Golden Globes - quick hits

Some off-hand observations from an evening of Hollywood glitter and self congratulation.

First off, when you bring Ricky Gervais back a second time you really should know what you're getting yourself into.  Have a little thicker skin folks - these are jokes, 'mkay?

That being said, I doubt we'll see him next year.

His best line of the evening wasn't even directed to anyone in particular and was said right at the end, so many may have missed it:

"And finally, thank you to God for making me an atheist."


And now to my awards:

The Toughest Category goes to:

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series Drama (and longest category title)
Steve Buscemi
Bryan Cranston
Michael C. Hall
Jon Hamm
Hugh Laurie

Wow, now that's a loaded category.  Any one of them could have easily taken the award and although I would have preferred Cranston, I was happy to see Buscemi bring it home.




The Who Knew He Owned a Tux award goes to:

Trent Reznor

Nice job rockin' the thin tie-look. 




The Most Inspirational award goes to: 

 Glee star Chris Colfer and his heartfelt speech:
"But mostly importantly [a thank you] to all the amazing kids that watch our show and that our show celebrates and are constantly told 'no' [by] people and environments and bullies at school, that they can't be who they are or can't have what they want because of who they are... Screw that, kids."




The Best Presenter award is awarded to:

Robert Downey - Hilarious, witty, bawdy and perfect timing as always.  Perhaps we just saw next year's presenter???

(Runners up - Steve Carell and Tina Fey)




The So Last Year's News award goes to:

Mad Men.  Sorry folks, no love this year - although I still love ya.



The Best Acceptance Speech award goes to:

(Tie)  David Fincher and Steve Buscemi.  Concise, well-thought, funny and to the point.  Well done, lads.




The OMG, is She Actually Wearing That award goes to:

 

January Jones... who knew?? 
Sorry, I guess that should be How is She Actually Wearing That...

(two-sided tape)




The Wish I Knew What He Said award goes to:

Paul Giamatti.  He got bleeped right away - then kept the censor's fingers trembling the rest of the way.  God, how I love that guy!



The Creepy-as-all-Hell-Laugh award goes to:

Natalie Portman, right after she delivered the line, "He totally wants to sleep with me...", she let out this weird snickering cackle, which made her punch-line very creepy indeed.



The Most Gratuitous Cutaway award goes to:

Brad & Angelina.  Besides being the butt of many of Gervais' zingers, there really was no reason to be seeing them every third cutaway.  Except of course that they are... Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.
Also, Jack Nicholson wasn't there.



The Hey, Could we Actually Hear From Someone Who Deserves It award goes to:

Lisa Cholodenko, the Writer/Director of award-winning The Kids are Alright had to stand mute as the producer yapped on and on and took all the glory.  Now, I know the award is officially given to the producer, but cripes, it is her movie, at least let her say something.



The Looking Like a Wax Figure award goes to:

Sadly, Sandra Bullock, who usually comes off so effortlessly beautiful and charming looked sad and a little waxen. Ouch.



And, finally the Biggest Winner award goes to:

The Social Network won for Best Director, Best Drama, Best Screenplay and Best Original Score.
Nice job to Mr. Fincher - he looks to be a lock for Oscar Night as well.

Devil - review with Horror Society

Well, after a year of blogging, I've decided to expand my radius a bit.  I'm now excited to announce that in addition to my usual ramblings here,  I will now be writing for one of the best horror sites out there - Horror Society!

So, check out my first review for Devil:

The Black Pit of Mental Illness... er Swan

Phew, let me take a breath for a sec.

That is one claustrophobic movie!

Endless smothering close-ups and from-behind tracking shots (Aronofsky loves these shots and used them to great effect in The Wrestler as well) and mirrors and reflections and non-stop black and white art direction and a feeling of inevitably falling off the edge and oh the anguish.

Let's see, how many mental illnesses did you catch?  I saw some bulemia, cutting, boundry issues with ma, a little OCD perhaps, some good ol' sexual repression and a huge whopping dose of psychosis and schizophrenia.  I sense a drinking game in the making!

It's kinda exhausting to have to see through someone's eyes when they're at complete frayed ends.

The last movie that was this psychically taxing was The Machinist.  What, you never saw The Machinist  You mean you never saw Christian Bale's attempt at bulemic method acting?

Anywho, that's another story for another day - suffice it to say that I hope both Bale and Portman got to go on nice long vacations in the warm sun and drink themselves silly and stuff themselves with chimichangas or somethin' after having finished these taxing movies.

As for The Black Swan, it is indeed a masterful ride, and between this movie and The Wrestler, Aronofsky proves he's got the chops to go from a heartfelt verité character study to a tightly controlled thriller.  And Natalie Portman is a shoe-in for an Oscar nod as she carries the entire burden of the film on her oh-so-fragile shoulders.

(STOP SCRATCHING WILL YA???!!)

My only qualms with the movie are with its screenplay.  It's fairly obvious from the getgo that Portman's character has some real mental issues and therefore the viewer never really walks that tightrope of "is it reality, or is it in her head" that is so crucial to films like this.  Check out Rosemary's Baby or Jacob's Ladder if you want to see it done right.  I also would have like to have seen the movie be much braver and push even further into surreal territory a la Lost Highway or Mulholland Drive.  Or perhaps the relationship between Portman and her mother could have exploded into further revelations and madness.  To me, it just seemed like the movie was a one-note melody.

Ooof - anyway... time to cleanse the palate with something light and breezy.  Oh, I don't know, something like...

 Oh yeah - much better.  No mental anguish there...

Miro Digital Arts - Shameless Plug Time

Well, now that the new year has rolled around it's time to roll up the sleeves and actually get back to work.  And speaking of work - I recently took a little time to spruce up the website for my editing business.

As you may know, while I quite enjoy rambling on this blog, and making short films, those things in no way actually pay the bills.  My real work is as an editor, and to be honest, work has slowed these past few years - hence the need to update the website and actually start (gasp) marketing myself.

So, here's my blatant marketing pitch:

When you have a moment, please check out my new website.  There you will see some of the work I do, and some of the projects I have recently completed.  I believe the work speaks for itself - documentary work that has aired on PBS's American Masters; corporate work for major companies such as Cisco, Old Navy and Skype; and independent films that have garnered multiple awards and have screened at festivals worldwide.

So if you, or anyone you know needs help editing a video, or has questions on how to finish their documentary, or how to get their indie film on Netflix, please drop by my website:
www.mirodigitalarts.com


Ok - now back to your regularly scheduled rambling...

Best Horror Movies of the Decade

To be honest, this wasn't a great decade for horror.  We saw lots of trends - J-Horror, Zombie mania, Torture Porn, 3D, and endless, mindless remakes, but not many memorable installments into the horror movie hall of fame.

Here are the lone standouts:

Let the Right One In - the vampire tale finally told from a personal perspective.  Quiet, reflective and chilling to the bone.

The Ring - the best of J-Horror transferred to the states. A compelling ghost riddle with a great ending.

 The Devil's Backbone - Del Torro's haunting ghost story.

The Orphanage - another foreign language pitch-perfect ghost story.

The Host - the best monster movie in a long time.  Great characters - a fun ride.  What Cloverfield and Monsters wanted to be.

The Mist - best Stephen King adaptation since Shawshank.  Builds up gradual tension and then crashes you with a brutal Lovecraftian ending.

Drag Me to Hell - Raimi returns to his manic Evil Dead roots, but with a more toned-down approach.  Fun, funny, scary and always entertaining.

28 Days Later - Danny Boyle's brilliant zombie reboot for the 21st century.

Saw - yes, it launched a torrent of horrible torture porn, but as a standalone low-budget horror movie Saw remains as a great example of what you can do with minimal sets, a couple actors and one nasty idea.

Paranormal Activity - lots of haters with this one, but I loved the setup and bought most of it - except for the flaming Ouija board - ok, that was kinda silly.



Let's see, a top ten list where 5 out of the 10 are foreign made (remember, 28 Days Later is British), another one (The Ring) is a remake of a Japanese film and two of the American-made movies were indie films, far from the mainstream studio system.  Really, a pitiful showing from Hollywood, where dollar signs led them to blindly rehash old favorites in a desperate attempt to generate revenue - instead of developing great new horror talents.

It's obvious the foreign and indie markets will continue to drive this genre.

The best of the rest:

The Mothman Prophecies
REC
Hostel
Trick 'r Treat
1408
The Last Exorcism

Best TV Shows of the Decade

I decided to skip over the Top 10s of the year and go right for the big daddy - the Best of the Decade.

First up - Television.

 This last decade of TV represents for me, the golden age of television.  Simply put, it is the best television has ever produced:




The Wire - The best. Ever. David Simon's brutally honest dystopian vision is the gold standard.









 





The Sopranos - The one that started it all - and relaunched Journey's career.

















 
Breaking Bad - Fearless. Bold. Funny. Visionary. Brutal.















Mad Men - Tone-perfect subtle portrayal of the pivot point of a decade and a man's journey to find his authentic self.
















Deadwood -  David Milch's foul-mouthed Shakespearean western is a multi-layered tour-de-force.

Band of Brothers - Epic portrayal of the realities of war in the mid-century.

Dexter - Puts all those CSI clone shows to shame.  Michael C. Hall carries the show with nothing but subtle facial expressions.














 
Curb Your Enthusiasm - Seinfeld synthesized into a crack-like addictive journey into Larry David's warped vision of ultimate social discomfort and humiliation.















Battlestar Gallactica - Sci-Fi told on an epic scale while maintaining its focus on character.

Rescue Me - Foul-mouthed.  Daring.  Brutally honest.  Went head-first into post 9-11 territory that no one else with a sane mind would touch.  Thank you Dennis Leary.















These brilliant and revolutionary shows easily match up against the best television of any decade - perhaps even the best narrative dramas of any medium.  If will be interesting to see if the next decade can live up to these achievements.  Clearly the most creative minds are now working in television - where the showrunners (usually writers) can maintain control of their vision.

Not one of these shows was produced by traditional network television.  And no one cares anymore - the era of the networks is dead.  My children couldn't tell a network from cable or pay tv or YouTube or hulu or Netflix.  It is all simply visual storytelling that comes to them from a box in our home - or on a mobile device on the go.  The revolution is already over.

The best of the rest:

Six Feet Under
The Office
Rome
Entourage
Generation Kill
Friday Night Lights
30 Rock
True Blood
Survivor
The Daily Show With John Stewart
Lost

Next up:  Best Horror Movies of the Decade