Bye Bye, Birthday

So ends another era. Oh, it's not significant in the grand or even minor scheme of things, but it was indeed a personal time for me, a tradition I kept for 28 straight years.

What I refer to is that every birthday, I would go to the cinema and (hopefully) enjoy a celebratory movie of choice. Sometimes this would be so important to me that I would pick a movie months in advance so we were living in the era of announced release dates for major films as though they were national holidays. Such is the modern day world of movies.

This ritual of mine, almost OCD in nature, began with special Christmas movie, something to cap off the end of a long holiday, the best of these being THE GODFATHER PART II and THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING in successive years. That practice began to be more difficult to maintain over time since I usually attended with a friend and, considering it was bloody damn Xmas, I began losing movie companions. Going to a movie by myself that night seemed to be a lonely and kinda creepy experience. Not that I had any qualms about flying solo any other time, my go-to modus operandi (my rationale was that I knew I wasn't going to talk during the movie). But Christmas night...I passed. I thought I'd feel like an outcast elf. 

Years passed and I finally decided to make it a birthday thang, beginning in 1993 with a perfect choice for me -Joe Dante's MATINEE, a sensational tribute to the films of William Castle set smack dab in the middle of the Cuban missile crisis. And yes, I went alone. 

This became like a special gift I could give to myself, something to give myself a break, pat on the back and reward myself for making it though another year. It allowed me to head into the next 363 days on a more or less positive note. Thus, this annual celebration of me was off and running.

Over time, my failing memory has caused me to momentarily (I hope) forget several films I've seen over the years, an unfortunately side effect of the passing of time. But I remember most of them and my track record for excellent film choices was pretty stinkin' good if I do say so myself (and I can because I have this blog) They are:

The aforementioned MATINEE, FROM DUSK TO DAWN, THE LORD OF THE RINGS TRILOGY (one right after the other), LA LA LAND, AVATAR, THE SHAPE OF WATER, PAN'S LABRYRINTH (all hail Guillermo!), BIRDMAN, STAN AND OLLIE, THE ARTIST, DJANGO UNCHAINED and NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. A couple of times, I'd up the ante with two movies on consecutive days as with NEBRASKA/THE WOLF OF WALL STREET and BLACK SWAN/TRUE GRIT.

Not a bad list, but there were a few clunkers like Peter Jackson's remake of KING KONG and THE FORCE AWAKENS, but they weren't crappy enough to ruin my day, just my taste buds. (See previous blogs; KONG-FOUNDED and THE FORCE WAKES UP AGAIN)

In 2020, I caught Sam Mendes' 1917, the last time I've set foot in a movie theater. While it wasn't the best of the bunch by any means, not even anywhere near my top ten, I was grateful to be able to have seen it on one the biggest screens in the area, a fine presentation that I certainly appreciated.

This year, it all came to an end. On January 29 (my birthday in case you want to get a head start on next year with the gift-giving), our illustrious governor Kate Brown of Oregon lifted the restrictions on movie theaters, allowing them to re-open with a ridiculous caveat. The theater capacity could be no more than 6 people. Well, isn't that just ducky. It would be unless you were a theater owner. Now it wouldn't matter to me really since I don't mind an empty auditorium all to myself. But in support of movie theaters in general, I say thee nay. Besides I ain't that comfortable eating in a restaurant, let alone sitting in the dark with a bunch of strangers. Not yet anyway, no matter how much I miss it.

So this year I still saw a new movie,  a very good thriller called THE LITTLE THINGS directed by John Lee Hancock and starring Denzel Washington, released simultaneously in theaters (somewhere) and HBO MAX. Another new normal that they assure is only temporary, but try getting that genie back in the bottle even at gunpoint.

The movie theater, as we once knew it, is fading away, another casualty of this life and time and another one to place in the loss column. 

Happy birthday to me.

Academy Awards Anonymous

Well, that wasn't very good, was it?

I guess that's the redundancy to end all redundancies but I really can't add or subtract anything to last night's Oscarcast, now the Velveeta of all cheesefests. I am reminded of Madeline Kahn as Lily Van Schtup in Blazing Saddles: "A wed wose. How owdinawy." This show could not have been blander if Ryan Seacrest* hosted. Instead we got ol' reliable Billy Crystal, playing safe and unfortunately sorry. Nothing worked for him. The crowd wasn't with him at all and his material just didn't jell. He's had too much time off and it showed. His Oscar stand-by material, the filmed opening putting Billy in all the nominated movies and the Oscar! Oscar! number were just clumsy. How do you parody Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close? "Hanks for the Memories." Yeesh. Playing it safe and inoffensive are not in the best spirits of comedy. But then again, Billy digging up Sammy Davis Jr. again brings out the PC crowd. "He went too far!" they whine while the other half of the dullards are saying "Sammy who?" The closest anyone got to edgy material at all was Chris Rock's line about black voice-over actors playing donkeys and zebras. "You think we get to play white people? Nah." I think the funniest parts of the telecast were Ellen Degeneres' JCP commercials.

No one embarrassed themselves too much, unless you count Emma Stone's lame bit with Ben Stiller who is looking more and more like his dad Jerry every year. They have the same kind of troglodyte body type. Cameron Diaz and Jennifer Lopez seem to be having some kind of fun that nobody else was having. Nick Nolte, who was just sitting there minding his business, not bothering anybody, did resemble a blood-engorged tick ready to pop at any second.

As for my final tally: I got 18 out of 24. Not too shabby. I said Hugo and The Artist would carry the night and I was right. I missed Meryl Streep though. She's (deservedly) nominated all the damn time. Why did they keeping treating her like Susan Lucci?

The Oscars are the long rung in the award season ladder and everyone just seems worn-out. After the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild, Critics Choice, BAFTA, Directors Guild, Writers Guild, the Academy Awards should be the Super Bowl. Now they're just another awards show...and it shows.

Oscar Picks His Nose

The title pretty much sums it up.

My feelings toward this year's Academy Awards amounts to Much Ado About Nada. It is basically an uninteresting selection of nominees. Once the academy upped the number of Best Picture contenders, the scramble went on to fit ten slots. This year, it's down to nine since they got screwed by a weak entry from Pixar. (I should note that, as of this writing, I've only seen two of the nine nominees. That's a moot point since this is all based on my expert analysis. Ahem.)

Therefore, since I don't have a dog in any of the fights, I'm just going to sit back and try to enjoy the show, a tall order indeed. (Hey, is James Franco going to be a presenter?) If Billy Crystal pulls it off this time around, he will be the undisputed champion of Oscar hosts.

So for better, nah, for worse, here are my best guesses for the winner on Feb. 26, 2012:

The Artist wins: Picture, Actor, Director, Screenplay and Score. (No screenplay award for Midnight in Paris. Woody is still seen as a New York filmmaker no matter where he makes his movies)

Hugo wins in most technical categories: Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design, Visual effects, Sound Mixing and Sound Editing.

The Help: Actress and Supporting Actress.

Beginners: Supporting Actor. (though it was worthy of a best picture nom in this weak group and the unsung Mary Page Keller for supporting actress)

The Descendants: Adapted screenplay (good movie. payne is incapable of making a bad film, just not up to his previous work)

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo: Film editing (longshot I'll go with since David Finscher's films are some of the best edited out there)

A Separation: Foreign language film

Rango: Animated feature

Paradise Lost 3: Documentary

Man or Muppet: Song (Two nominees and neither one gets a performance. Granted, this is usually the weakest part of the show, but this is an insult)

Harry Potter and the Long-Ass Title Part Two: Makeup (throw it a bone, for muggle's sake!)

The Barber of Birmingham: Doc short

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore: Animated short

The Shore: Live action short

By the end of Sunday night, we'll see how well I fared this year. Then I'll just switch over to The Walking Dead. We'll see which show has more zombies.