Godzilla Minus One

 A nice day has been forecasted and I'm going to enjoy those mid 80s (F) temps.  If the long range forecast is accurate, our summer's going to be not too hot, and not too cold, pretty much like the porridge Goldilocks liked that was just right.

Yesterday work was bothersome.  I had partially completed their design when I was called over to mix paint so the supervisor could get a lunch break, so I turned it over to an associate who's much better with designing blinds then I am.  He was not exactly happy with this, since he's isn't going to get credit for the sale.  For that matter, neither am I.  There used to be a time when changing a design would net you some of the sales.  Not any more.  Well, this couple went home, and then returned 20 minutes before I was scheduled to leave, and since there's no way I was going to stay past my scheduled time, I turned them over to him again.  This like this are irritating.  I felt bad for him, since he was going to end up spending hours with them.

I watched Godzilla Minus One last evening, it's on Netflix, and was pleasantly surprised.  I'd heard it was good, and I've always liked Godzilla movies.  Then, to be perfectly honest, I've always like monster movies, but the directors took a different approach with this one.  It's focused on just a few individuals, rather than the destruction of Tokyo.  It was the first Godzilla film to win an Academy Award.  

I saw that Elon Musk has had the policies changed on Zitter (if that's how it's pronounced) clearing the way for porn.  While pornophiles may be cheering, keep in mind that it once used to be a legitimate platform of news, with porn on the side.  Now legitimate news has fled to other platforms, including Threads, and Elon's got to make money some way.  Unfortunately, I suspect this will end up being bad for porn, because Zitter seems to have mounting problems just like his other businesses, and like other flailing billionaires, Musk will have to put the blame somewhere, rather than admit to his own incompetence. 

And Hunter Biden's jury was selected yesterday.  My personal feeling is that he 's going to be found guilty.  He did something stupid, and while he's going to try and blame it on his problem with drugs, that can't be used for an excuse. This is how it is.  

Katie Britt Lied

 Hello to later hours!  For the next... oh, so many months, the sun will not set in the evening until I am home from work.  I like that.  As we age, driving at night can be a bit of a bother, especially in drenching rainstorm like we had last evening.  Wowza!  Did we get rain!  Well over an inch fell soaking in and nourishing the roots of all my bulbs, and tubers,  and bushes.  I have tulips sprouting out all over the place, and after this week they're going to pop even more because start on Tuesday, our daily temps are going to be hitting the low 70s (F).  Will summer be a scorcher?

Retail was slow because of the constant rain, which occasionally reached deluge status.  You know it's heavy when you can hear it pounding on the roof of the brick and mortar, orange home improvement retailer I work for on weekends.  Yesterday, you could hear it pounding!

Because I do work today there will be no rowing, slow running, or cycling today.  Not only the times change, the Oscars are tonight, at a new time.  7 P.M. rather than their normal 8 P.M.  On Sunday, I work 10:30 - 7:00, so a change was necessary.  Last Monday, I asked if I could come in early in order to leave early, and got the approval.  So, I'll be leaving the house at 0930 this morning, or perhaps a little earlier.  Sometimes, we gotta do what we gotta do.  

As expected, I will be watching the Oscars this evening, the only award show I watch.  I know who'd I'd like to see win, and who will probably win.  Ryan Gosling, for example, without his performance Barbie would have been just another comedy, however I think the Oscar will go to Robert Downey, Jr..  I don't think Oppenheimer will walk away with everything, there were just too many very good films this year.  I can see costumes and set design going to Poor Things.  Joy Da'Vine probably has a lock on the Best Supporting Actress for The Holdovers.  Adapted Screenplay is anybody's guess, it could go to either Oppenheimer, Poor Things, or Barbie.  Tonight should be very entertaining.

And, to no one's surprise, it turns out that Katie Britt lied about the sex trafficking victim.  She didn't have a chat with the victim, Katie met her when Katie was part of a 3 senator round table 2 years ago.  And that sex trafficking?  That happened while George W was president, down in Mexico City.  Conservatives have zero ethics, they will lie about anything and everything to try and stay in power.  Her spokesperson admitted this, but, as was expected, said Biden was to blame because.... Republicans need to blame him for something.

And now, for a commercial break

Today is the first of 3 days off in a row for me.  You could say I am pleasantly happy.
The Oscars are on tonight... (sorry, next week).  I'll watch.  I go to a lot of movies.  There is no host, which should make the ceremony interesting.  The Academy tried to shorten the show by announcing certain awards were to be given out during commercial breaks.  After a lot of loud complaining, that's not going to happen.  So, what makes the show run long?  Here are 3 suggestions they should consider if they want to shorten the run time:

#3.  Don't seat nominees at the back of the auditorium.  When 4 people win for Best Documentary, they wait in the aisle until everyone is out of the row.  Then together, they all walk down to the stage (nobody runs at the Oscars).

#2.  Eliminate the long acceptance speeches.  Winners feel the need to thank everybody.  Unfortunately for them, nobody cares who helped them on their long, struggling path to success.  Sometimes they ramble on.. and on... and on.  Remember McConaughey?  He won for a film whose title is pretty much forgotten by just about everybody.  His career was going nowhere before the win, and since has been approaching the death spiral zone.

#1.  Cut the commercials since they take up the most amount of time.  The Academy has decided they don't want to financially break even with the telecast, they want to make money.  This means there's an award followed by 3 minutes of commercials.  There are 24 awards and there are commercial breaks after 23 of them.  Someone introduces a film clip from a nominated film... and then there's a commercial break.  We hear a nominated song... and there's a commercial break.  When you have over 72 minutes of commercial breaks in a broadcast scheduled to run 3 hours, you have a problem.  The fact that they even considered giving awards out during commercial breaks is one of the definitions of failure.  People watch to see the awards, not 25 minutes celebrating the wonderment of Samsung.  What do I do during those aggravating mini-intermissions?  Usually taking a leak, or getting another glass of wine, or both.

Finally, I'm going to touch briefly on the Jussie Smollet problem, and it is a problem.  If you read this blog, you know I sat silent while everybody was jumping aboard the Jussie train.  I'm the cynic, remember?  Personally, I thought the whole thing sounded sketchy right from the beginning: a black celebrity, walking alone on a secluded street in the early morning hours gets attacked by white racists.  These things do happen, and they are ugly, and people get killed.  If the police are correct and this thing was staged, Jussie Smollet is a terrible man who took advantage of the sympathy of millions of human beings.

The fading relevancy of the Oscars

Well, the Oscar nominations are out next week.  I used to get excited, taking off the morning of the nominations and the day after the broadcast, that was when I saw a lot of movies.  I still go see a lot of movies, but there's not so much excitement over the Oscar festivities and it wasn't until I read an article in the NYT a week or so back that I full understood why that is; it's all about relevancy.  Have the Oscars become irrelevant?  Sure, it's a big night for Hollywood, but when it's all said and done, does anybody really care who wins?  I don't understand why anybody would want to give an award to a film nobody sees.  Case in point:  Neil Patrick Harris ran around in 2 pairs of tighty whities last year in what was supposed to be a good humored jab at "Birdman."  Nobody got the joke because nobody saw the movie, well, that's not totally correct.  Some people paid money to go see it, there just weren't that many.  In fact, "Star Wars:  The Force Awakens" made $15 million more in it's advanced Thursday showings then "Birdman's" total domestic gross through out it's entire run.  Now, there's some irrelevancy for you.
The sad truth of the matter is that the Oscar voters are desperately attempting to prove they have artistic integrity... and nobody cares.  Artsie fartsie is fine for film festivals, in fact, that's why people go to them unfortunately the majority of the movie going public doesn't really care about artsie fartsie.  Anyway, I've been thinking that perhaps the Academy should come up with another award and give it to the best artsie fartsie film.  That way they could give an award to the Best Documentary, Best Foreign Language, Best Artsie Fartsie, and save the Best Picture Award for the Best Picture.  Who cares if you get an award for a move nobody has any desire to go see?

Now, I know there are people out there who are going to complain "hey, I saw 'Birdman' and it was great."  Yeah, you and 4 million other people, 35 million people went to see "American Sniper."  So, if "Birdman" was so good, why didn't 38 million plunk down their $10 bucks for that film?  But then "American Sniper" isn't artsie fartsie, is it?  And that's what counts.  

 

Producer's failure

There's a lot of finger pointing going on right now regarding the film "Selma," and its failure to garner more then one Oscar nomination.  Personally, I feel those fingers should be directed at the producers for bungling the timing of the release so terribly.  Last year saw 2 films with black casts receive multiple nominations, of course "The Butler" was released in the spring and "10 Years a Slave" in late August, which gave them months to generate good 'press.'  This was not the case with "Selma," which was released to 19 theaters on 12/16, expanding to 22 theaters for the first week in January, a time when its Box Office actually declined.  The Box Office did pick up on 1/9 when the film was released nationally, but by then most of the Academy voters had already sent in their nominations.  Another issue compounding the last release mistake was the fact that DVD's of the film were not sent to Academy voters ahead of time.  The producer's excuse was that the film was released too late for them to do that.  What were they thinking?

There was a time when many of the nominated films were released late in the year, mostly because the studios wanted to make sure they remained fresh in the voter's minds.  Then a little movie called "The Silence of the Lambs," which was released on Valentines day in 1991, went on to sweep the Grand Prix of Oscars (Actor, Actress, Director & Film).  It proved that memorable films, those which truly merit awards, are not easily forgotten.  And, of course, this doesn't mean films released late don't get nominated, look at "Into the Woods" and "Unbroken," however it does indicate that if you release late in the year, you need to go deep and wide into the nation.  Twenty two theaters isn't going to get you squat.  The movie industry waits for no one.  It is constantly moving forward, because even now there are people thinking of next year's awards.

Ego at the Oscars - McConaughey fails

I like watching the Academy Awards.  For years I would host small parties where friends and I would gather around the TV rooting for our favorites and booing at those winners we didn't like.  Times have changed and I now I usually sit watching the awards nodding my head with approval when some deserving film wins awards.  Most of the time I enjoy listening to the winner's speeches since they actually do tell you a little bit about the person behind the performance.  This year, however, I was a little stunned by Matthew McConaughey's speech.

As I listened to the words fall out of his mouth, I couldn't help but wonder "is this guy for real?"  So I was not surprised the next day when others, writing about the awards, called it bizarre.  One said it was "pure McConaughey."

  I also started to see a lot of angst flying around the Internet because he had failed to mention AIDS, which soon turned to irritation and anger.  The LGBT community had supported this film from day one and he didn't even give them a nod.  First of all, those complainers need to understand he didn't accept the part in "Dallas Buyer's Club" because he was a great humanitarian who felt he needed to shine a bright light on the early days of the AIDS epidemic.  He took that role because he wanted to win an Oscar.  Why do you think he lost so much weight?  To bring realism to the part?  Hell no, he wanted to win an Oscar.  Unfortunately the LGBT community made the sad assumption he took on this role because his heart was in the right place.  They failed to understand this was all about ego and nothing else.  That was made perfectly clear in his "pure McConaughey" acceptance speech.

In fact, I suspect he has some serious ego issues and working with him is going to become very difficult.  It wouldn't surprise me if from now on, if it's not done his way, it doesn't get done... at all.

Aren't I just too precious?

Too often people take characteristics of their favorite actor's screen persona's and apply them to real life.  Quite a few, no doubt, have made the assumption Matthew McConaughey is an easy going guy in real life.  Me?  I think he's pretty self-centered.  If you're not with him, you're against him.  From what I've read, he's still good friends with Lance Armstrong, whose character is reprehensible at best.  You know what they say about birds of a feather?  They stick together.  Still, you would have thought he would have had enough sense to keep from rambling on about his 'old man' and 'light beer.'  He sounded too much like an actor who really doesn't give a shit about anything but himself.

Stinko Man of the Year - Bruce Broughton

As someone who likes movies, I always make an attempt to watch the Academy Awards.  I think last evening's telecast was better then most.  Not only will it be remembered for the winners but also for the 'selfie' sent round the world... and the pizza delivery guy.  Who ever would have thought you'd see Brad Pitt handing out paper plates, or Kevin Spacey handing out paper napkins.  This was the first ceremony in which the actors, even those who didn't win, seemed to be having a good time, as though it really was a celebration of film and not death match competition.  I felt a little sorry for those who felt "Gravity" should have won Best Film but they should understand it is a work of science Fiction, a genre which never wins.  The one thing I did find curious was Best Song category, I'd thought they'd nominated five not four.  Surprisingly, there had been 5 Best Songs nominated but one nomination was revoked.  Curiosity demanded I do a little research.

The song which had its nomination pinched was by a composer name Bruce Broughton, lyrics by some guy named Spiegel.  It seems that for 9 years, from 2003 to 2012, Mr. Broughton was a Governor of the music branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences - the group which votes on the songs which get nominated, and he is still on the Executive Committee of that group.  There are 239 members of this branch, that number is important.  Since there were 5 songs nominated, a song needed to get at least 48 votes in order to get a nomination.  The songs are sent on a compilation DVD to the voting members with no information as to writer, composer, or lyricist in order for them to be reviewed solely on the merits of the song.  Broughton sent emails identifying his song and asking voters take it into consideration.  How many emails did he send?  About seventy, he claims, and he only needed 48 votes to garner a nomination.  Perhaps this is how a song which no one had heard of, from a movie which only made $134,000 on it's release, managed to get a nomination.

Stinko Man of the Year!

Because this guy wanted to win an Academy Award for Best Song he pretty much shit away his moral ethics.  According to him he wasn't using his influence as a former Governor and still current Executive Committee Member to insure his song would get enough votes.  That's horse shit.  He knew exactly what he was doing.  True, as he points out, there is no specific rule that forbids actions such as his, but that's the kind of argument you hear from someone who is morally corrupt.  For him, the only thing that counted was getting the award.  Since he is on the branch which compiles the songs the voters get to preview, one can only wonder if his dirty little fingers were stinking around in there as well.  And, if the Academy hadn't revoked his nomination, one can only what kind of influence he might have smacked around during the actual voting for the award.  In case you haven't realized it, I think Bruce Broughton is pretty much of a scumbag.  If he gets any award it should be for Stinko Man of the Year.

Oscar nominations - no snubs just sour grapes

The Academy Award nominations were revealed yesterday morning and true to form, for me, I slept in and didn't check them out until yesterday afternoon.  Now, don't get me wrong, I like the Oscars, in fact it is the only award show I ever watch.  It's always interesting to see actually gets nominated.  A lot of people out there don't realize how much money is spent to get an invite to the party, so to speak.  Voting members of the Academy are hit with an avalanche of PR.  Some times it works, some times it doesn't, and when it doesn't one of the first words to be spoken with bitter chagrin is 'snub.'  Every year we hear this whine from stupid people who don't know the definition of the word.  What they really should be saying is "I'm a bad sport and I'm pissed."

Webster defines 'snub' as "to treat with disdain or contempt especially by ignoring."  Notice, the emphasis is on either 'disdain' or 'contempt,' not 'ignore.'  If you think the voting members of the Academy think Tom Hanks is contemptible and that's why they didn't nominate him you've got your head up your ass.   Hollywood loves Tom Hanks, most of his films tend to make money.  They don't look at him disdainfully, they think he's a nice guy.  The simple truth is when the votes were tallied to nominate Best Actors, five other people had more votes then he.  There's no snub there.

The sad truth is most people don't know who the nomination process works.  Here it is simplified:  Actors nominate actors, writers nominate writers, directors nominate directors, and so on and so forth.  Every body gets to vote for the Best Film nomination.  There are a lot of names, the one actors is several pages long.  Everyone who is eligible is on that ballot, even Johnny Depp.  That's right, if you were a voting member of the Academy and you wanted to, you could give Johnny a vote in the Best Actor category for his stunning performance in "The Lone Ranger."  You can be he gave himself a vote.

So when the Nominations are revealed and you hear some one claim to have been snubbed, or people whine that a certain film was snubbed, you have to remember this nothing more then shitty sour grapes.  Remember the shit storm of sour grapes Leonardo Di Caprio threw when he didn't get a nomination for Titanic?  He was so upset at not getting nominated he publicly announced he wasn't going to be attending the ceremony.  Like... did he think they really cared?

Oscar Nominations: beating the hell out of snub

So, the Oscar nominations came out yesterday and once again there are a slew of complaints of potential nominees being either overlooked or snubbed.  I always have to laugh at these since most of the whiners simply have problem dealing with the number issues.  There are only so many votes to go around.  Just because your favorite doesn't get enough votes to receive a nomination doesn't mean he was snubbed.  To snub someone to to purposefully stop that person in his tracks because you don't like that person.  By any other name, snubbing is just being rude, or possibly hateful, or maybe viciously angry.  "Lincoln" received twelve nominations, had it only received eleven, with no nod to Spielberg, that would have to be considered a snub.  People need to understand the Academy nominates ten films but only five directors so that means five directors are going to get the shitty end of the stick.  Are they being snubbed?  Hell no, they just got less votes then the five who were nominated.  The truth is people don't want to be considered losers so rather then admit to that they take a bat and beat the hell out of the 'snub.'

One of the biggest and loudest whiners of all time was Leonardo Di Caprio when he failed to get a nomination for "Titanic."  His problem was he believed his own press, that all those millions of people going to see the film did so because of the love story.  This is pure horse shit.  The world loves disasters and Hollywood understands this quite well; they've been making mega bucks off of them for years.  I went to see "Titanic" with a date and I can tell you, walking out of the theater afterwards, we were not having a heart to heart conversation about the love story.  Hell no, we were talking about how neat it was to watch that ship sink.  Of course no one would ever want to admit that, so the love story became the hook.  Watch the movie again and you'll realize how wooden Di Caprio's performance really is.  He didn't get a nomination because the real star of the movie was the Titanic itself, not him.

Clint Eastwood complained that he'd been hobbited by Peter Jackson's win for "Return of the King."  Only a man who talks to chairs would have failed to realize Jackson got the Oscar for directing a 17 hour (if you count the extended version) magnum opus.  Still, for Eastwood it was a snub.  

Last year Meryl Streep won Best Actress and a lot of "people" thought Viola Davis had been snubbed. This is horse shit, too.  These "people" evidently don't know their Oscar History.  Any actor who gives a good performance playing a real person, whether living or dead, is an odds on favorite to have their name called on Oscar Night.  So, if you're an nominated actor up against a Margaret Thatcher or a Truman Capote you might as well go and enjoy the evening for what it is and remember, you're not being snubbed.

My predictions for Oscar night?  Lincoln will get eight, Les Miz will get three and The Avengers will win what ever it's nominated for because it made so much money.