' ' Cinema Romantico: Oscar Nomination Q & A

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Oscar Nomination Q & A

Now that the nominations for the 86th Academy Awards have been unveiled the time has arrived for Cinema Romantico to answer the most pertinent questions. Let's get to it.

Not your Oscar host. I don't think.
Q: Who's hosting the Oscars again?

A: I have no idea. I’d like to see Brad Pitt as his character in “The Counselor” host, but host from a barstool on the side of the stage, making pithy comments as the ceremony goes along, repeatedly calling the endless parade of odes "sophomoric."

Q: Kind of like Armond White at the recent New York Film Critics Circle awards?

A: Eh, maybe not that harsh. I’m sure Armond White will dismiss the Oscars as the “religion of immoralism”.

Q: Aren’t they really just harmless fun?

A: Not in Armond’s World, sparky. In his world, tuning in to the Oscars does not mean you think movies are kinda cool, it means you are the bedfellow of motion picture communism.

Q: God, that’s a depressing way to start this Q&A.

A: Not as depressing as Adèle Exarchopoulos failing to land a Best Actress nod. You know she moved mountains in "Blue is the Warmest Color." Literally. Moved mountains. France registered a 7 inch shifting of the Pyrenees the night of its premiere.

The woman who gave The Best Performance Of The Year clearly has no time for the Academy's shit.
Q: Well, she had to make room for Meryl Streep's record breaking 887th Best Actress nod.

A: My sources indicate that next year she will take on Cameron Diaz’s role in a remake of “The Counselor” at which point everyone who hated the original version will suddenly swoon for it. (Harrison Chadwick of the Paducah Observer says: "'The Counselor'! NOW I get it!")

Q: Will Meryl get to use the Rihanna accent?

A: Of course!

Q: I also think it's worth nothing your LakeBell4BestActress hashtag never really gathered steam.

A: #fail

Q: Adèle or no Adèle, Lake Bell or no Lake Bell, it’s Cate Blanchett’s award to lose, no?

A: Oh, absolutely. The only suspense will be whether or not Vivien Leigh’s Ghost storms the stage to demand credit.

Jennifer Lawrence: Backlash Antidote.
Q: The Best Supporting Actress field includes last year’s Best Actress winner, Jennnifer Lawrence. Thoughts?

A: I had a chance to speak with Myron Plotz, associate director at the National Backlash Research Institute (NBRI) in Oceanside, California, this morning, and he indicated that from his office’s perspective, this is the most interesting Oscar race in years.

Q: Really?

A: Yes, around his office they apparently call Jennifer Lawrence “The Steamroller”. This is on account of the fact that she effortlessly, charmingly “steamrolls” any and all backlash. However, the NBRI has been detecting faint levels of backlash surrounding her “American Hustle” performance and that paired with a partial resistance from some pockets of the media to “American Hustle” in general plus the endless assortment of amusing JLaw GIF’s may result in unprecedented Lawrence Backlash.

Q: So Lawrence will lose?

A: Not so fast. Plotz sees Lawrence as perhaps as the one person in Hollywood most capable of owning the backlash. Plotz notes that self-deprecating ownership of backlash is, in fact, the most potent countermeasure to backlash. Thus, if Lawrence can get ahead of the critical kickback, she may well be able to stymie it. If not, Lupita Nyong’o will be your winner.

Q: And you're predicting?

A: Lawrence. But I'm secretly rooting for Sally Hawkins in "Blue Jasmine."

Q: How can it be secret if you just said it?

A: Next question!

This is A.J. Langer as Rayanne Graff, who was not nominated for an Academy Award.
Q: It would appear Jared Leto of "Dallas Buyers Club" has surged to frontrunner status for Best Supporting Actor.

A: Indeed. I’m gonna lose a lot of money from a wager I made 20 years ago that A.J. Langer would be the first in the “My So Called Life” cast to win an Oscar.

Q: Really? In that bet you went with A.J. Langer?

A: I ♡ Rayanne Graff forever. Also, you clearly never watched this show. Girl had game.

McConaughey's comin' to get ya, Oscar.
Q: Matthew McConaughey took Best Dramatic Actor at the Golden Globes for "Dallas Buyers Club". Does this make him the Oscar favorite?

A: I think so. It's his "time."

Q: But why isn't it, say, Leo's "time"?

A: Because Matthew McConaughey went out wandering in the rom com wilderness for a decade. He was fallen, now he has risen. The human angle! That’s what wins Oscars!

Q: So you’re suggesting Leo needs to jerry-rig a redemption story for himself?

A: Precisely! He’s got, what, six weeks until the ceremony? Plenty of time for him to stage a rolling-around-in-the-gutter breakdown, issue a phony apology and then propose to Margot Robbie.

Q: His "Wolf of Wall Street" co-star?

A: Imagine if those two got engaged in the middle of awards season? My God, the media would swoon so hard it might just become Leo's "time".

Q: It's not "time" for Christian Bale?

A: Christian Bale had his time which therefore makes him ineligble to have it be his "time".

Q: What about Chiwetel Ejiofor?

A: His "time" is the future.

Q: Wouldn't logic dictate that it should be Bruce Dern's "time"?

A: "Time" is relative. And unfortunately, fair or not, "time" has appeared to pass Dern by.

Q: How about Alfonso Cuaron? Is it his "time" to win Best Director for "Gravity"?

A: It's not really his "time", but it might very well be his time. The one thing that could potentially trip him up is if it's revealed portions of that virtuoso never-ending unbroken take to open the film were faked.

Q: Well, of course, they were! It's set in space!

A: Shhhhhhhhhhh!

Q: All right. The last one. The big bottle of Evian. Best Picture. It would seem, despite the 9 nominees, that it's down to "12 Years A Slave", "Gravity" and "American Hustle." Do you have a prediction?

A: Not yet. We need to wait for the Best Picture Narrative emerge. I'm sensing a game-changing twist the first week of February.

Q: Cuaron's quote about giving Sandra Bullock "herpes" at the Golden Globes wasn't the game-changing twist?

A: Hardly. That was just the stand alone opening to grab the audience's attention. Now we settle in and wait for all three acts of the campaign to unfold.

Q: Any closing thoughts?

A: Indeed. In lieu of failing to nominate Nicole Holofcener for Best Original Screenplay for "Enough Said", I say to the Academy (paraphrasing the "probable" Oscar host): a plague of pustulant boils on all your scurvid asses.

6 comments:

Lexi said...

Truly though.. why can't we have this Brad Pitt character or someone hosting from a barstool making pithy comments?

Nick Prigge said...

I mean, they've tried everything and everyone else for hosting. Why not give this a shot?

Derek Armstrong said...

This post is, to quote Kenny Banya, "gold."

That is all.

Nick Prigge said...

Why thank you, sir. And thank you for the "Seinfeld" reference. Those always make my day.

You know I adore the Oscars, but I also know what they are and how they work, and so I try to maintain a pithy view of them too.

Andrew K. said...

I am not even specifically fond of Bruce Dern and/or NEBRASKA but that ""time" has appeared to pass Dern by" was very profound Nicholas. (I am saying Nicholas as opposed to Nick here to indicate gravitas.)

His "time" is the future is sort of ace, too.

Extra points for every time reference. I just really like time.

(I'm secretly backing Julia Roberts but would go ALL the way in for Sally Hawkins in a heartbeat. Breaking my heart good in that scene on the phone with Louis C.K.)

Nick Prigge said...

It's funny that you like time, because I have a general dislike time. Not just "time" but time. Stupid time.

And that phone scene in "Jasmine".....O.M.G. Yeah, wrecks my heart too. I mean, Sally makes you feel it. She makes you feel everything in that movie, the heartbreak, the insecurity, the life that isn't getting anywhere. And of course, it's not her show, it's Cate's show, and she knows it, and that just makes it more tragic.