Oscars 2016 -- The Awards

Best Original Screenplay 

We've renamed this category "Gifted Hands".  Not so much for the talented writers who produce this material, but rather for Doctor Ben.  In a category that always contains a few "sleepers", the good doctor is always on our minds.

• Bridge of Spies
• Well done, particularly so because you know the major plot points going in.  
• Spotlight
• Another "basics known" storyline, but the revelations (biblical reference accidental, but happily noted) about how the story unfolded and the Globe's handling of it were brilliant.
• Ex Machina
• I LOVED this movie.  Quite a clever plot and believe it should (but won't) win something.  And this has NOTHING to do with Alicia Vikander.  Nothing at all.  Jennifer who?
• Inside Out
• Biased by our official capacity as mediocre middle class parents, this is our sentimental choice.  It doesn't win -- the idea is they're thrilled to be there (which is what Vicky Craig said to me in 1977 -- I know, Vicky.  Know ya lied!)
• Straight Outta Compton
• The guilt felt by the old, white men who nominated only....nah.  No way those closet-Trump-supporters even saw this one.  'Shame, because this was one of our big sleepers this year.  We expected nothing and received tons.

Hope Springs Eternal

Best Adapted Screenplay

My wife said "'The Big Short' was based on a book?  So what do they get an Oscar for?!?" She has a point.  Some people will want to make a Socialism joke right here.  For me, it was more reminiscent of how most of the people who've ever worked for me must've felt.  Let's concentrate our focus on:

• The Martian
• They'd have to cut the statue in half and give 6.5" of it to the Cuarons, because this be Gravity, 2: Red Planet Farmer.     
• Carol
• We didn't see it.  Not because we didn't want to (or because Donna has a sister who is a giant....LOVELY, lovely human being.  Why oh why did I tell these people the URL to these pages?)  
• The Big Short
• Winner, winner, economy-wrecking-chicken-dinner!  Like Too Big to Fail, you have to be prepared to be sick to your stomach as it causes you to relive the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and also because you come away with some clarity.
• Room
• Several people commented that they couldn't watch this because of the subject matter (a sexual slave kidnapping), but honestly, it's more touching than disturbing.  Absolutely loved both the writing and the acting.  Doubt it can win anything (maybe Best Actress), but brilliantly done.  Highly recommended.
• Brooklyn
• This was a sweet movie that both of us loved.  Nothing earth-shattering, but a well written and realistic human struggle.  No awards, but our eternal praise (unlike the actual Brooklyn).  
  

Best Picture 

• The Revenant
• Tough movie.  Great movie, but exhausting.  Haven't felt this way since There Will Be Blood (or since I managed a group of hipster technology architects).  You can't watch this one again.  Does that matter?  

• Mad Max: Fury Road
• Um...what?  Listen -- I'm a big fan of action movies.  And post-apocalyptic action movies.  I enjoyed The Road (but see the Daffy warning above on that one) and am addicted to The Walking Dead.  But Best Picture for Fury Road?!?  Did people just get overwhelmed with the fact that there was a genuine, discernible plot in a Mad Max movie?  Tickled to nominated-state because Mel Gibson didn't even make a cameo?  There hasn't been this big a surprise since Marisa Tomei was nominated for My Cousin Vinny (and, well, see below...of course that was before Jennifer who was before Alicia...)

• The Martian
• I'm much more supportive, here, than in the writing category because, well, plagiarism.  Highly entertaining movie.  Don't get why Matt Damon was considered a comedic actor.  If that's the case, then Tom Hardy should be nominated for a comedy award, too.  No win, though -- too soon since Sandra Bullock was stranded in space.  Now if THIS guy made a cameo...

• Bridge Of Spies
• I'm a sucker for a Cold War story.  Even have a piece of the Berlin Wall in my room (thanks, Michael).  Maybe it was an easier-to-understand world.  We had all of our facts wrong and miscalculated all over the place, but it made for sound bites you could consume (or, I was 12...one of those).  Good movie, great props to Mark Rylance (also funnier than Damon in Martian Farmer), but no awards.
• Spotlight
• Tough movie for a different reason.  I used to make the standard "hey, I was an altar boy and had breakfast with the Father at the rectory every morning.  What, I was too chubby for him?" joke all the time.  This is a reminder that this particular joke isn't funny.  Too far-reaching a scandal, too disappointing a cover-up, too late to fix it.  Hoping for a win or two here (and Ruffalo was incredible).
• The Big Short
• Another upsetting (albeit for a very different reason) movie.  Challenging to root for because you have a great guy (Steve Carrell) opposite a completely typical Hollywood asshole (Christian Bale).  But separating the work from the man (as we so often have to do), both were amazing (and Ryan Gosling could easily have been nominated, too -- also funnier than Damon in Martian Dirt Farmer.  Come to think of it, two of our three kids are also funnier than Damon in God's Green Gravity Earth...I mean Mars).  This should win.  But I think some of the old white men voting think the bear is real and will know if they voted for him or not.  HEY, OLD MEN: THAT'S THE GOVERNOR OF NEW JERSEY YOU'RE THINKING OF.  NOT THE CGI BEAR.  VOTE FOR...oh, crap, they aren't listening.  It's Viagra time.
• Room
• Brillian, clever, touching, tense.  What else do you want?  Oh, ok -- if they blew up the house at the end you'd like it.  Time to take your meds.
• Brooklyn
• Hey!  A movie with just a story about people.  Believable people who you root for (and against).  A plot without a killer twist or special effect or nested dream sequences.  No wins (except maybe Saorise) but so glad to see Hollywood producing this kind of stuff again.

Acting

Some great performances this year.  Here are our choices:

Best Actress

Jennifer Lawrence did not deserve a nomination here (sorry, sweetheart...but I haven't felt the same about you since American Hustle.  No it does NOT have anything to do with Alicia Vikander.  Well, not...NO.  Nothing to do with her.)  Saorise Ronan was brilliant and sympathetic in Brooklyn.  She'll be back for statues in the future.  This year, Brie Larson wins for Room.  You believed her in a very tough role.  Brie wins (and I get points for passing on the very obvious cheese jokes).

Best Actor

Cranston and Redmayne both had roles that could've gotten them an Oscar, but they phoned in their performances (and I'm a fan of both).  They'll rebound.  But Redmayne probably thought he had a lock with an historic role about possibly the first transgendered person.  As Bob Ueuker used to say, "Swiiing...and a miss."

I was most impressed with Fassbender as Steve Jobs.  We all know the character very well and fully expected the "genius, but an asshole" approach.  But Fassbender gave him real depth.  I wish he would win, but Alejandro Inarittu decided to treat Leonardo DiCaprio like shit for 4 months so he'd get his first-ever statue.  Leo was good, but Tom Hardy way overshadowed his acting in Revenant.  And it's hard to root for anything associated with Inarittu as he allegedly makes Christian Bale look like Mother Theresa.  Leo wins, but I'm not happy about it.  .

Best Supporting Actress.

Vikander and McAdams both gave great performances in their respective films, but Winslet was awesome (and, again, not a personal fan).  We didn't even know it was her for the first few minutes of her scenes!  This one's a lock.

Best Supporting Actor

THE most competitive category this year.  All 4 of the losers (Hardy, Rylance, Ruffalo, Bale) would win in any other year.  They were all magnificent and in all 4 cases, overshadowed the actual stars of their films.  But the sentimental choice will be Sylvester Stallone for Rocky Balboa in Creed.  It's a shame his award will be a little tainted by the lack of nominations of black people (including Michael B. Jordan as Apollo's son, Adonis) but Sly deserves it.  He was actually great!

And, still my favorite awards show moment of all-time.  This is one white person we want to keep around...and around:

Oscars Overview 2016

Black Oscars Matter

Where the Polynesians got their inspiration for Easter Island 

I titled last year's post "It's a Nice Day for a White Oscar".  There was so much publicity about last year's nominations being the "whitest since 1998", that we naturally assumed there would be some swing away from this embarrassment.  Yet, here we are with an all-white slate.  Even Straight Outta Compton (which my wife and I, hardly fans of the genre of music covered, enjoyed immensely) was only nominated for screenplay, written by...no need to wait for it...two white people.

This led to two questions:

• How are nominations even determined?
• How are they getting away with being "So White"?

The Nomination Process

I had never considered this before.  Largely because I'm not in the business, but mostly because...daily life.  We have 3 kids (one of each) and the lectures I give them don't apply to me. This complete lack of knowledge on the nominating process DOES, however, represent a very real blowback point when one of the 3 realizes I don't practice what I preach.  Since 2 of the 3 of them are certain to see this post, let me follow Thompson Theorem #4(a): 

"Holistic understanding will not occur without detailed knowledge of the underlying components and an uninterrupted supply of single malt."

This is how the nominations are determined (simpli-fied, predictably, since I'm a simple-ton):

1. Pricewaterhouse Coopers, without the use of any mayonnaise jars, makes a list of eligible movies:
1. A movie's Producer or Distributor submits an application including a list of credits.  The film must be:
1. at least 40 minutes in length
2. publicly screened (and not for free) in Los Angeles County for 7 straight days in 2015
3. premiered at a movie theater, not on DVD, Television, Smellivision, or the Internets (sorry, Mad Jack, Beyond Thunderbone)
2. The ballots are distributed to Academy Members.

Just kidding.  He's not in the Academy....he let his membership lapse.

    3. Members chose their top 5 in each category, in preference order.

The tabulation that occurs after that would make Rube Goldberg blush.  It's based on Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), a preferential voting system that is used to elect the President of Ireland, the lower house of Parliament in Australia and the city council of Berkeley, California.**

**-Draw your own chemicals-in-use conclusions.

So is the system bleaching the nominations?  Could be.  Take a look at this demographic of voters:

No, I swear that's not a profile of Trump/Cruz supporters (though they are likely to think the "whiteness" is the only good thing coming out of Hollywood these days).  These people are old white men.  But this is not the telling graphic...this is:

The punchline, it turns out, is that the racism (overt or otherwise) occurs in drama schools and casting rooms.  If they get the roles, minorities are nominated and win more often than whites:

• all minority actors land 15% of top roles, 15% of nominations and 17% of wins
• black actors convert 9% of top roles into 10% of best-actor nominations and win 15% of the time 

Alright, that's enough.  I watched Crash.  I know it's upsetting to hear a long tirade about racism, so I'll let Chris Rock handle the rest of the heavy lifting.  Some general thoughts before I get into the categories:

• Meryl Streep Earns Her .... Nothing!
• She probably wasn't even going, but now that all of the non-Chris-Rock-black-people are boycotting, there are extra seats available (I said I'd stop, didn't I?)  She actually had a legitimate role last year (no, not Ricky and the Flash -- Rick Springfield.  'Nuff said, right?) as Emmeline Pankhurst in Suffragette, a true story about the women's rights movement in the U.K.  Even had Carey Mulligan and Helena Bonham Carter in it. She'll be back next year, though, for her docu-drama on the rampant spread of disease in the porn industry, Streep Throat.  

• The Death, Rebirth, and Death...er, Re-Death?...of Movie Theaters
• My lovely wife predicted two years ago that we would be able to do our annual quest to see the nominated movies online in January and February.  NONSENSE, screamed the cinephile technology geek!  I attended the funeral of the traditional theater house when I saw an X-rated movie at the Brunswick Theater in Trenton in 1979.
  
   (Before you heap your derision on me, imagine MY trauma -- those screens are 70 feet wide.  I have only in the last few years recovered my self-esteem.)  The modern theater has reclining seats; entertaining employees; drinks; reserved reclining entertaining sleep-inducing seats; and so much more!  But this year's effort (81.4% of major noms viewed...our best year since 2007!) included 13 movies streamed at home.  The major difference this year seemed to be VUDU (peer-to-peer streaming service acquired by Walmart in 2010).  They are making a concerted effort to get top movies first.  This is a little upsetting to me because, A) Walmart; but more importantly I prefer the hassle of the movie theater visit -- at least for the top 10 (or so) pictures.  The children still exist and, oh boy do they want.  And there is no end to the siren song of the glowing rectangle, so the endless "pause it...I just have to respond to this one text" really takes the flow out of a movie.  Oh, and VUDU's app (or strategy) sucks -- Tivo shows a movie as "available" on VUDU, even if it's a pre-order offer that won't kick in until weeks after the Oscar show.  You can't find this out until after you log all the way into the service.  Walmart.

Now, after the jump, the awards (our choices, not our predictions, in bold...and, 'no', 'not' is not a prediction just because I bolded it.  Sheesh):  click here

Oscars 2015

It's a Nice Day for a...White Oscars 

Racism is dead in America.  We know, because John Roberts told us so.  And if white guys say it's over, it must be over, because we invented this shit.  So spare me the racial outrage at the all-white nominees.  The nominees were all-white in 1998 and that show got the highest ratings in 20 years. Just think of this year's show as the Boston Celtics.

Some broader thoughts before I get into the categories:

• Meryl Streep Earns Her 19th Nomination
• Enough now.  The coach of the Arroyo High School Girl's Basketball team was suspended for winning a game 161-2.  Streep keeps rolling along and no one says a word.  Maybe it's because the Arroyo Dolphins are named for an aquatic mammal.  Where's the Flipper outrage?!?

•  True Stories
• A bunch of the nominated movies and people are true stories -- American Sniper, Selma, The Theory of Everything, Foxcatcher, The Imitation Game.  Does this mean we've lost the ability to create?  Is story-telling dead?  Worry, not, gentle reader.  The "true stories" take so many liberties with the truth, they are very much akin to self-assessments I've written at work over the years -- eligible for a Pulitzer prize for fiction.  Here is a sample from the Hollywood Bubble:

• The Iraq war is black-and-white (there's that color issue again)
• George Wallace never regretted being a racist
• Lyndon Johnson didn't give a shit about black voting rights
• Alan Turing was a sociopath
• Stephen Hawking was a joy to live with
• Magneto shot JFK
• The one, incontrovertible truth, is Ed Norton playing a guy who's incredibly difficult to deal with.  Turns out, Ed Norton is a guy who is incredibly difficult to deal with.  
• Preferential Ballot System
• The top vote-getting movie might not win, thanks to a new, PBS.  The 6,000 or so voters rank all 8 movies.  The smallest stack of ballots (for the movie with the fewest 1st place votes) is removed and all of the votes redistributed to the other 7 stacks, and so on and so forth until a movie has 50% of ballots plus 1 vote.  It's a sort of a Bucklin voting system. Speaking of people I'd like to Buck, 

• Snubs
• The top grossing movies of 2014 were largely shut out of Oscarville -- Guardians of the Galaxy, Hunger Games, The Lego Movie, Transformers IV: Cross-Marketing Withdrawal is Hard -- these stacked up over $1 billion in receipts...and that's not counting the fat 11-year-old I saw sneaking into a Tom's River theater without a ticket. Yeah, I saw you, wide load!
• This also opened the door for a PAINFUL spate of Lego jokes {insert your own 'suck my brick' replacement here}
• The Black List
• This refers, not to the Red Scare hunt for Communists from 1947 to ~1960 or so, but to a poll of "most popular screenplays not yet produced".  Four pictures were on this "Black List", Foxcatcher, American Sniper, The Imitation Game and Whiplash.  Am I the only one struck odd, however?  Would you glibly resurrect the name of one of your darkest scandals for use with an "underdog" list?  I guess this isn't the crowd to ask to look in the mirror and report back reality.

Now, onto the awards (our choices, not our predictions, in bold...and, 'no', 'not' is not a prediction just because I bolded it.  Sheesh):

Best Original Screenplay 

As I've said previously, this is where the "sleeper" films come from.  This sleepiness is always on my mind during Lent.

• Birdman
• Clever story, head-scratching ending (but it took me less time to figure this one out than The Sopranos, and I grew to love that initially painful experience).
• Grand Budapest Hotel
• Clever, but Donna fell asleep, so it's not allowed to win.
• Boyhood
• Let me begin the Boyhood bashing right off the bat.  Ok, so they took 12 years to film it. And you can only sign a contract in the US for 7 years.  No longer.  And they got all of the same principles to come back year after year.  That's the only thing it had going for it.  It took 39 days to film in total.  And it shows.
• Foxcatcher
• Sienna Miller is one of those really good actresses (and really good looking people), that I can never identify.  Whenever she pops up on a talk-show, I think "I recognize her...or do I?"  What does this have to do with the screenplay?  Nothing.  And Foxcatcher shouldn't win because it's a true story. 
• Nightcrawler
• This is a very clever story, told in a very smart way.  But I only know that because someone told me.  Next time, I'll try to actually see all of the movies in this category.

Best Adapted Screenplay

"Adapted".  My son used to tell people he was "adapted".  Maybe one day he'll show up in this category.  For now, we'll concentrate our focus on:

• Imitation Game
• Loved this one.  It lost our Screenplay vote when I successfully predicted "Today, we call them computers".    
• Boyhood
• Hacky.  Don't even know why it made this category -- felt like a Lifetime movie to me. Must've been written by a white guy.    
• Theory of Everything
• This was a tough movie for me -- Stephen Hawking's disease and his wife's struggle supporting him made me think of my parents the entire movie.  I shed enough tears to screw up a pretty tasty vat of popcorn. 
• Whiplash
• A musician's movie, so I am probably rating it unfairly high.  But my athlete-wife enjoyed it, too, and the script had a healthy combination of some great jokes, clever witticisms and some unpredictable twists.
• Inherent Vice
• How did I miss this one?  It has graphic nudity.  I love my graphics naked.

Best Picture 

• Birdman
• Big fan of the dark comedy and quirky plot.  This had plenty of both, but we both felt there were "bigger" stories.  I guess this is like an MVP award in sports -- do you really want the scrappy 2nd baseman whose team made the playoffs because of his small-ball, or do you want the guy whose homers will be compared to Mantle and Mays?  You can say it.  It's alright.  I know.
• Imitation Game
• No I am NOT overrating this one because it's about the first computer.  Scott Matheson didn't overrate 2001: A Space Odyssey because the opening scene featured the first drum stick.  I overrated Whiplash because it's a musician's movie. 
• This thing is a big ole math problem, and they made it a relationship story, a persecution story, and a clock-is-ticking drama.  This is our choice, though we know it as much chance of winning as Turing did of shagging Keira Knightley.        
• Boyhood
• I'll stop the bashing now, but I have a feeling I'm going to feel that same awful sensation if it wins -- the one I felt at the very end of Lost when we find out they'll all dead and in Purgatory.  Don't be mad if you didn't see it -- I just did you a huge favor.

  

 

• Theory of Everything
• Beautiful film that deserved more box office and deserves a better chance at this award.  This is not a remake of some mix of Good Will Hunting, A Beautiful Mind and My Left Foot.  This is a love story, a story of struggle and of triumph.
• Whiplash
• I said before this is a musician's movie, but rent it anyway.  Even if you're a drummer.
• Grand Budapest Hotel
• This might've been too quirky for its own good, but it was a wonderfully entertaining movie.  Twists we couldn't see coming; laughs at unusual places.
• American Sniper
• We actually liked this movie, despite being told in advance that it is slanted; historically inaccurate; etc.  I really could've done without the "our guy is a hero, but your guy who does exactly the same thing uses his powers for evil", but Cooper's performance more than makes up for that.  Really quite good, if too binary in presentation.
• Selma
• And, finally, the movie that brought back the discussion about race, because Ferguson and Donald Sterling weren't enough to get the dialog going.  The truth is this is a powerful movie, even if you knew the details of the history.  But the direction is weak (sorry, I know Paramount blew nomination chances with its lack of distribution of DVDs, but I hated the way this was shot, cut and presented).  Some powerful performances (David Oyelowo was the one Paramount really screwed), but too much historical inaccuracy.  No JFK here, mind you, but with a better script, the actual MLK speeches and a different director, Selma wins.  Not this version.

Acting

Some great performances this year.  Here are our choices:

Best Actress

We have the two big slam dunks of female acting -- Bat Shit Crazy vs. Undeserved Dementia.  Our vote would go to Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl), but we're all living longer, so we all have a family member who makes us cry.  Julianne Moore is Aunt Dolly, asking me the name of my dog again.  We don't have a dog.  Julianne wins.

Best Actor

This is a category that's bound to disappoint in 2015.  Michael Keaton is a front-runner because he played sympathetic crazy in a smartly written movie.  Bradley Cooper does a phenomenal job playing a complex character who humanizes the tragedy of war (even if the movie demonizes Iraqis unfairly) who is also murdered**.  Steve Carrell turns in the performance of his career (and we've learned he has more range than comedy from Little Miss Sunshine and Seeking for a Friend for the End of the World), but no one saw this movie.

Our choice would be Eddie Redmayne (Theory of Everything).  Your reaction might be "it's easy to play a guy who can't speak and is stuck in a wheelchair", but he showed us both the progression of the disease and still communicated real emotion even after he began speaking through an American-accented 'puter.  Redmayne should win.  Keaton will.

**-Spare me, spoiler-alerters.  The guy's on trial right now.  Read a newspaper, fortheloveofgod. 

Best Supporting Actress.

We will readily admit that Patricia Arquette was the best thing in Boyhood.  But that is a limbo bar you step over.  This is a Lifetime movie that has one remarkable thing about it -- they were able to have 12 annual reunions where everyone made it.  My old wedding band, Cheers, has a better track record than that.  And the only thing we ever win is a Holy Saturday hangover and a bunch of flack from our wives.

Best Supporting Actor

Norton was great in Birdman, but he was playing himself (see above).  We actually liked Ethan Hawke in Boyhood, but we're soured on the hype for the "can you believe they actually..." blah blah blah shut it.  Do you know how many bad Doogie Howser jokes are in your future?!?

This should go to J.K. Simmons.  He didn't just play mean, he played complex mean.  You believed him when he said he needed to drive the best to see if they could become the best, yet you still feared him.  It was intense.  I'm biased because this is a musician's movie, but even my all-sports-all-the-time wife liked it.  Hoping for a Simmons win here.

And, still my favorite awards show moment of all-time.  I've posted it before, it deserves yet another run.  I'm counting on you, fellow narcissists.  Do the needful and be yourselves:

An Exciting Oscar Year...Which Ellen Will Ruin

Oscar Caps a Big Year 

There's a massive drought in California.  This is a metaphor for...I dunno...God's unhappiness with the Hollywood Heathens.  She is clearly fed up with them, so she cut off their water.  That explains the plethora of good looking people; the perpetuation of perfect weather; and a lot of alliteration for a Left Coast location.  California is also the nation's most populous state, it's largest economy and produces the most turkeys (and not just the ones directed by Steven Brill!)

This year's Oscars expose a bunch of things wrong with our society -- not things that demand the end of the species, but certainly enough for God to turn off the water:

• Her
•  Our anti-socialization campaign through technology is complete.  Siri is now sexy, so it's ok (and, let's face it...the only way most of us were getting Scarlett Johannson was to buy a license).  
• Nebraska
• We abuse our elders.  
• Gravity
• We litter in space.
• Blue Jasmine
• We molest (and then marry) our children.
• Philomena
• We sell our children.
• 12 Years a Slave
• We sell their parents, too.
• The Wolf of Wall Street
• We pile cocaine up so high that much of it falls to the floor unnecessarily.  
• Captain Phillips
• We go to sea forgetting all of the valuable lessons Wayne LaPierre has taught us.
• Dallas Buyers Club
• We blame people for their terminal illnesses if they live differently than we do (which reminds me: what were those Legionnaires up to at the Bellevue-Stratford?!?) 

And, most egregiously of all:

• American Hustle
• We show more Amy Adams cleavage than Jennifer Lawrence.

Best Original Screenplay 

As I've said previously, this is where the "sleeper" films come from.  This sleepiness affects your writing as well, so back off, grammar police.

• American Hustle
• Clever, but clearly a rip-off of Argo.  Not that I'm complaining -- my kids are listening to music that flashes me back to my cream-colored leisure suit and vinyl roofed Oldsmobuick with opera windows, so I'm in a happy, Disco Stu-friendly place.
• Dallas Buyers Club
• Donna's a big fan of true stories.  This one is moving without being depressing.
• Nebraska
• We laughed so hard we woke the kids**.  Our pick.
• Her
• VERY clever story.  The juxtaposition of a guy whose job is writing letters for other people against his love for an operating system is brilliant.  The technology component is distracting only because Donna asked if the next version of this movie would feature "OS/2" -- I spent 10 minutes of the movie trying to think of an IBM operating system joke that a non-geek from the '80s would get.  Fail.
• Blue Jasmine
• I am still willing to admit being a Woody Allen fan, despite realizing that all of our anxiety about Michael Jackson and children should have been applied to this creep.  Clever plot (and the usual brilliant dialog) obscured by a performance that genuinely makes you hate Cate Blanchett's character.

**-No, we did NOT have them sleeping in the back of the theater.  They were sleeping in the car in the parking lot.  We were really yukking it up.

Best Adapted Screenplay

"Adapted", in the way that I "adapted" Rodney Dangerfield's jokes for the last 30 years.

• 12 Years a Slave
• The acting was outstanding but the plot was completely predictable.  Give me Django Unchained.  
• The Wolf of Wall Street
• I was working for a Wall Street firm in the '80s (albeit in a support function...meaning there was absolutely no support for the IT guys having this much fun, let alone making a lot of money), so I know a lot of this stuff went on, but this is too aggrandized for my "how dare you leave me out of this kind of multi-year party" bitterness.    
• Captain Phillips
• Now I have to go watch the documentary made by a "real" Somalian pirate to hear his side of the story.  Who has this much time for pirates that aren't audioanimatronic?  
• Before Midnight
• I suppose it would be best to actually see a movie before rendering an opinion on it.  Screw that.  It's a dumb title.  I'm thinking of Eric Clapton playing in Thelonius Monk's band and bad things happening.
• Philomena
• Another true story, and one that hit home for us (besides having adopted a son...and worrying about stories of black market children from places like Guatemala...I was adopted in 1962 with, apparently, some involvement from Catholic Charities).  Our pick.

Best Picture 

• Her
•  Clever.  But we both found the giant face-scenes to be too much and too long.  Donna thought the entire thing was too long (a phrase she only ever utters to me when in a movie theater).  
• Nebraska
• This was original, well acted, beautifully shot and released in the wrong year.  Sorry, Mssrs. Payne, Nelson and Dern.  You're all going home empty handed.  
• Gravity
• Loved this movie, not just because of the 3D and not just because they took the idea of Sigourney Weaver in panties in space and made it into a whole movie.  It was edge-of-the-seat tense and surprisingly twisty-turny for a basic "stuck in space" plot.  But the implausible guy-riding-the-rubble of the World Trade Center ending was a distraction.  Let me know when the next Sandra In Panties flick is released.  Until then, no statue.
• Philomena
• Our personal choice, though we know it has no chance.  And not just because of Steve Coogan's stiff acting.  Touching and worth a view if you haven't seen it (and, apparently, many have not).
• The Wolf of Wall Street
• Huge Scorsese fan.  So many naked chicks that George R.R. Martin blushed.  Even remember the yacht moored in front of the World Financial Center with the helicopter on top.  But so much of this was a rip-off of Goodfellas (the bad guy walking and talking into the camera; the pop-music vignettes; the drugs) that I found it distracting.  Donna was disturbed for another reason...she was suddenly suspicious of my Wall Street career.  Until she remembered I don't have any money.  Or great party stories.
• Captain Phillips
• A little too over-the-top when 5 billion dollar Navy ships surround and take out a lifeboat.  But tense, well acted and gripping drama.
• Dallas Buyers Club
• Once you get beyond "holy crap, that's Matthew McConaughey?!?", a really well-written and acted story.  Reminds you how badly we all acted not too long ago.
• American Hustle
• Great cast and performances.  Only the 15th movie of all-time to have all four acting nominations.  The problem is that all of them (Coming Home; Network; For Whom the Bell Tolls; Streetcar Named Desire; Sunset Boulevard; etc.) are better than this.  And so is the last movie directed by David O. Sullivan, featuring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper -- SLP.  

And, our choice:

• 12 Years a Slave
• Our expectations were possibly set too high.  We both enjoyed this, but found the acting to be the only really compelling thing.  The plot was predictable and the bad guys just too dyed-in-the-wool evil to be interesting (forgive me, fellow white-guilters...I am not passing judgement in favor of slavery.  I am withholding judgement in favor of this being an all-time-great movie.) This will win because people believe they are supposed to vote for it.  

Acting

Some great performances this year.  Here are our choices:

Best Actress

Everyone is talking about Cate Blanchett's performance in BJ (give me a minute...ok.  My adolescent moment is over), but I hated her character.  I get that this indicates good acting, but I found it distracting.  I rooted against her, so I'm rooting against Cate.  Forgive me.

We like Judi Dench.  And not just because we laugh at everything Maggie Smith says in Downton Abbey.  She was genuine, in a way that you wish you knew this character in real life.

Best Actor

We really think Bruce Dern should win, but he won't.  When Chiwetel Ejiofor was getting whipped, we were getting whipped.  You saw his anguish, not in the obvious physical pain, but in the deep, deep loss of his family.  This is a lock.

Best Supporting Actress.

We haven't seen anything as funny as June Squibb in Nebraska in a long time.  But Jennifer Lawrence needs to win so we can bet on how many steps she'll take before falling.

Best Supporting Actor

We think is should be Jared Leto.  Not just because he really looked like a dragster.  He was funny, scathing and pained when needed.  But Hill, Fassbender or Abdi could easily win here.  The most balanced of categories.

And, on the flip side, we can't wait for the unbalanced.  Please, Hollywooders:  drink up.  Drug up.  Do whatever you need to do to let your inner self out.  What we're really looking for is something like this:

Movember -- Why Am I Doing This?

Movember -- The Why

Welcome to Movember. This is an attempt to raise awareness about men's health. While I think most of us know what the "right things" are, we apply them inconsistently -- at least I do. By talking about it every day in Movember (and growing facial hair -- hey, I didn't invent the thing), I hope to build a better set of habits. Each day I will post a picture of what should be a hairier and shrinking face. I aim to live healthier to ensure I'm here for my children longer, have the energy needed to help them in all things, and prove to my wife I still have a lot of testosterone.

We have lost a number of family members and friends to cancer.  Donna survived a bout of skin cancer 30 years ago.  There is a positively infinite number of fund raisers, awareness campaigns and media discussions about the disease.  I have to confess having two moments of paranoia myself, one ending with a very pragmatic doctor scolding me for thinking some persistent throat inflammation was a tumor.  But it is a forgivable self-diagnostic leap when it is part of our daily conversation.

Many years ago, I was fortunate enough to meet Dr. John Mikuta, a pioneer in the field of gynocologic oncology.  After he got a glass of ice and pulled the giant flask of pre-made manhattans out of his jacket pocket (he knew the hostess of the party wouldn't serve alcohol, so he took care of himself), he explained to me that medical science's understanding of the root cause of cancer had not advanced in 100 years.

 John Mikuta passed away in January of 2013.  I hope his flask is eternally full.

This was very troubling to me.  Think of the money we've invested; the researchers at NIH, Johns Hopkins, Memorial Sloan Kettering; the billions invested in drugs by Big Pharma.  It's humbling to realize that nature could guard her secrets this well for so long.  Or maybe just a realization that we're not as clever as we'd like to think.

Donna is always concerned that her cancer will return one day, so she keeps herself current on cancer research, treatment and trends.  She read an interesting book some time ago titled "Anti Cancer -- A New Way of Life".  The thing that struck me was the inspiration the author took from Stephen Jay Gould's diagnosis of mesothelioma.  Gould's doctor told him the average patient survives 8 months.  As a scientist and a writer, Gould wanted to know where to start researching on his own.  The doctor told him that none of the written material would be of much help -- certainly the standard "you're not a trained medical professional, so it will confuse rather than help you" dodge.  Gould didn't listen, dove into the statistics around other patients' experiences and took control of his own disease management.  He lived 20 years after initial diagnosis.  David Servan-Schreiber, one of the founders of Doctors Without Borders and author of Anti Cancer, had a similar experience.  Taking Gould's example, Servan-Schreiber managed his own process and lived 20 years with brain cancer before succumbing in 2011.

I am fully aware that these two anecdotes of extended survival times are not proof that managing your own disease, diet and lifestyle are causal.  But I am also deeply suspicious about what we know and do about cancer today.  The focus on early detection has certainly led to much more aggressive action than would be undertaken if we waited until patients were symptomatic.  Are we really extending life?  Having witnessed a dear friend deteriorate over the last three years, I wondered all along if she chose the proper paths.  She fought lung cancer aggressively and died.  Would she have died anyway?  Most certainly.  Did the treatments improve her quality of life, or extend it in a meaningful way?  We'll never know.  But I come away from all of this with one certainty only:  I will never put my life blindly into anyone else's hands, regardless of their experience and technical expertise.  Treatment is an option.  No treatment is also an option.  Diet, exercise and lifestyle may not prevent cancer.  But they are integral to health, so they have to be considered.  And statistics don't apply to me.  I'm going to die sometime between one of these keystrokes and 2083.  If I become sick, I will be the one to decide what steps are taken, not an actuary in a white lab coat.  I will follow John Mikuta's example and take care of myself on my terms.


Welcome to Movember!

http://mobro.co/glennthompson

Movember -- Humour

Humour

With a 'u'.  Gives it an air of respectability.  Aire.

I started the day off in a foul mood (the way I ended the previous evening).  Driving to work, I heard a news report from NY about Santacon.  I was unfamiliar with this particular event, which I think made it even funnier.  Santacon is a take-off on ComiCon, that ridiculous convention of all things from the Comic Book world:  the magazines themselves; movies related to them; TV shows; science fiction; science fantasy; straight fantasy; Dungeons and Dragons; World of Warcraft; and pretty much anything else that occupies the minds of 13-year-old boys...



...as well as larger, unevolved versions of the same.



Santacon, however, started as some sort of charitable event, but morphed into an excuse to have a winter boozefest...a veritable mid-term St. Patrick's Day, if you will.

So the WNYC news announcer, in serious "spawn-of-Cronkite" tone, said "The NYPD has asked bar owners not to serve alcohol to patrons dressed as Santa Claus".

This was enough to nearly cause me to crash.  Mercifully, everyone on Route 10 West at that moment was listening to the same program, because we swerved in such synchronization that it caught the eye of the one NASCAR fan on the IOC.


This fixed my wagon, as my mother used to say.  You'd be surprised how often my wagon was broken, according to her.  Perhaps it was a metaphor...for my ass.  "That'll fix your ass" works, but I'm shuddering thinking about what a "broken ass" would mean, so we'll get back on track...in 5...4...3...2...

Humor is an important part of my life.  I guess most people would say this.  But I think about it. Obsessively. Like a guy who went to a convention focused only on comedy.  What would they call it, now that "ComicCon" is taken?

I analyze comedy.  Categorize jokes.  Rate all-time comics the way we used to compare baseball players from all eras.  When Donna and I were getting serious (date #3), I put her through a series of comedy tests:

• What did she think of I Love Lucy?
• Which episode is better: Kramer's Kandy Kitchen or Vitameatavegimin?
• Life of Brian is the best Python movie.  True or False?
• Compare and Contrast: Moms Mabley, Phyllis Diller, Joan Rivers
• The Simpsons.  {just saying the name must evoke a positive reaction}
• Howard Stern is a radio broadcast imitation of Lenny Bruce.  Discuss.

The litmus test prior to getting engaged was the movie Arthur.  We rented it and watched it in her apartment in Maryland (we had a distance relationship at the outset, which is why things went so well at the beginning!)  I sat to her left on the couch and leaned back to see if she was laughing without prodding from me on which parts were funny.  (If you've ever watched an episode of The Simpsons or Modern Family with me, you know that I howl like there's a prize for maxing out a dB meter).  The Arthur test was on...

• "Steal something casual..."
• "You must have hated this moose"
• "It's what I live for..."
• and the pièce de résistance:  "Is this a joke?  Are these Polish girls?"

You know the outcome, because we're happily married for almost 16 years.  Better evidence is that she quotes Arthur as a matter of routine (e.g., any non sequitur in our house is met with "I have a brother who moved to New Jersey"...love it when my disease catches...BTW, message me if you know who said that without looking it up.  I'll be impressed.)

So I thought about how restorative that little Santacon laughter was for me today.  Laughter is the best medicine came from somewhere (albeit not from Big Pharma).

Physical effects

There have been studies done to determine if there is a physical benefit from laughter.  There are no definitive results, but there are clear benefits in disrupting stress cycles (like the one I had this morning) and breaking a bought of depression.  Hey, these are serious studies (and not by the guys who studied if "Ovulatory cycles have an effect on the tips of lapdancers...")  Holy Jebus, guys...if you want to go to a strip club, just tell her:

• "Honey, I'm a faithful guy and I don't do this very often, but I think it would be worthwhile if the boys and I had a night out at Stinkfinger Willies"
• OR, if that doesn't fit your relationship, try "We're working late...the boss will probably want to take me out for a drink or two to thank me for that...I have NO idea where we're going or what time we'll be home...but, wherever it is, there'll be bad cell reception."

Two endocrine response systems are particularly susceptible to stress:  the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis (HPA) and the sympathetic-adrenal-medullary (SAM) system.  I'm not as lost here as you might think -- I buy only HPA-free plastic bottles now and nobody is more sympathetic to Sam I Am than I am (or was it pathetic?)  HPA and SAM hormones bind to and alter the effects of immunologically active cells.  This means your stress level can, in fact, hinder or progress disease!  (Oh, and there is that other stress-related health issue...that a lot of us, under chronic, crushing stress, tend to eat poorly, skip the gym, smoke, drink and take other pharmacological paths to deal with the pain.  JAMA mentioned that one, too.)

Psychological stress has also been shown to impair vagal tone.  I don't have the first clue what this means, but I am thankful Donna had good vagal tone when we were dating (hell, I wouldn't have married her if she didn't).



The good news is that this health improvement is easy:  allow yourself to laugh.  Find things to laugh at.  Then laugh.  Let's be clear: we all also say "I've got a great sense of humor".  No you don't.  You enjoy laughing.  So do I.  But a very small subset of the population is good at making us laugh (and those people are GODS).

But I will offer you this:  allow yourself to laugh out loud.  My children all grew up thinking the funniest thing in the world was dad's idiotic cackling on the couch when a funny TV show was on.  Now they're all Simpsons fans.  I Love Lucy, too.  I don't know what Puritan or Victorian impulse causes us to put three fingers over our closed mouths and chuckle like one of the Queen's consorts after she farts.  Open your mouth, push a lot of air out and laugh naturally.  It's the greatest sound in the world and the cheapest medicine with absolutely no side effects (except that your kids may go to school and ask their teachers if they "pop out at parties" and are "unpoopular").

BTW, today's little driving incident was not my first near-laughter-crash.  That happened in 1985 on South Broad Street in Hamilton, NJ (then called Trenton because Jack Rafferty had not completed his life-altering campaign with the USPS to give them a one-word name).  Jimmy Tohill, Scott Matheson and I had just seen Return of the Living Dead at the Eric theater next to the Independence Mall.  Driving away from the theater, we were doing what guys do...repeating every funny line in the movie like we wrote it.  "Send more paramedics" almost caused us to need some.  Irony in action.

Movember On!

Movember, Day 19 -- Men's Social Health

Men's Social Health

Wait...what?!?  Social Health?  Men don't need to think about this.  We just do it.  And it takes the following forms:

• Drinking modest amounts of alcohol and watching sports
• Drinking excessive amounts of alcohol, telling our wives (or the police officer) that we only had modest amounts, and watching sports
• Drinking enough alcohol to prevent us from lying about the amount, and watching women
• Watching (or coaching) our kids in sports (and drinking alcohol afterwards)

As boys, our social networks revolve around our neighborhood, our school and extra-curricular activities. As adults, precisely the same thing happens, but it is done existentially through our kids.  Because children have an innate need to go in a direction 180 degrees from the one suggested by their parents, this often takes us on a path we have not traveled on our own.  (Having daughters does the same, but that's a whole other 10,000 word rant waiting to happen on another day).

I had an introspective moment last night, thanks to Debbie Kirsch.  The history of that relationship begs for its own post, but that's a level of typing that's liable to rub my fingerprints off entirely.  I'll hold on that broad topic about one of my favorite all-time broads until I need to crack a safe.

Debbie Kirsch was the President and resident Director of Hexagon Players of Mendham.  Sadly, she passed away at a very young age in September.  She was the singular force driving Hexagon for the last 15 years and no one could replace her.  I don't mean that in the "kind to the departed" sense.  I mean that literally.  She was:

• an experienced performer, so she knew how to spot, develop and manage talent.  
• childless, but loved them, so she built a rapport (hell, a relationship) with about 300 of them (no exaggerating).
• a senior marketing person with AT&T, so she had a strong commercial sense that allowed her to manage and promote a charitable organization.
• employed by a boss who supported her extra-curricular activities.
• a giant pain-in-the-ass who could get people, including strangers, to do things for her (or, more accurately, the company).

When Debbie passed away, many of us thought that Hexagon would as well.  She had a large support cast, but she set and drove the agenda.  Her dying wish, however, was that the company would continue.  In lieu of flowers, the family even asked people to make donations to Hex (it's a 501c3 -- I know, because my wife is the person who incorporated them!  And now, a shameless plug (because there is no longer a shameless link):

Beyond my involvement (and Donna's producing, choreographing, doing publicity or tickets -- no performing...sorry...only enough room in 5 Hope Farm Lane for one giant ham), our daughters have performed in over a dozen Hex shows between them.  

So here we are, sitting in a room in Mendham trying to find a path forward.  Cathy Malmstrom (a long time member of Hex and friend of Deb's) gave a history of the company at the behest of its founder, Les Fredericks.  It gave us all a chance to reflect on the amount of time and number of relationships directly related to this small community theater company. And it occurred to me that it happened to my family accidentally.  Kate El-Kadi's daughter, Tara, was in a show -- Oliver! -- in 2001.  Hexagon needed male performers, so Kate called and said "you're new to the area...we know you have trouble making friends because...well...you know...so why don't you audition?"  I did, got an ensemble part and, when another cast member had to drop out, played a last-minute Mr. Bumble**.  

In the "way forward" meeting last night, the room was filled with people that we consider our friends.  Some are closer than others, of course, but we have had meals with all of them; all have been to our house (at least for a cast party or two); and we are happy every time we see them.  Almost none of them would be in our lives were it not for the existence of Hexagon; Kate's experience with my anti-social behavior; and that PIA-In-The-Sky, Debbie.

But this happened accidentally.  Surely, if I had not auditioned for Oliver! in 2001, some other local activities would have filled our time.  But unlikely to have been community theater (Hexagon is Mendham's only option).  Deidre has such a lovely singing voice that she certainly would have been a musician regardless, but would she be a stage performer?  Alaina wouldn't without Deidre's example.

More importantly, this is an arts and education activity in our community.  Hexagon has done summer teaching programs.  Debbie directed five Mendham Township Middle School shows (she was such an important part of that community that the Principle used the emergency notification auto-dial system to let every family in the school know when she passed so the parents would be prepared to talk to their children...I got chills typing that).  Our floats in Fourth of July and Labor Day parades won awards.  A surprisingly large number of kids who are Hex Veterans went on to Broadway and national touring companies.  And our first-hand experience with this was accidental.

The defining moment in our Mendham community experience was around the show Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.  Debbie directed a free show in the Mendham Borough Park on a Friday night.  We estimate we drew around 600 people.  It was a great cast (I was the Pharoah who, if you know the show, was a thinly disguised Fat Elvis...now it makes sense, right?), a beautiful summer night and a very grateful local audience.  When Saturday night rolled around, we were in jeopardy of losing our only other performance (after two months of rehearsals) to a thunder storm.  As soon as the electrical activity started, the owner of the rolling stage and sound system shut us down as he couldn't risk losing his expensive gear.  We were about to lose a great opportunity, when Debbie had a brainstorm (trust me: inside that gray matter was a permanent, cataclysmic weather event like that 25,000 mile wide storm on Jupiter).  She got permission to move the show to Grace Lutheran Church.  We had no sets or lighting available.  Cast members got neighbors who were planning to watch the show to help carry costumes and props and walk them to the church (which is almost a mile away!)  There was no sound system, so I took another neighbor in my car, sped home and got some gear from the basement.  We set up a bunch of chairs, got the PA set up, loaded the CD with the music and fired away the performance.  The thunderstorm raged outside and the audience perspired inside.  During the emotional ballad "Close Every Door", Debbie shut the ceiling lights so we were completely in the dark.  One of the audience members pulled out a pocket flashlight and shone it on Joseph's face while he sang.  It was one of the most amazing things I've ever witnessed -- truly the "community" part of community theater coming out.

And our participation in this was all accidental (my personal qualifications to play Fat Elvis aside).  

So my Movember thought in the context of Movembering Hexagon forward is that we should actively manage our Social (and Community) Health.  Many of you already do this.  Most of the rest have plenty happening through your neighbors or kids.  But all of us should consider if we're doing enough...and value what these activities do for us.

Movember On!

**--In an odd twist, my last show with Hexagon was in 2012, around the time of Sandy, and it was Oliver! as Mr. Bumble.

Movember Awards Update -- The Movembies

The Movembies

Should call these The Crabbies, as this exercise has definitely drawn a crowd that walks sideways.

Some statistics before we get into the categories and potential nominees:

• 186 responses between FB photos and blog comments
• 22% of comments have been supportive (or posted by women I think are cute, so comments like "Knock this annoying s@#$ off, Creep" are filtered through Movembie goggles to come out "Knocks my s@#$ off, Clooney")
• There are only two (count 'em, 2) drinking references.  People are either being polite or assuming that calling it out is like saying Rob Ford likes to party now and again 
• There were four political references (three of them about ACA)
• Only 1 pubic hair reference (Art Feith)
• There was only one movie reference -- to Return of the Living Dead (thank you, Scott)
• More comments pointed out my lack of testosterone (6) than my advanced age (5) or general aesthetic disappointment (3)
• Mass Murderers were a popular reference point (Charles Manson; The Unabomber; Stalin; Fidel Castro; The Joker)
• The really offensive comments have come from women:
• Lori Quann ("I log on...and THIS is what I see?!?")
• Mary Kornick ("...made me jump")
• Kim Mastromarino (implied that I only own one t-shirt)

EXCEPT:

• Steve Gibson (who assumed that I lost my job, wife and heterosexuality all in the same sentence)

The Mid-Point Nominees

• Categories:

• Horizontal Hold is Off

• For the people who have sprinkled their abuse across a broad spectrum of categories
• Lori Quann
• Claire Palombi
• Shawn Hurley
• Tim Seaman
• Best Overall Joke
• Damian Proulx (for "JP Morgan Chafed")
• Celebrity References

• Bob Brabston (Barney Frank)
• Beth Brabston (Bates from Downton Abbey)
• Sue Marinello (Nathan Lane)

• Wake Me Up, Before You ShaveShave
• Several people took a while to realize what was happening, but the clear winner for delayed reaction is my niece Kim Mastromarino (November 16)
• Menage a Trois
• Beth Brabston ("I was told this was a picture of John Adams") and Bob Brabston ("I would not say he's out of the wino stage yet")
•