, there probably is an ideal summer camp/slasher movie to be made, one that takes the elements of the genre and riffs on them in an interesting way or makes them fresh again, but whoever is holding the purse strings of this thing isn’t interested in that.
also…yeah…Elm Street remake. No thanks….unless interesting people are involved and they have something to add to it.
Lol, Pierre. Much as I covet your Muze shirt, you can hang onto it. The site owners finally sent me a notice congratulating me of being a winner of their Oscar contest and awarding me and my two co-winners each an $18 “unlimited annual membership” to the site. As far as I can tell, the $10,000 was only for getting all of them right–a bit of a racket, considering you have to have at least a $6 membership to enter.
Jeez, being known as awesome hereabouts and elsewhere is worth more than $18!
btw, in case anyone missed Clooney’s appearance at the Oscar ceremony on Sunday here’s why he was absent. It was news to me anyway.
“a bit of a racket, considering you have to have at least a $6 membership to enter.”
That’s a bit of a letdown, jennybee. But then, you can’t put a price on Oscar. As you may know, even the Academy itself reserves first right of purchase should one become available. Actually, I remember going to The Auteur site but quickly and politely exited after learning they wanted my money, for Pete’s sake.
But you can’t by prestige, can you? When one has one’s finger on the “pulse of the Academy” — sociocultural thought leaders as they are — one inhabits a rarefied world of intellect, elegance and heightened taste.
The number of online contests seems to have dwindled this Oscar season, perhaps owing in part to the bad economy. In the past, there have been some opportunities to make more than a few pesos made possible by the predicting skills of a jennybee. Hopefully, in the not-so-distant future, the world will rise from the ashes and the salaries and benefits of such keen prognOscarcators will afford same to take post-award winnings to the Caribbean for some well-earned R&R while Karl Rove is tied up in a courtroom and Joe the Plumber has his face buried in a rusty toilet bowl.
Here’s a link to the online prediction contest, “Beat the Crowd,” which I’ve entered for two or three years now. This is not only free to enter, but a well-organized, fun event. This year’s winners — all three of ‘em — scored 22 of 24.
http://www.srmedia.com/BeatTheCrowd/crowdRank.html
Thanks for the link Alison. He’s always off somewhere working on a AIDS vaccine and what not.
I saw the Clooney segment when it first aired and really like to see high-profile celebrities assume roles such as this one — especially if they seem to know what they’re talking about. What makes this one even better is the receptive response Clooney got from Obama/Biden. This appears to be more than mere window dressing, which often has been the case with past presidents and their resident/pet celebrities.
One contrary example that comes to mind is Elvis Presley’s appearances with and in behalf of Richard Nixon for his administration’s anti-drug campaign, which in my opinion was rigidly judgmental, short-sighted and altogether off base. Knowing what we do now about Presley’s drug addictions, this peculiar alliance seems all-the-more paradoxical.
Jeez, that Clooney is a total jerk.
Aw Craig don’t be jealous.
Q: With regard to Kate WInslet …. has there ever been a bigger movie star who has had so few major box office successes? Basically, everyone has seen Titanic. Then she’s had a handful of middling box office earners (The Holiday, Finding Neverland, Sense and Sensibility) .The rest are arty stuff that mainly cineastes care about.
Maybe she’s not actually a big movie star. Great actress, yes, but not everybody can be a Meryl Streep.
Kate may not be Nicole Kidman, but I think K’s point is that Kate carries a lot of box office mojo of her own, she just chooses to use her powers (generally) for good rather than evil (evil in this case as not for making bad remakes and lame thrillers, in-between the Oscar bait).
She’s not opening Mama Mia, but she probably has no interest in it. Yet. She’s definitely considered a draw by studios though.