All Right

Which jackasses actually voted for Tom Hooper over David Fincher? Stand up and admit your complete lack of taste, please.

Fuck you, AMPAS. Your attempts to get more "hip" this year fell flat as usual and the Golden Globes actually made better picks than you did.

Oscar Oscar Oscar!

Last year I was really excited for the Oscars because I didn't have a life at the time. It was right before spring break, everything felt drab and gray, and the days were just an endless cycle of ennui, work, and an occasional senior-fueled spat with the administration.

So the fact that I am anticipating the Oscars this year with only mild eagerness is a sign of progress, I think. I'm looking forward more to visiting a dear friend at her college and getting trashed with her for the first time (she was more uptight about drinking in high school).

And if anything, this has been one of the least exciting Oscar seasons I can recall. I blame the blogosphere for dissecting the race down to every last calibration to the point that any "surprises" that occur have already been predicted in advance. Even with the mild spouts of drama (The Melissa Leo thing, in which Leo will henceforth be referred to as a noun other than the person, as in "pulling a Melissa Leo"), the sudden "The King's Speech" switchabout, the snubs (my poor Andrew - stop saying that, why do I always feel so possessively protective of him? It's the vulnerable Bambi thing he has going on, probs) and happy nomination surprises (Hawkes and Weaver), the Fincher-Hooper showdown, the marvelous HBC speech - everything's been handled with grace, I feel. But I thought this would be a nice last time to give tribute to the 10 BP nominations. Randomly unfiltered, vaguely nonsensical.

BEST PICTURE COMPETITION

The American Rebel

The Royalty Porn/Feel-Good

The Underdog

Ordinary Man in Extraordinary Circumstances/Directorial Vehicle

The Indie Hit

The Family Drama

Pixar - Toy Story 3

The Blockbuster

The Spectacle/Thriller

The Western

LAST YEAR, my Oscar crushes were Kathryn Bigelow, Colin Firth, Anna Kendrick, Jeremy Renner, and Christoph Waltz. By crushes I mean I googled constantly without shame, youtubed them and gossiped about them and wondered about their respective futures.

THIS YEAR, my Oscar crushes were Annette Bening, Colin Firth (rewatched Valmont again the othe rnight), Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, David Fincher, and HBC doesnt count becuase everyone is always obsessed with her anyways or at least they should be. I also became a fan of Amy Adams and Nicole Kidman via Oscar roundtables for the first time. They're both a lot more self-deprecating, charming, funny, and surprisingly non-fussy than I would have expected. Before, I thought Amy Adams was kind of bland and Nicole Kidman a self-absorbed diva, but they've only spoken intelligently and thoughtfully, and been sweetly low-profile throughout this period of incessant self-promotion.

MY FINAL PREDICTIONS:

Best Supporting Actor: Christian Bale

Best Animated Feature: Toy Story 3

Best Original Song: "We Belong Together" Randy Newman

Best Original Screenplay: The King's Speech

Best Animated Short: TBH, I don't have a damn clue. Fail, I know.

Best Documentary Short: Ditto

Best Live-Action Short: I don't even know the nominees.

Best Adapted Screenplay: The Social Network

Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo

Best Makeup: Barney's Version?

Best Costume: Alice in Wonderland

Best Sound Mixing: Inception

Best Sound Editing: Inception

Best Cinematography: True Grit

Best Original Score: The Social Network

Best Visual Effects: Inception

Best Documentary Feature: Restrepo

Best Editing: The Social Network

Best Foreign Language Film: Incendies

Best Actress: Natalie Portman

Best Actor: Colin Firth

Best Director: David Fincher, The Social Network

Best Picture: The King's Speech

Oscar viewing party food suggestions: Sushi, appletinis (The Social Network), frosted cake (Black Swan, The Fighter),beef kabobs (Winter's Bone - not same as squirrel, but oh well), anything organic-y - hummus, fruit smoothies, heirloom tomato hor d'oeuvres (TKAAR), trail mix (127 hours), tea sandwiches (The King's Speech).

Singing Baby Jesse Eisenberg

Oh god. I died laughing, in a sweet way.

Everyone just died knowing that Colin Firth is just as romantic as Mr. Darcy is.

Six Degrees of Award Circuits

It's just an aspect of my voyeuristic actorphilic self that I always enjoy making little connections betwen actors and stringing pieces of random/useless trivia together. Whenever I watch a big actors' event, my brain inevitably starts to buzzing "I wonder what said actor thinks of other actor?" "Have they met each other?" "They worked together on ___ and they're reunited! Holy shit!"

This year's "people of the hour" group has a lot of old-timers, so I had such glorious fun spotting the connections and remembering how they all know each other in one giant actor-cest circle.

Christian Bale actually has the most ties at these award shows, despite being seen as more of an outsider. He's worked with Nicole Kidman in 1995's "Portrait of a Lady". And of course, he and Christopher Nolan are one of the best Hollywood duets, even if it's quite ironic that their best-reviewed work was not with each other. He also used to be a good friend of Winona Ryder, who's been everywhere (fun fact: his wife was Winona's assistant before they got married! They met at a BBQ Winona was throwing) and I wonder if she was at the Golden Globes because Depp was there, and do they ever have awkward run-ins? Or maybe they're just all chill about it, like "let's pretend we weren't actually madly in love for years and you didn't used to have a tattoo of my name and you were not, in fact, my 'first everything'. Cool." Bale must also be seeing a lot of his "I'm Not There" costar Julianne Moore and fellow "Little Women" Claire Danes (who won awards endlessly for Temple Grandin) at these events, and be happy for Lisa Cholodenko who directed him in "Laurel Canyon". Oh, and lastly it's a shame Bale wasn't at the BAFTAS because Miranda Richardson was a nominee and of course, they worked together in his legendary debut film, Empire of the Sun. He really has worked with a lot of people, having been around for 20 years. I wonder what Richardson thinks of her growed up young costar.

A bit bizarrely, Natalie Portman and Annette Bening were both in "Mars Attack!" (I don't remember who they played at all) and she was also in "Cold Mountain" with Kidman.

Tom Hooper, despite being kind of a Hollywood newbie, still probably sees tons of friendly faces at these award circuits from his great TV work, like Paul Giamatti from "John Adams" and Barbara Hershey and Hugh Dancy from "Daniel Deronda" (I'm a fan of both, especially 'Daniel Deronda" - it's sensual, grandly moving and perfect for a rainy Saturday).

Maestro David Fincher knows a lot of people, obvs., like fellow Oscar nominee and "Fight Club" alum Helena Bonham-Carter (I love both of them so much), and has directed Mark Ruffalo, and "somewhat" directed Nicole Kidman (she was originally cast in "Panic Room" but backed out from a busted knee and made a voice cameo instead).

Just at the Golden Globes alone, it was cool that Johnny Depp was nominated (even if the nom was a completely facetious one) because he was nominated along with his "Pirates" co-star Geoffrey Rush and obvs. HBC since they and Tim Burton complete a robust triangle of weirdo-love. Speaking of Colin Firth, "The King's Speech" will be the second Best Picture-winning movie he's been in that also has Geoffrey Rush - they were both in "Shakespeare in Love" and most impressively, this is actually Firth's third BP winner - he was also in "The English Patient". So both he and Ralph Fiennes have three BP Oscar winners under their belt. Can we call up the stats for that? Who else has done that?. Um, according to Wikipedia, a lot. But still impressive! Best of all, I discovered a few months ago that Firth starred opposite Annette Bening in 1986's "Valmont", an adaptation of Les Liaisons dangereuses, which so surprised me that I watched the whole thing on instant Netflix. God, they were so YOUNG! And oh so beautiful. I highly recommend that one as well. If only Bening could win....it'd be so cool for the both of them.

Firth and Bening being period-wear sexy in "Valmont"

Mark Ruffalo and Michelle Williams were both in Shutter Island. You would have thought that their Oscar-nominated performances would have come from that movie.

Javier Bardem is nominated with The Coen Brothers who directed his Oscar-winning performance in No Country, of course.

Oddly enough, Jeff Bridges, despite having the longest career in the group, has no connections to any of the nominees, except the the Coen Bros.

JANE EYRE FIRST CLIPS ARE HERE

My ovaries did backflips while watching these clips. The clips are fucking. hot. This is my idea of porn, basically.

The first is after Jane saves Rochester from the fire. One of my favorite scenes from the book and it's a bit altered but OH SO SHMEXY (though my friend disagrees, calling it sinister, but what the hell does she know?) When she leaves him, I was like "FOOL" but of course, hers is the smarter move. Not that she planned it - she's just naturally good and morally upright - but it's still a smart tactic that can be employed in any modern romantic situation. It makes her so that much more tantalizing to Rochester (and respected by him too, of course). Men enjoy chases and stubborn girls.

"I am cold"[/But my insides are melting with steamy, scintillating desire]

Mr. Rochester proposes to Jane. Wow, this is a huge clip to show beforehand, obviously, but I guess they want to stir up as much interest as possible.

Mia's delivery is a bit stiff here. At times she *kinda* feels like she's reading off a page, which is disappointing, but overall it's effective. The Rochester voice is JUST PERFECT! Sigh. I like their chemistry. Gawsh I wanna see them make out.

Cousin Diana shows one of Jane's drawings to St. John.

Jamie BELL! Man it looks like he totally nails the whole repressed proper English thing. His voice is also schmexy (TOO MUCH SEXY IN THIS MOVIE!) and he kind of reminds of Christian Bale when he was thirteen, if that makes sense at all. Either way, he is really attractive in this video and I've never found Jamie Bell attractive. Which is important because he needs to be a strong foil to Rochester and though it never occurred to me while reading the book, the audience should feel some tension around the pair and suspect the potential of their relationship just alighting from the fact that they're both young, good-looking, and in close proximity, which is what Rochester does after he learns of St. John.

A month to go....can't wait.

2011: A Whiff of Hope

Well, Oscar season is far from over and I still have multitudinous tumultuous Oscar rants to rage about, but for now I'm looking ahead to 2011 in film.

Even if I've come to the realization that mediocre superhero flicks and trashy princess fairy tale live-action "interpretations" (aka Twilightfied) will saturate the movie market for the next, oh, twenty five years, there are always still glimmers of hope to be found.

Feb. 11: The Eagle - Channing Tatum, Jamie Bell

What? Don't judge me. Most likely it will end up being this year's "Clash of the Titans" (at least, just as funny and not as boring), but maybe it will be the best guilty pleasure of 2011. And that to me is just as wonderful as any movie plied with Oscars.

March 11: Jane Eyre - Mia Wasikowska, Michael Fassbender

OH MY GOD. I JUST CAN'T WAIT. Have already done my fair share of obsessive pre-conjuncturing.

May 27: The Tree of Life - Sean Penn, Brad Pitt (or the other way around?)

Well obviously even if we get redundant rhapsodizing of sheer nonsense from Malick, I'm just happy just to be bombarded by his sublime montages.

June 10: Super 8 - JJ Abrams (is always the real star of his movies)

It just looks real cool, is all. A bit of nostalgic Spielberg-feeling. I like the fact that Kyle Chandler is in it, though ENOUGH WITH THE ELLE FANNING. Child stars get overexposure like no other, and right now there are like, twelve. I haven't even seen "Somewhere" and even I'm sick of seeing her everywhere. She's supposedly modeling for Rodarte or something equally preposterous precocious.

July 15: Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows: Part II

I hope that this will be as haunted and self-assured as its companion piece, and I know that I will have a major breakdown after the movie fades to credits and the full realization that my childhood Harry Potter is over, really over, hits me at last. Just me and every late teen/young adult, just blubbering incessantly and weeping inconsolably. All beautiful things have to come to an end. For the time in my life, I'll feel the full impact of the words, "they'll never understand what it was like". OK shut up now. Pull it together til July, dammit!

Nov: Twilight - JUST KIDDING. FUCK THAT SHIT. Wow 2011 is going to be an emotionally unstable one for me when it comes to the movies...

Dec 21: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo - Rooney Mara

(Trailer TBD????)

Fincher Fincher Fincher Fincher Fincher

Possibles: War Horse, The Adventures of Tintin, Hugo Cabret, Arthur, X-Men: First Class, Your Highness

Looking back at my 2010 list of anticipated movies, I realize that a third of the movies I never saw on that list and a third of them didn't even come out. And that was in April. Making a list at this time of the year is starting to feel futile.