Sunday, February 22, 2009

Live Blogging the Oscars....

8:29 -- As I wait for Hugh Jackman to start the show, I'm thinking the same thing everyone else is thinking.... was Ryan Seacrest too busy with the red carpet show to host? Seriously. A show known for sucking is going to be worst.

8:30 -- Wow, he's really bad at doing an Australian accent.

Kate Winslet looks about 50.

Wow, it is nice to see that they decided to do something different this year. Instead of a funny opening that was the highlight of the show, they decided to open with a cheesy off, off, off, off, off, off, off,off, off, Broadway number that wouldn't look out of place on the Tony Orlando and Dawn Show.

Hugh Jackman -- A straighter Nathan Lane?

8:38 -- The musical number is over, and I wish

8:39 -- Mickey Rourke looks great? He looks like the victim in last Thursday's CSI.

8:40 -- A montage of Best Supporting Actress nominees. So tonight is going to be like a ---th Anniversary show with lots of nominees who had nothing better to do presenting the awards? Whoopi Goldberg looks like a pregnant leopard. Tilda Swinson got all dressed up in her finest 400 count sheets.

8:44 -- Wow, Anjelica Houston looks no different than she did a couple of decades ago..... unfortunately. So this is how it is going to work, people who aren't going to win tonight pretending to admire those that don't? Whoopi, what's up with that tattoo? Classy.

Goldie Hawn -- So this is what cute looks like it its mid 60s? I wonder how many of the muscles in her face are currently NOT paralized?

8:48 -- The Oscar goes to....... Penelope Cruz. Damn, I've already missed my first prediction. "This ceremony was a moment of unity for the world!". Yes, I understand that Israelis and Palestinians have a big Oscar party that stops the fighting for just a minute. And in case you're wondering, this is what Penelope said in Spanish, "It isn't an honor just to be nominated, I wanted and deserved this, and all you American dogs can stick it in your leveraged and bought-out bums! Long live Spain. Oh, and Generalissimo Fransisco Franco is still dead."

8:52 -- Tina Fey and Steve Martin -- Wow, those would be novel hosts. A Scientology joke. Why not cut to Tom Cruise?

Best Original Screenplay -- Dustin Lance Black for Milk. I love those commercials. It does a body good. What's that? No matter, I got this prediction right. Is it just me or is the podium uncomfortably close to the audience? Wow, by promising that gay people might actually get treated like humans, this guy just provided the fodder for 100 different AM radio stations tomorrow.

Best Adapted Screenplay -- "There's an inept quiet?" You're going to nominate a guy who writes that? Slumdog Millionaire wins and I'm now 2 for 3 in my predictions. And his speech gets our first bleep of the night. Given the FCC, it was probably for saying poo.

9:03 -- Jack Black and Jennifer Anniston -- Who are two people who didn't get nearly enough attention as children?

Best Animated Picture -- What, you mean Space Chimps and Clone Wars weren't nominated? Can't imagine why. This show is slowly taking on the feel of one of those 4 hour AFI 100 biggest movies of all time shows.

Wall-E wins. Wow, big shock. And I'm now 3 for 4.

9:08 -- Best Animated Short -- I have no idea how to spell what won, but any guy who says, "Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto" in a speech that he knows nobody will understand is great. I would have picked this film to win, but for some reason, I left the Animated Short category out of my predictions.

9:16 -- Sarah Jessica Parker & Daniel Craig -- Bond and the Horse he Rode In With. Why would Matthew Broderick want to ever leave that. Did they really give her a line that ends in "...full face-lift?"

Art Direction: -- Winner -- Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I'm now 3 for 5, but did have this as the potential spoiler. Did they bring the set behind them from the Muppet Show?

9:19 -- Costume Design Award -- What is the deal with all the camera movement? Is NFL Films producing this year? Uh oh, The Duchess wins. I'm now 3 for 6.

9:23 -- SJP -- "We don't have to tell you what a makeup artist does." Really, Sarah, have you seen yourself on screen? The Make-Up award goes to.......... Curious Case of Benjamin Button -- 3 for 7. Really? Did you see the Dark Knight? That guy was missing half his face! Oh wait, I forgot that Aaron Eckhart was a method actor who actually had his face ripped off for the role.

9:25 -- The guy from the movie that too many women swooned over and the chick from Mama Mia. The chick from Mama Mia is wearing Aretha's bow under her boobs. Wonder why she took the lights off. A montage of romance from this year's films. A nice match cut between Mickey Rourke and Nicole Kidman shows how much they're starting to look alike. Eve and Wall-E were the least manufactured looking of all the faces shown.

9:31 -- Oh my God, this is how we're trying to improve the Oscars, by giving us a lesson on how movies are made? Ben Stiller is wearing a Joaquin Phoenix beard while Natalie Portman tries to do the intro. Would it have killed her to work on her timing? Ben Stiller derailing the show might be the funniest thing tonight. I'm sure the cinematographers aren't laughing, though. Slumdog Millionaire wins, completely trashing my record. Wouldn't it have been much funnier to have Christian Bale present this f-ing award?

9:39 -- Jessica Biel was the hope of the Sci-Tech awards dinner, and she showed up tonight in the curtains from that event. I just noticed the set looks a bit like the stargate in 2001. Maybe they can warp me to the end of this snoozefest.

9:43 -- Pot jokes from Pineapple Express. Seth Rogan has lost weight, which is the most interesting thing from this montage. Although having the cinematographer from Saving Private Ryan was amusing. This goes on far too long, which isn't surprising since it was done by Judd Apatow. My understanding is that when this bit comes out on DVD, it will be in a four hour director's cut.

Toyland wins best live action short. 3 for 8.

9:52 -- Hugh Jackman has now switched to hosting the Tony Awards. Is that Beyonce? Forgive me, I can't really tell my semi talented R&B stars from one another anymore. Hey look, it's one of the plastic doll toys from High School Musical. Ooops, my bad, that's Zac Efron. The number was created by Baz Luhrman. It was hard to tell because they held each shot for more than one second.

10:03 -- Cuba Gooding Jr. was able to be there? I would have thought Snow Dogs 4 was shooting. Another supporting actor award. Seymour Philip Hoffman showed up in a designer outfit and a watchcap from a BP station. Nice. Joel Gray is able to be there? Josh Brolin did brilliant work in Milk? I think he did brilliant work in winning Diane Lane. Hubba. And look, Christopher Walken decided to grow out his forelocks. Kevin Kline gets the honor of introducing Heath Ledger's award. Kline is looking more and more like John Cleese.

Heath Ledger wins. Awesome. Nice heartfelt speech from his family. And a classy move by the academy to use the "Hoe-down" theme for their playoff.

10:14 -- Best Documentary -- Bill Maher gets serious. Yawn. Man On Wire wins. I am at 5 for 10 or something like that. Cute acceptance speech by the subject of the documentary.

10:17 -- Best Documentary Short -- Smile Pinki wins. Bill Maher is disappointed to find out it isn't one of those movies with the fingers that have mouths painted on.

10:23 -- An annoying quick montage set to loud music. Baz Luhrman strikes again? Will Smith shows up to give out the visual effects award, which oddly enough is one of the least produced award presentations of the night. Winner - Ben Button again.

10:29 -- Sound editing -- Dark Knight. Another random playoff -- Mr. Blue Sky

10:31 -- Sound mixing -- Slumdog Millionaire. Wait a second? Isn't this only to be given to action movies? Hey look, there is John Mayer and Jennifer Aniston. In lousy seats.

10:34 -- Film Editing -- Slumdog Millionaire. Thanks for showing the clip from Benjamin Button, which made it clear the visual effects kind of sucked.

10:41 -- Nice to see Eddie Murphy has managed to get over his anger at Meet Dave not being nominated. Perhaps I'm not French enough, but I still don't see much to laugh about in Jerry Lewis. Of course, the man invented one of the most important pieces of film equipment ever, the spit take glass.

10:44 -- Jerry takes the stage and looks 100 pounds lighter. And apparently he left the funny in that tuxedo.

10:50 -- The Producers, realizing that we're all worked up over the non-stop excitement they've provided us all night, decide to play several minutes of lullabies inspired by the films that have been nominated. Hugh Jackman looks disappointed that they haven't found a way to work in a dance number for him.

10:54 -- Zac Efron shows up to show us his range of emotion from A to A and a half with the award for Best Score. Slumdog Millionaire wins. I'm fighting off sleep.

10:57 -- Best songs goes to show that this was a lousy year for songs. Apparently so bad that they brought John Legend in to sing a song from the Lion King.

11:01 -- Slumdog wins another award. Best song. Honestly, didn't we have our fill of Indian music with Ravi Shankar at Woodstock?

11:07 -- Best foreign language film -- Departures.

11:10 -- Queen Latifah gets to do the death roll call, wearing some sort of blue dress and OMG, she's going to sing for the In Memoriam? To be fair, she originally was going to rap an NWA song, but then thought better of it. I love the way the producers have decided to take full advantage of our big screen TVs by showing us the death montage not on our TV, but on TVs in the hall. Nothing to show how important Paul Newman was by putting him on 1/10th of my screen. BRAVO!

11:19 -- Best director is being given by famed director Reese Witherspoon, who I can't help but stare at and think of last week's Family Guy, in which her chin was used to cut into a safe. Danny Boyle. Slumdog Millionaire.

11:26 -- Is Anne Hathaway pretty or not? I can't decide? What happened to Halle's Berries? Sophia Loren looks good for a 90 year old. And so does Nicole. Hey Nicole, Michael Jackson called and wants his nose back. Kate Winslet wins. And thanks everybody, including her breasts.

11:39 -- Best actor. Bobby DeNiro is the funniest thing tonight, which says a lot about the crapfest this telecast has been. Poor Richard Jenkins has to see Adrian Brody, the most likely person on the stage never to be up there again, talk about his career. Sean Penn wins, and looks instantly depressed that George Bush is no longer in office..

11:54 -- Best picture has been given out...... Slumdog Millionaire. I'm too comatose to care.

12:00 -- Game over, exactly at midnight. In exactly one year, stay tuned for Howie Mandell hosting the show.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Why is this Cartoon Offensive?


Okay...... I'll have to say that when I first saw the headlines about an "offensive" NY Post cartoon, I looked at this and assumed that someone from PETA was up in arms over what is a tasteless picture of a dead chimp, or perhaps just general good taste over the fact that some poor woman suffered greatly in a story that is essentially turned into a joke here.

Now that I realize that it was the tenuous connection between the monkey and Obama's race. Here's the thing...... I don't see it.

Have the people protesting ever been in your average first grade class? Ever seen that it is common for out of control kids to be referred to as monkeys? Ever seen a Super Bowl commercial? How about the one where incompetent coworkers are portrayed as....... Monkeys.

Need a refresher? It's right here:



I'm left leaning, voted for Obama, and generally find the Murdoch owned media reprehensible. But it seems to me that the people furthering a stereotype here are the people who turned this into far more than it actually is. The fact is, most of our politicians are dumb monkeys, to busying flinging poo to do anything serious. That's what I got out of this. If anyone deserves an apology, it is the poor woman who apparently needs a new face after being attacked by a chimp.