Aaron’s Oscars recap Huge night for Gravity. HUGE. It won on 7 of its 10 nominations (and the biggies of Director, Editing, Cinematography, Score). Cuaron is a favorite of mine, so this is nice to see his excellent work recognized. Top prize to 12 Years a Slave (further validation of Steve McQueen; now everyone, please rent or buy Hunger). 12YAS also won with Nyong’o winning Best Supporting Actress and Ridley winning Best Adapted Screenplay. Everything about Ridley said he was a writer (who probably doesn’t talk to other humans all that much). The boys toys were swept by the men of DBC, two of that movie’s three wins. I still haven’t seen this; hopefully it will come back around in theaters now. I wonder if Jared will show off his Oscar on tour. Interestingly, the Academy voters shared my view that almost everything in American Hustle was vastly overrated, gimmicky, and too cool for school; it went a remarkable 0-10 in its nominations. Absolutely no love also for Captain Phillips (6 noms), Nebraska (6 noms), or TWOWS (5 noms). I’m at least thankful for the latter. Marty didn’t tell a compelling story. I think its nominations were primarily out of respect for Marty. The Great Gatsby (a ho-hummer of a movie) was nominated for 2 design awards and won 2 design awards. So, a rather big night for Catherine Martin, who luckily has two hands. And finally, here are some things I learned. I learned that Cate Blanchett was from Australia. I learned that Spike Jonze has imaginary friends. I learned than Bill Murray looks like he did in Zombieland. I learned that Lupita Nyong’o was born in Mexico. So, between her and Cuaron, that country had a heckuva night. I learned that there is confusion regarding the definition of a “selfie.” Is a selfie attributed to the owner of the camera phone, the director of the photo, or the person who actually holds the camera phone and manually presses the button? Purists go with the latter. Thus, technically, Bradley Cooper’s selfie broke Twitter. I learned that Pink probably also should have sung Wind Beneath My Wings. (Is there anything worse than singers acting out the words in their songs?) I learned that The Moon Song was really more of a short jingle than an actual full-length song. I learned that when it comes to feature documentaries, it is best to be about American stuff than about stuff in other countries. I learned that I still don’t care much for the style and delivery of Ellen “The Female Jay Leno” DeGeneres; she’s about as bland as you get in comedy. It’s no wonder she’s really popular in the Midwest. Of course, she’s infinitely better than that squinty-eyed freak Seth MacFarlane. So, let her host next year; let’s just have her not try so hard with the pizzas and the twitpics; for a minute there, I got flashbacks of James Franco. I learned that Ridley and McQueen probably have a beef. As screenwriter and director respectively, neither thanked the other in their acceptance speeches, and neither physically showed much joy when the other was winning. I learned that many actors just can’t read teleprompters to save their lives. Nor pronounce other peoples’ names. And finally, I learned that the dope-smoking, bongo boy’s hero is some spectral, etherial version of himself 10 years hence. Not MLK. Not Gandhi. Heck, not even his dad. Nope, he worships a future version of himself, if only because the real version of himself 10 years in the past is too busy playing dopes in unintelligible rom-coms. I knew this guy was a bit too wrapped up with himself, but I didn’t realize it was that bad. Geez.
Posted on: Mon, 03 Mar 2014 15:25:59 +0000