And The Oscar Goes To . . . . . . I Don't Have A Clue Because I've Seen Hardly Any Of Them

With the run up to the Oscars well under way, the Baftas, Iftas and the Golden Globes are done and dusted and we can all see who the ones to beat are at this year’s ceremony on March 7th. But one thing I love doing is checking out as many of the nominees as I can in the month or two running up to it and when I think about I have seriously slacked on my cinema going this year and now that I have fuck all to be doing with myself, waiting for that very silent phone to ring, I cant wait to get stuck into this years nominees.

First on the list is, of course, Avatar, and, I know, this is something that has to be seen in a cinema, the 3-D experience and all that, no downloading and watching it on your computer, get your arse off the couch and get yourself to the pictures. But you know what? I haven't been that pushed. I'm defo gonna go over the next 2 weeks but I have kind of made my mind up about it already, I know, I know, I hate doing that. Even for the fact that everyone I know is saying its fucking savage and that I have to see it. I was at least expecting 1 or 2 people to think its shite, some of my mates are very hard to impress and they all seemed to have loved it. It has a kind of a Titanic bang off it.

Number 2, I am really going to have to make myself watch for the simple fact that I cant handle Sandra Bullock but her movie, the ranked outsider for Best Picture at 125/1, The Blind Side, and its also up for Best Actress for herself and not only is she nominated but she is the fucking favourite at 8/13, Best Actress! I never thought I'd see the day. She was okay in that film Crash that weirdly won a couple of years ago but that is about it, just go onto her Imdb page, it is not a pretty sight. The weirdest part about all of this is, I think the reason she is the favourite is the fact that she won the Golden Globe in January but she won that for The Proposal, don’t ask me how but she did. This is a performance I have got to see, I am very suspect, the best film that bird ever made was Demolition Man for fuck sake.

The third movie is a film that everyone said is absolutely amazing, I awaited its release for a couple of months but due to Panto commitments, I never had the time. District 9 is up for 4 awards, Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay and 2 other technical award, not sure which ones, (I presume visual effects, from what I have seen from the trailers, its got to be the favourite, fuck Avatar, it looks like the intro to a computer game). But its out on DVD so I think this is the road I'm gonna go down today. I can’t wait, a nice apartheid metaphor that involves 10 foot aliens before lunch, sound quality.

The fourth movie is An Education . . . . . . . . if I stumble upon it somewhere on the internet, I might give it a gander. . . . . Actually fuck that, I've just flushed my so called credibility down the preverbal jacks. I love Alfred Molina, I met him years ago when he was in a play with my oul'one, and let me tell you, he was fucking quality in it. Fred, if you are reading this, I was rooting for you. Stanley Tucci wasn't that good in The Lovely Bones, it should of been you. My little tip, if you are looking for an outsider to stick 2 euro on, An Education at 66/1 would be a nice one, it reeks of Oscar movie . . . . . . . who am I kidding, you might as well flush that 2 euro down the drain. . . . . . . . . . . How can you flush something down the drain, you flush things down the toilet, not the drain.

I checked out the new favourite to take the Best Picture yesterday, The Hurt Locker, which knocked Avatar from its perch after sweeping the Baftas and I loved it. I still don't see it taking the Best Picture prize though. It's up for a whopping total of nine awards, Best Picture, Best Director for Kathrine Bigalow, James Cameron's ex-wife, who I am a pretty sure will take it, people have been going on about the fact that the academy have never awarded a woman for directing and this is the perfect opportunity. She is 2/7 to win - not even worth the bet. Also up is the leading man, Jeremy Renner, who to date has been just a supporting actor in stuff like SWAT, North Country and 28 Weeks Later where he always put up a solid show but now, he has defo cemented himself, I think, as a leading man but as the youngster of the group, he is a major outsider at 18/1. The film is also up for 2other big one, Original Writing and Score which I think Hurt Locker could be decent a contender but will probably loose out to the favourite which is the first animated film to be up for Best Picture since Beauty & The Beast, UP.

I think UP will have to be on my list, believe it or not, I've never been a major fan of those Pixar style movies. People have been going on and on about them for the last ten years and I have never really understood the fascination. I have watched them and enjoyed them but that is it. Like when people were going mad that Toy Story 2 wasn't nominated all those years ago, I was scratching my head, going 'What?' but this UP movie has been get ridicules reviews, anyone I know who has seen it, said its one of their favourite films of the last couple of years and now, the Oscar nomination, I have to have a look.

But onto a nominee that I got to checkout that is up for Best Picture - Inglorious Bastard, now, where do I start? How did this piece of shite get nominated? Not even if the academy extended the amount of nominees in the Best Picture category to 20, it shouldn't be in there. What a pile of my arse. I remember going to it and really rooting for it, I couldn’t wait. We had that amazing opening scene between Supporting Actor favourite, Christoph Waltz (who is a dead cert at 1/25) and that French actor, Denis Menochet (who was equally as deadly) then shite for about an hour until Michael Fassbender comes along. We then have that quite good scene in the bar where everyone gets milled out of it, then shite, absolute shite until the end. The name of the film was Inglorious Bastards and the Inglorious Bastard had probably about 40 lines in total between them all throughout the whole movie and Brad Pitt had 35 of them. The short time that Brad Pitt, that big cunt who directed Hostel and all the other little wankers were on screen, they actually made me feel sorry for the Nazis, that is a very hard thing to do and I'm not even going to go into the other story line about the girl in the cinema and nazi solider film star because I might actually fallasleeeeeeeeeeeeee jnunfvju7eimoewm####p--ij2eor;;tr.h..t........Oh my god I actually fell asleep on the keyboard just there. Fucking hell, how did it get in there? When you have stuff like The Road & Let The Right One In not even getting mentioned.

Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire is a must on my list over the next week but I am just terrified of it. I know for a fact that to say that it will be a heart breaker will be the biggest understatement in the world. I haven't met that many people who have seen it but my mate, Coffey, said it was savage so that is definite download.

The other 2 Best Picture nominees that I’m gonna stick in the download category for the week, just for the fact that I’m as broke as a joke, is Up In The Air, which I’m really looking forward to. I haven't heard many mates going on about it but I thought Juno was slick, well, your one in it was kind of wrecking my head by the end of it, but all in all, I liked it so Up In The Air will be a sure bet on the list for the coming week. The other is the one movie in the Best Picture Category that I reckon has absolutely no chance of winning. I wouldn't bet on A Serious Man if you paid me . . . . . well, I probably would because you’re paying me to do it so once the bet is less than what you’re paying me I can see it being well worth my while but other than that, I wouldn't go near it. The small amount of people I know who have seen it, kind of said it was alright . . . okay . . . good . . . . grand. Now that doesn't sound like a Coen's movie to me. The Coen's, they are the reason why I'm gonna check out this movie but I wouldn't be surprised if this is the one I forget to watch.

But their we have it, there is my list 'But stop, Jack. There are a few others in other categories that you will have to see.' Yeah, like what? . . . . . Crazy Heart which I have already renamed as The Wrestler with country music . . . . Invictus, which I saw and found to be very very pleasant. A very easy going movie about Nelsen Mandela in the most easy going part of his life, why they did that? I will tell you why, because Morgan Freeman is too old to play him in any other era of his life. It should get nothing in this year’s ceremony. But the one other movie that I am rooting for all the way, which is only up for the one award, Best Adapted Screenplay. Come on Armando Iannucci for In The Loop. Legend!

So lets go, I have my list of Motion Pictures, I think I’m gonna start with 'Up In The Air', yeah, that looks like a good place to start.