the big show.

Here are my predictions for the nominees and winners of this year's Academy Awards ceremony, if it does indeed happen, and it seems it will because show producers are vehemently saying that it will take place whether the writers support it or not. (The Oscars have continually brought in millions, perhaps billions, of dollars into the Los Angeles and California economy, so it not happening would be not only distressing for Hollywood, but also the many businesses who count on the Oscars for profit and sustenance.) I'm crossing my fingers for the negotiations and I hope they occur sooner than later (with or without mediation by A-listers, guild heads, etc.) so that dues can be paid to those who have contributed most last year to the art of films, which is as important as making films.

There are some glaring omissions when it comes to categories, but I'm working on it.

Best Original Score
Atonement -- Will Win / Should Win
There Will Be Blood -- Could Win
Into the Wild
Beowulf
Ratatouille

Best Cinematography
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly -- Will Win
There Will Be Blood -- Should Win
No Country for Old Men
Atonement
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford -- Could Win

Best Editing
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street -- Will Win
Michael Clayton -- Could Win
Atonement -- Should Win
Into the Wild
No Country for Old Men

Best Original Screenplay
Juno -- Will Win / Should Win
Michael Clayton -- Could Win
Ratatouille
The Savages
Lars and the Real Girl

Best Adaptated Screenplay
No Country for Old Men -- Will Win / Should Win
There Will Be Blood -- Could Win
Atonement
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Best Art Direction
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street -- Will Win / Should Win
Atonement
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
300 -- Could Win
Across the Universe

Best Supporting Actress
Cate Blanchett :: I'm Not There -- Will Win / Should Win
Tilda Swinton :: Michael Clayton -- Could Win
Amy Ryan :: Gone Baby Gone -- Could Win
Saoirse Rohan :: Atonement
Catherine Keener :: Into the Wild

Best Supporting Actor
Javier Bardem :: No Country for Old Men -- Will Win / Should Win
Casey Affleck :: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford -- Could Win
Philip Seymour Hoffman :: Charlie Wilson's War
Tom Wilkinson :: Michael Clayton
Hal Holbrook :: Into the Wild

Best Actor
Daniel Day-Lewis :: There Will Be Blood -- Will Win / Should Win
George Clooney :: Michael Clayton -- Could Win
Johnny Depp :: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Viggo Mortenson :: Eastern Promises
Ryan Gosling :: Lars and the Real Girl

Best Actress
Julie Christie :: Away From Her -- Will Win / Should Win
Ellen Page :: Juno -- Could Win
Marion Cotillard :: La Vie en Rose -- Could Win
Angelina Jolie :: A Mighty Heart
Amy Adams :: Enchanted

Best Director
The Coen Brothers :: No Country for Old Men -- Will Win / Should Win
Paul Thomas Anderson :: There Will Be Blood -- Could Win
Sean Penn :: Into the Wild -- Could Win
Tim Burton :: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Julian Schnabel :: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Best Picture
No Country for Old Men -- Will Win
There Will Be Blood -- Should Win
Atonement -- Could Win
Juno
Michael Clayton

classes begin.

I attended my CTCS402 class for the first time today at the Robert Zemeckis Center and my professor is Anne Thompson. She works for the trade publication Variety which is based in Los Angeles though it was contributors in other countries and is read widely around the world. If I do well enough in this class, maybe I'll muster up the courage to ask my Prof. Thompson if a job there might be good for me after I graduate. Wish me luck!

the globes looked a little flat.

That was a depressing Golden Globes conference. There wasn't even any suspense or excitement to the show! Billy Bush and Nancy O'Dell could have at least tried to go for the long pauses after reading off the nominees before announcing the winner. And this would have been the year to do something like that, too, since there were a few surprises. I thought everyone was already rooting for Cate Blanchett to win for "I'm Not There" (in the category of Supporting Actress), but I guess that wasn't really the case (so I wasn't surprised when her name was called). Quite a few people, I realize now, were pulling for Amy Ryan to win for "Gone Baby Gone" - though Blanchett's film has been getting more glowing attention than Ryan's, which I think will be better for Blanchett's campaign to win once again at the upcoming Oscars (should they indeed happen).

Most of the other categories I could have predicted fairly easily, as the precursor awards (critics circles, top tens, etc.) were nearly consistent in favor of several folks. Daniel Day-Lewis for one, his performance is being likened to "Citizen Kane" and "The Treasure of Sierra Madre" and those kinds of references don't come by often at all. His previous competition was thought to be George Clooney for "Michael Clayton" but now it seems it's Johnny Depp (for "Sweeney Todd") since Clooney hasn't been able to pull away enough of the limelight from the notoriously-dedicated actor and Depp just won the Golden Globe for Actor in a Musical or Comedy. Julie Christie was also my guess for the win, and it appears she'll have little to fear come Oscar-time since most of the other nominees are in films that haven't been very successful as with Christie's "Away From Her". The nominees aren't out yet, of course, but if they retain mostly nominees from the Drama side of things (versus the nominees under Comedy/Drama) then Christie should have nothing to fear. Blanchett is already getting nods for her Bob Dylan portrayal so it's likely the AMPAS will just let her have that (assuming she wins there too). Besides, "Elizabeth: The Golden Age" wasn't a very well-received film. "Atonement" was, however, but it isn't particularly noted for Keira Knightley's performance in it. If Christie doesn't get it (but as one of the only veterans in this category, she's very likely to), it'll go to Angeline Jolie or Marion Cotillard, the latter for her role in "La Vie en Rose" which, like "Elizabeth" and unlike "Atonement", is only being recognized for the performance more so than the film itself.

The only real upsets for me were for Director and Dramatic Picture. I understand that "Diving Bell" hardly got its dues in the nominations (snubs in the Picture and Acting categories), but I have a strong feeling that the Hollywood Foreign Press really gave Julian Schnabel the award because they opted not to even nominate him in the Picture category. No doubt the man touches some nerves with his creative filmic reflection of the lead character's plight, but next to the superb work of the Coens in "No Country for Old Men", I don't think there's quite a contest - it should have gone to the gruesome twosome. I do suppose that feeling good will always win out against feeling disconcerted, and "No Country" had that bleakness in spades. (For the record, I'd have chosen Paul Thomas Anderson in this category were it up to me, because the man has not only reinvigorated his career, which wasn't failing in any way, shape or form, but he's done so in a way that's vastly different from his previous body of work. His direction of actors is astonishing and his knack for layered visual storytelling is sparkling.)

When one of the Access Hollywood hosts announced Julian Schnabel as the winner for Director, I started making bets that "No Country" was going to win not only because it deserves to, but also because the Coens got robbed in that category and they needed to be compensated for it. So for "Atonement" to win is well and good, but it was rather upsetting for me at the time because I don't think "Atonement" will hold up as well in the process of aging, whereas "No Country for Old Men" will be around for decades to come, yearning to be digested for its tough moral and literary content. I still love "Atonement", though, and hope it still makes the nomination at least for Best Picture at the Oscars, but I'm crossing my fingers for "No Country" not to mention my personal favorite of the year, "There Will Be Blood".

If neither of those two films win for Picture next month, then there will, indeed, be blood.

go suck a hockey puck, doo doo head!

I really get a kick out of how my fellow Americans try so hard to sanitize the media, even our own language (as messed up as it is) and how it's gotten to the point that we'd rather have political correctness than practicality. Sometimes it really is just that much simpler to say "For fuck's sake!!" (though those exclamation marks should never be fulfilled lest you want to be stared down by any parents or elderly in the immediate area - which is far scarier than any one of those emo/punk/goth kids). And sometimes the original meaning or context is lost when there's so much rhetoric involved. And sometimes the point is even assisted by bad language! I went through my whole childhood thinking that Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty was the ultimate badass because she said "...and all the powers of HELL!". Who cares that she's killed by a sword in the bladder, she said Hell!

This Orbit Gum commercial is hilarious because it satirizes this phenomenon of sanitizing our language (and our behavior, as the office setting evokes images of sexual harassment lectures) with some pretty absurd euphemisms. Who says kumquat anymore? (What are they, anyways?) Either way, it's inspired me to start using ridiculous monikers as comebacks, so if I call you a lint licker, be sure and feign shock and distress to appease me.



I think the hilarity of this commercial is helped by their British accents. And the delivery of the lines! In this awards season for films, I think it's a shame there aren't awards for Best Performance in a Commercial. That woman in the leopard print totally deserves Best Supporting! haha!



** By the way, I just saw There Will Be Blood no more than one hour ago so I'll be able to put together my list of personal favorites (and picks for what the year's best films are) by this time next week. I hate to ruin the suspense, but Paul Thomas Anderson has on his hands another gorgeous masterpiece and I'm leaning heavily towards it as my top pick. (Leaning? More like hunching over with one arm sticking out in that general direction.) Anyways, it'd probably have been more exciting (for you and me) for me to figure out who else will fill out the Top Ten. Where will Atonement fit in? No Country for Old Men? Sweeney Todd? 3:10 to Yuma!?

wicked witch of the western world.

Have you heard of Ann Coulter? I don't profess to hating a lot of people, especially those I don't know personally, but I have a strong sense of conviction in my disgust and disdain for that wretch of a woman. Some of the absurd, hateful and outlandish things she's said really make me worry about the state of national ethics, not to mention the general direction of American politics - and I'm an optimist! She made some statements about Jews needing to "be perfected" by the cleansing qualities of Christianity (I'm not Christian, but that's only supposed to sound minimally facetious) and about how women shouldn't vote because their faculties render them malleable to what she might call the deceptive powers of liberalism that made me quiver at the knees; I even spent a couple moments silently praying to some higher power to strike that woman dead before she can harm any more in our world. Her attacks on the wives of the 9/11 victims and on John Edwards are simply frightening things - they're like warm-up words for a planned genocide or something. She's like Hitler reincarnated into an ugly, bony, limp and lame woman, and she hardly even resembles that - a woman. Who could marry that!? (As I understand it, no one, since she's been engaged several times only to have them broken off not too much later.)

One thing I will admit to is being fascinated with her singularity. She has such hate for liberals (or anyone she deems to be liberal enough, like Guiliani, which is ridiculous) that her words seem to almost transform into little puffs of hot smoke that morph into mythological demons as they leave her poisonous lips. It's like listening to Hitler's speeches dubbed over lions attacking innocent goats. Her cracked, harsh voice sounds like utter pain, like her own throat can't stand the evil that looms in her dark, dank head. But like a poorly-made foreign film or reality television or a disturbing quasi-porn flick, it's compelling only because her worldview and beliefs are so odd, so enormously incorrect and stupid that they must be viewed by the rest of the world in order for us to know - to know truly and deeply - what it'd be like if we were devoid of a moral center and thirsty for the light that is consciousness and humanity.

But perhaps her whole shtick is all a joke and a big publicity stunt, at which point it would cease to be even minimally compelling and she would be sloughed to leave relevance. Not that she's very relevant in the political landscape, anyways, but still.

this is like our first date!

I just got myself one of these things after having seen so many of them penetrate my repertoire of sites that I visit frequently, and after having decided that I want something better to do with my time and energy when browsing the internet instead of simply doing just that. (I also got an iPod Touch for Christmas and wanted some use for it since the thing isn't exactly intuitive when it comes to social networking sites like MySpace or Facebook.) So expect random, meandering, pointless posts from time to time! haha.

Actually, the point of this was so that I have a more legitimate way to channel and contemplate things that are affecting me or really piquing my interests - like films or music that have struck me recently, or restaurants and ideas that I find to be tasteful and intriguing. Since no one uses Xanga anymore, I thought I'd reserve some of my time and output to something a little more popular (though I'm still planning on posting on my Xanga from time to time, maybe about more personal stuff since, like I said, no one really reads it anymore and I can anticipate few folks laying their eyes on my streams of consciousness and secrets).

At the moment, I'm drafting up a revised Top Ten list for films of the last year (2007) since it's kind of unfair that the original list included films I've yet to actually see. I'm also evaluating a list of films I'm personally looking forward to most for this new year, 2008. 

But aside from film, I still need to outline what my visions and hopes are for this site since I'm really pining for this thing to stay alive and actively-involved in my life for the long run, so I'll have to update with something along the lines of a mission statement or promise or something. Think of it sort of as a New Year's Resolution.

I'm traditionally not good at keeping up with those, but maybe this is the year!