I've already dissed The People's Choice Awards. And I've ignored The Golden Globes (The self aggrandizement of the HFPA simply annoys me, so I don't generally bother.)
But now we've got the Oscars! Academy Award time is here. And I may no longer live in LA (and my Sunday paper no longer has the Calendar section on top) but damnit, I look forward to the Academy Awards!
It's funny, but this year's list of nominees doesn't have anything that leaps out at me as particularly surprising. The closest you might get is seeing Sideways nominated up there with the big guns like The Aviator, Ray, Million Dollar Baby & Finding Neverland, but with all the press it's gotten (and yes, the Golden Globe for Best Comedy) it's hardly surprising. (It is, however, a well deserved nomination.)
The Incredibles, sadly (but as expected), got relegated to the "Best Animated Feature" ghetto, but really, which of those five Best Picture nominees would you have bumped? Fahrenheit 9/11 & The Passion of the Christ caused nary a ripple (thankfully… I'm tired of the ranting on both sides of the aisle for these movies). And I can't think of a single nominee that wasn't talked about in one of the several magazines I've been reading as likely to get nominated. Even the girl from Maria Full of Grace doesn't count, since she was listed as the favored long-shot countless times.
I don't know whether this speaks to the quality of the films and people being nominated (they were all so obviously exemplary that you'd be a fool to not notice them?) or an indictment of the Academy for somehow playing it safe. But right now, the biggest surprise shaping up for awards night would be seeing Martin Scorcese snubbed once again. And that would be just criminal. (Although, the fact that the DGA bumped him in favor of Clint can't bode well!)
Now, right on the heels of the announcement of Academy Awards nominations come the Razzies. The Razzies are fun, simply because they like to poke fun at awards season and mock everyone by pointing out the potentially worst films of the year. Usually this degenerates into picking on the most obvious/popular choices for worst movie/performance of the year, but they're still amusing.
This year's no real exception, with Halle Berry's Catwoman and Oliver Stone's Alexander in a race to the bottom and Ben Stiller getting nominated for every single performance of the year (this guy's working almost as much as Jude Law).
But, interestingly, this year's Razzie nominations are almost as predictable as this year's Oscar nominations were obvious. Who couldn't see Catwoman getting the most noms this time? And Alexander? (Stone's an interesting director, but from everything I've heard, he really missed the mark on this one.) But they're high-profile flops just begging to get slapped around.
Probably the biggest surprise to me is that Chronicles of Riddick managed to avoid too much attention. True, Vin Diesel got a nomination for worst actor of the year, but hey, talk about easy targets! I'm not disappointed it didn't get smacked around more… I actually thought there was a pretty good story potentially buried under this somewhat clunky movie. I'm just surprised it didn't get picked on more.
Oh well, it should still be fun to watch, come awards night. And we still can look forward to seeing whether Catwoman trumps Alexander. And hey, who knows… Surviving Christmas or White Chicks could pull a surprise "win" and trump 'em both!
Oh yeah, and I'm looking forward to seeing who wins the Oscars too.
But now we've got the Oscars! Academy Award time is here. And I may no longer live in LA (and my Sunday paper no longer has the Calendar section on top) but damnit, I look forward to the Academy Awards!
It's funny, but this year's list of nominees doesn't have anything that leaps out at me as particularly surprising. The closest you might get is seeing Sideways nominated up there with the big guns like The Aviator, Ray, Million Dollar Baby & Finding Neverland, but with all the press it's gotten (and yes, the Golden Globe for Best Comedy) it's hardly surprising. (It is, however, a well deserved nomination.)
The Incredibles, sadly (but as expected), got relegated to the "Best Animated Feature" ghetto, but really, which of those five Best Picture nominees would you have bumped? Fahrenheit 9/11 & The Passion of the Christ caused nary a ripple (thankfully… I'm tired of the ranting on both sides of the aisle for these movies). And I can't think of a single nominee that wasn't talked about in one of the several magazines I've been reading as likely to get nominated. Even the girl from Maria Full of Grace doesn't count, since she was listed as the favored long-shot countless times.
I don't know whether this speaks to the quality of the films and people being nominated (they were all so obviously exemplary that you'd be a fool to not notice them?) or an indictment of the Academy for somehow playing it safe. But right now, the biggest surprise shaping up for awards night would be seeing Martin Scorcese snubbed once again. And that would be just criminal. (Although, the fact that the DGA bumped him in favor of Clint can't bode well!)
Now, right on the heels of the announcement of Academy Awards nominations come the Razzies. The Razzies are fun, simply because they like to poke fun at awards season and mock everyone by pointing out the potentially worst films of the year. Usually this degenerates into picking on the most obvious/popular choices for worst movie/performance of the year, but they're still amusing.
This year's no real exception, with Halle Berry's Catwoman and Oliver Stone's Alexander in a race to the bottom and Ben Stiller getting nominated for every single performance of the year (this guy's working almost as much as Jude Law).
But, interestingly, this year's Razzie nominations are almost as predictable as this year's Oscar nominations were obvious. Who couldn't see Catwoman getting the most noms this time? And Alexander? (Stone's an interesting director, but from everything I've heard, he really missed the mark on this one.) But they're high-profile flops just begging to get slapped around.
Probably the biggest surprise to me is that Chronicles of Riddick managed to avoid too much attention. True, Vin Diesel got a nomination for worst actor of the year, but hey, talk about easy targets! I'm not disappointed it didn't get smacked around more… I actually thought there was a pretty good story potentially buried under this somewhat clunky movie. I'm just surprised it didn't get picked on more.
Oh well, it should still be fun to watch, come awards night. And we still can look forward to seeing whether Catwoman trumps Alexander. And hey, who knows… Surviving Christmas or White Chicks could pull a surprise "win" and trump 'em both!
Oh yeah, and I'm looking forward to seeing who wins the Oscars too.
Comments