The Academy Awards Circle Jerk.

As you may or may not know, the giant circle jerk of the motion picture industry known as the Academy Awards is coming up. If you don't know what they are, allow me to explain. Every year the people in charge of what goes on the silver screens get together to offer each other awards and tell each other how wonderful they are. It's important that these actors and movie makers receive the credit they deserve as they do so much for our country as a whole and rarely receive any sort of attention. In all seriousness, this is the only awards ceremony for the movie industry, so I guess it's not that selfish or narcissistic.

Oh yeah, but those totally don't count...

To be fair, since I am writing about these awards, I am totally buying into it on a level, so I suppose the hypocrisy meter is off the charts right now. In a counterpoint though, I would probably do a write up on the Garbagemen Yearly Awards (GYAs) were they televised and hyped anywhere near as much.

Due to infringement issues with another well known award, the GYAs are often called the Oscar2's.

Every year people all over the country tune in to watch these awards, usually betting on who will win what and making drinking games out of the amount of times someone cries while accepting their awards (Halle Berry=Shitfaced). While gambling and drinking make the Academy Awards more enjoyable, there is a certain appeal to them on their own. As much as I hate to admit it, the Academy Awards are some of the most accessible awards for the simple reason that the only thing you need to do in order to be educated on the subject is to watch movies. As Americans, we have wasting time on entertainment down to a science, so to contribute analysis about something that requires that we just sit there and enable two of our senses is a dream come true.

There is also a mystique to these awards. A feeling that these people who are winning them are actually the-second-coming of Jesus and will deliver us from our sins. Winning one seems to signify that these lucky recipients have truly arrived, and can now do whatever the fuck they want. Don't believe me? Ok, well here is Adrien Brody...

"Yes, I am an ugly John Cusack."

Not the best looking dude in the world, it's fair to say. He probably will go through his life only hoping that someday he will be able to hold hands with a girl and not have her be totally repulsed. Well, sorry Adrien, but you seem doomed to being a giant, ugly loser forev....

WHAAAAAAA--------

That's right. Seconds after winning an Academy Award, Adrien Brody, not only made out with Halle Berry in front of America, but successfully avoided any legal issues that you think would come of just grabbing someone and making out with them. Did I mention that that is Halle Berry he is making out with? Oh I did? Ok.

While I loathe the grandstanding and self-importance that this event stands for, I can't help but be suckered into all of the hype surrounding it for the simple reason that I love putting my own two cents in, and I love movies. So yes, I am going to bitch about how stupid it is that we buy into this shit and then write multiple posts about it. Hypocrisy is my name. Fucking deal with it.

For a long time now, I've kept an eye on the Academy Awards whenever they roll around. If not for any other reason then to become indignant when things don't go the way I think they should. For example, Christopher Nolan not even receiving a nomination for Best Director with The Dark Knight (Comic book movie, ok. You can get away with snubbing it for best picture, but the fact is Nolan immersed me so much in that world that I didn't even notice how retardedly complex and impractical the Joker's plans were) or how offensive it is that Daniel Day Lewis and Sean Penn have the same number of Oscars.

The directors vetoed Penn's demand that the title be, "Oscar Please?"

This year however, I've decided to get more involved, as this year is the first year that the Acedemy has allowed for ten nominees for best picture as opposed to the usual five. This piqued my interest, after all a more open field should, in theory, make for better competition and hamper the politically bullshit aspect of the awards going to "who should get it" rather than who deserves it. So, I really made a concentrated effort to see all of the Best Picture noms in an attempt to be educated for this Saturday.

Because I live in Caribou, and therefore have limited access to movies beyond the sophistication of The Tooth Fairy, I have only been able to see seven of the ten nominees. Precious, An Education, and The Blind Side still evade my viewing pleasure, so I am currently unable to act incredulous that Mo'nique won the Best Supporting Actress Golden Globe over Anna Kendrick. However, for my next few posts, I will be writing up the various Best Picture nominees and giving my own take on them and ranking which ones are really the best in my opinion. Who knows? I might actually manage to swing a viewing of one of my three unviewed noms while I'm at it. Any opinion on which one I should watch first, Gollum?

"Thinks it should watch The Blind Side, I does"

Well, I'm not going to lie. That's not at all the answer I expected.