We've been walking barefoot all summer.
This update comes at you live from glamorous Ardsley, New York.
Broken Lizard's Club Dread was kind of disappointing. If you've only seen the ads, you may wonder how this is possible, but Super Troopers and Puddle Cruiser were very funny. Dread is totally amusing-- it has laughs-- but it's even *more* slackly paced than Super Troopers. That was not the way to go, here. I will give it this: Super Troopers kinda petered out at the end, but the hardest I laughed at Club Dread was in the last bit of it.
Oscar predictions-- I have money on these for the first time ever, at my office. I say Rings for picture/director (splits have become more and more common over the past few years, but I really can't see what else could power through in either category), Depp for actor, Theron for actress, the Sand & Fog lady for supporting girl, Tim Robbins for supporting guy, Seabiscuit for adapted screenplay, and Lost in Translation for original.
Those are my predictions, not my favorites. Despite my gambling stance, I'd be very happy if Bill Murray won. He's basically the only chance for a great acceptance speech, unless A Mighty Wind wins for best song and Eugene Levy accepts in-character. And, despite my admiration and affection for Lost in Translation, I don't think it was an amazing script. But I'd like to see Sofia get an award, and she won't be the first woman to win best director. Well, actually, she might, but not this year. And if American Splendor wins adapted screenplay, I'll do flips.
There won't be a Rings sweep. It'll take maybe half of its nominations (so, yea, it'll win, uh, five and a half statues). Hardcore Oscar sweeps seem to be slowly but surely going out of style; since Titanic won an assload in 97/98, a few movies have hit the picture-director-screenplay thing (American Beauty, A Beautiful Mind) but a lot of 'em, even big ones, top out around 4 or 5 wins. It's like they nominate movies and then realize how indifferent they are to them. Then again, I think it makes it a hell of a lot more fun to watch, knowing no single movie will walk away with 8 or 10 awards.
I'm really disappointed in most of the techie nominations. Look, even if the Matrix movies disappointed the hell out of you, that doesn't mean Pirates of the Caribbean somehow had better effects work. And Seabiscuit deserves no kind of art direction or editing awards. Almost as if to mark the occasion of undeserving but "respectable" movies cleaning up in tech, Entertainment Weekly ran this idiotic article talking about the foolishness and embarassment of box office/critical bombs scoring nominations in the past. Obviously, there have been some mysterious choices across the board over the years. But this article was basically saying that it's ridiculous be nominated for Best Art Direction unless you're also some kind of middlebrow awards-bait movie already. They said something to the effect of "Sure, Toys had really good art direction, but come on! No one likes it!"
I know it doesn't really matter, but as someone who seriouslyhonestly appreciates good art direction or cinematography, that kind of snobbishness is pretty inexcuseable.
Shoutout to the weather this weekend, that was great.
Shoutout to KayBees for closing all over the place.
Broken Lizard's Club Dread was kind of disappointing. If you've only seen the ads, you may wonder how this is possible, but Super Troopers and Puddle Cruiser were very funny. Dread is totally amusing-- it has laughs-- but it's even *more* slackly paced than Super Troopers. That was not the way to go, here. I will give it this: Super Troopers kinda petered out at the end, but the hardest I laughed at Club Dread was in the last bit of it.
Oscar predictions-- I have money on these for the first time ever, at my office. I say Rings for picture/director (splits have become more and more common over the past few years, but I really can't see what else could power through in either category), Depp for actor, Theron for actress, the Sand & Fog lady for supporting girl, Tim Robbins for supporting guy, Seabiscuit for adapted screenplay, and Lost in Translation for original.
Those are my predictions, not my favorites. Despite my gambling stance, I'd be very happy if Bill Murray won. He's basically the only chance for a great acceptance speech, unless A Mighty Wind wins for best song and Eugene Levy accepts in-character. And, despite my admiration and affection for Lost in Translation, I don't think it was an amazing script. But I'd like to see Sofia get an award, and she won't be the first woman to win best director. Well, actually, she might, but not this year. And if American Splendor wins adapted screenplay, I'll do flips.
There won't be a Rings sweep. It'll take maybe half of its nominations (so, yea, it'll win, uh, five and a half statues). Hardcore Oscar sweeps seem to be slowly but surely going out of style; since Titanic won an assload in 97/98, a few movies have hit the picture-director-screenplay thing (American Beauty, A Beautiful Mind) but a lot of 'em, even big ones, top out around 4 or 5 wins. It's like they nominate movies and then realize how indifferent they are to them. Then again, I think it makes it a hell of a lot more fun to watch, knowing no single movie will walk away with 8 or 10 awards.
I'm really disappointed in most of the techie nominations. Look, even if the Matrix movies disappointed the hell out of you, that doesn't mean Pirates of the Caribbean somehow had better effects work. And Seabiscuit deserves no kind of art direction or editing awards. Almost as if to mark the occasion of undeserving but "respectable" movies cleaning up in tech, Entertainment Weekly ran this idiotic article talking about the foolishness and embarassment of box office/critical bombs scoring nominations in the past. Obviously, there have been some mysterious choices across the board over the years. But this article was basically saying that it's ridiculous be nominated for Best Art Direction unless you're also some kind of middlebrow awards-bait movie already. They said something to the effect of "Sure, Toys had really good art direction, but come on! No one likes it!"
I know it doesn't really matter, but as someone who seriouslyhonestly appreciates good art direction or cinematography, that kind of snobbishness is pretty inexcuseable.
Shoutout to the weather this weekend, that was great.
Shoutout to KayBees for closing all over the place.