Was That Movie Supposed to Be Funny?

Last Friday, it dawned on me that the last time I had been to the movies was to see Tropic Thunder back in September, and even though Robert Downey Jr is a meal of an actor, I decided it was time to see something new.

I threw a dart at the newspaper, to decide which movie from the post-Oscar nightmare-scape to go see. The dart landed fortuitously on Sunshine Cleaning, the remix of the movie Little Miss Sunshine, but with Amy Adams instead of Steve Carell.

I suppose I should put up one of this obnoxious warnings: IF, FOR SOME REASON, YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE PLOT OF THIS EXTREMELY ORIGINAL MOVIE, STOP HERE. Seriously, you have never seen anything like it before... That is, if you haven't gone to the movies since 1924.

The idea is simple, two sisters come together to pick the last scraps off the rotting carcass that is their shattered lives. And there is plenty about fifteen minutes of black humour along the way. A solid fifty percent of this movie is close-up shots of Amy Adams about to cry — This movie is an actor's wet dream.

In hopes of making more money, Amy Adams and Emily Blunt (the sisters) open up a crime-scene clean up crew. In going around cleaning up the remains of other people, they learn to cope with the suicide of their own mother, who died like 20 friggin years before the events of the movie. I'm not particularly a huge fan of movies which are about people overcoming a traumatic life events which happened a long time ago... I'm looking at you, Wes Anderson! I will admit, that some of the cleaning scenes were pretty funny, but there are only like two of them in the movie.

The movie follows in the footsteps of Little Miss Sunshine, in its wry humour, and its themes of suicide and following your dreams despite the fact that you screwed them up years ago, and they are pointless anyway. It does tack on new themes like letting go of the past and abusive relationships, and Emily Blunt not noticing that the moderately attractive girl from 24 totally wants to get into her pants.

To sum it up, this movie might be worth seeing, if you are into emo crap (or if you like laughing at emo kids). I spent most of the movie not sure whether I was laughing with the movie makers, or at them. So if you are looking for a good cry, wait a week to see that not even Hugh Jackman looks good in sideburns. Oh, topless Hugh Jackman makes everything better.

Statues of Naked People

February is a surprisingly good month for TV. The prime time season is in full swing, and they have moved on from unveiling new characters to giving hints as to whom they are going to kill off for the season finale. The biggest night on television is this weekend, the Super Bowl, where the nations companies compete to see who can make the best 30 sec video. However, there is another film-making competition, later this month: the 81^st Academy Awards. (Right: Jarvier Bardem tries to give Oscar a boner)

This mother of all award shows, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences' annual presentation ceremony dwarfs all other awards. The Golden Globes can't possibly compete and the Grammies are nothing but more proof that Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences is just a party school (Yale to AMPAS' Harvard). There is no greater display of opulence than watching the red carpet to see who Jennifer Antison is wearing, and whom Billy Bob Thorton is wearing!

In honour of this great sceptical, I am going to help feed your gambling addiction by making forecasts as to who is going to win what. So grab some pop-corn, call your bookie, and bask in my wisdom. I will tell you who is going to get their hand on that fabulous golden naked man.

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
While Taraji Henson probably gave the only noteworthy performance in Benjamin Button, I'm going to go with Amy Adams: "What's that Mr. Squirrel? Philip Seymour Hoffman is putting his thing up little boys rectories? Oh my!"

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
While Josh Brolin is over-due for one of these things, the Academy doesn't seem to have their head on straight for this category: They receive an epic fail with Robert Downey jr as their token minority pick. And while Philip Seymour Hoffman touched me with his part in Doubt, being killed by an Olsen twin will give Heath Ledger the edge he needs.

Best Actress in a leading Role
Since Bride Wars bombed so bad, I'm assuming that Ann Hathaway is nominated for Get Smart, which she was out-shown by Steve Carell, The Rock, Alan Arkin, and that little Asian dude from Heroes. And while Kate Winslet is on a roll (role?) this year, Catholic is a slightly lesser evil than Nazi Guard/Pedophile in Hollywood. So the Oscar goes to Meryl Streep.


Best Actor in a Leading Role
I have no idea who The Visitor is, so I assume what's his face is not going to get it, and there is no way that a guy playing Richard Nixon will get it (those wounds are far too fresh). Mickey Rourke won the Golden Globe, and that is a dumb award, so nope. While Sean Penn won the Screen Actors Guild Award, the Academy are pussies when it comes to political issues, and thus will pass up Milk for the sadly predictable Brad Pitt in Benjamin Button. In Brads defence, I haven't seen narration like that since Ron Howard on Arrested Developement.

Best Picture
There has been a lot of buzz about Slumdog Millionaire, the movie which has been a breath of Bollywood air on this rather stale season. Slumdog will definitely sweep the Original Song, and original score for their deft use of MIA. However, I'm going to say that Benjamin Button is going to win, because the Academy is boring.

I could go on to call things like Best Sound Mixing or editing, but who knows what any of these things mean (What the hell is a Foreign Film?). So I will have to leave you with these predictions and let time test my knowledge of Hollywood.