Awards
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Dear Members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, The next time Mr. Daniel Day-Lewis does the lead role in a motion picture, I request you to simply disqualify all other potential Best Actor nominees for reason of not being Mr. Day-Lewis and present him with the statuette forthwith. To support my humble
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The entire principal cast of A Streetcar Named Desire received Academy Award nominations for acting in 1952. Three of them won. The one who didn’t? Marlon Brando. I’ve been following the Oscars regularly for nearly as long as I have been a serious movie buff. That’s a long time, and the quizzerly part of my brain
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Oscarcast… As award ceremonies go, this one has to rank among the worst in recent memory. Anne Hathaway, an actress I otherwise admire immensely, looked like she was having as much fun as a thirteen year old girl watching Princess Diaries 2. Watching her performing co-host duties, however, was about as much fun as I,
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Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin were, by and large, unfunny. Martin was the better of the two — there were moments when it seemed like Alec Baldwin had forgotten his glasses and was having trouble reading off the teleprompter. When they did get their timing right, it was awesome to watch. The quip about Christoph
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After having watched The Reader I realized something interesting: It is a movie about guilt and involves a former guard at Auswicz, but this description simultaneously tells you everything and nothing. I will not spend much time on the plot, which is beautiful. Or on the writing, which feels like a punch to the gut.
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I woke up early on Monday morning a week ago so I could watch the Oscarcast on TV. Most of it was fairly standard — Kate Winslet’s dad whistling and Philippe Petit balancing the statuette on his chin were the highlights for me. By my reckoning, that’s slim pickings. My wife missed most of it,
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Did any of you happen to see Mickey Rourke’s speech at the Indie Spirit awards last week? This is what he did up on stage: I’m happy for Sean Penn, I really am. He probably deserved the award as much as Mickey did (I haven’t seen either movie yet, so I can’t comment). But as
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Dear Kate, Ref: My earlier letter to you regarding accepting awards that are surely your due by now Congratulations! I couldn’t be happier. Good speech, too. Not outstanding, but definitely an improvement. Asking your dad to whistle — and, to our delight, actually hearing him do it — was an especially nice touch. My only
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At the time of writing this, Slumdog has already won over audiences around the world, snagged a few Golden Globes (and other awards besides) and is widely expected to take home some statuettes on Oscar night. And I’m happy for the cast and crew who made it this far. I really am. But here’s what
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Not from me, although I have much to be thankful for. This one is about acceptance speeches. My friend Rajendran posted a comment to my Kate Winslet post asking whether the reference to Emma Thompson was due to her acceptance speech at the Globes years ago, for Sense and Sensibility (Thompson won for Best Adapted Screenplay).
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