Thoughts on the Oscars: 1)All of the wins were justified, I thought. 12 Years A Slave for Best Picture, Adapted Screenplay, and Supporting Actress? All well deserved. Gravity for Best Director as well as the technical categories? All well deserved. Her by Spike Jonze, aka the guy who should have won for Being John Malkovich,for Best Original Screenplay? Well-deserved and long overdue.Jared Leto and the guy playing up his Southern upbringing for the Actor categories? Well deserved. Still, I was disappointed that American Hustle didnt win even one, since it was a fun movie.Other than that, it was almost depressingly easy to pick the winners before they were announced. (Wouldnt you have loved to see a Best Makeup acceptance speech by the guy from Jackass:Bad Grandpa? Just the fact that it got a single nomination at all was enough to make me smile.) 2)WHY did the Academy think it was a good idea to let Ellen Degeneres host AGAIN? Im sorry, but she is simply NOT FUNNY. I can watch a half-hour of her on TV, but anything more than that is testing the audiences patience. As much as I bashed Seth MacFarlane hosting last year, at least I laughed a handful of times at his jokes, if not the opening monologue/number. He looks like a comedy TRAILBLAZER next to Ellen. Maybe he and Billy Crystal could host next year. 3)I want to give the academy credit for bringing back the old tradition of having performances of the Best Song nominees,along other ways of making the show better than usual. It was long overdue and a necessary part of the ceremony, I think. There seemed to be a more notable effort to cut the fat out of the show this year to make it more watchable, although there were a few unnecessary montages and sketches, such as bringing out a pizza guy to send into the audience, and some nonsense involving Twitter. I also want to commend the Academy for allowing the winners to give slightly longer acceptance speeches. I never understood why the Academy would rudely(and cruelly) cut off a speech given at the highlight moment of the winners career because the audience allegedly find it boring. If you insist on being so mean to the winners, dont then proceed to another unfunny and unnecessary sketch/pointless montage/musical number that doesnt even have ANYTHING to do with the Best Picture nominees( Ladies and Gentleman, the cast of Stomp pays tribute to 1980 Best Picture winner Ordinary People!) THAT bullshit has always bored audiences, not seeing some guy thank his junior high math teacher. 4)I want to commend the audience at the ceremony for showing class this year during the In Memoriam montage(one of of only a few that are actually necessary). I could hear some applause when Gandolfinis image started the montage, but otherwise the audience remained respectfully silent until it concluded with Philip Seymour Hoffman. In years past, I couldnt STAND watching the memorial tribute. It always pissed me off to see Hollywoods overfed and overpaid clapping wildly whenever some renowned actor of yesteryear was listed among the deceased, but sat silently at the face of some special effects artist or producer whose work might be just as influential, if not more so. Its vulgar, its disrespectful,and its one of those things that gives Hollywood its well-deserved negative reputation. Another good example would be the Free Roman Polanski! petition and the wagon-circling in defense of Woody Allen (when a lesser director would have been blacklisted on the spot for the allegations facing Allen), but those are separate issues for another rant. At least the audience at the 2014 Oscars had some dignity and self-awareness.(One last thought on the memorial segment: Although I admit there will always be a place in my heart for the song Wind Beneath My Wings, was it really necessary to bring out Bette Midler herself to perform it? Other than that song, I have never enjoyed her or found her amusing in any way. Can you name the last movie/TV show she was GOOD in? Neither can I. And I certainly dont give a shit about her uninformed rants on Twitter, no matter what Faux News thinks. Can yuppie boomer Hollywood stop pretending anyone is interested in her, Aaron Sorkin, Billy Joel, Whoopi Goldberg, or anyone else who belongs on a reality show instead of a major awards show?) 5) News flash, Hollywood: No one wants to hear you boo a Best Documentary nominee/winner because you think theyre too liberal. They did this to Michael Moore in 2003, and I could hear boos last night when nominee Dirty Wars(one of the most important documentaries of the decade) was announced, simply because its creator Jeremy Scahill(one of the best journalists alive today, thank you very little)gave the same criticisms of President Obama that he gave W. Bush. In other words, a journalist who judges a leader by their ACTIONS rather than words. I cant wait for a documentary about Elizabeth Warren to be made, to send the Hillary-loyalists of Hollywood(notice I didnt say Democrats) into conniption fits. Elizabeth Warren and Barbara Lee for President/Vice President in 2016! Thank you all for reading thus far.
Posted on: Mon, 03 Mar 2014 18:40:08 +0000
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