Live-blogging is dead. Long live Facebooking the Oscars. Or at least according to me and Bill and Ryan. The three of us Facebooked the Oscars rather than live-blogging them and it was quite enjoyable. We were joined by Pax and Rory and Deidre and Neil and many others and this morning I awoke to 42 notifications from late commenters on each of our many updates. However, don't think this means I'll be reviewing the show because that's what the Facebook updates were all about. We updated throughout, and we're all quite pleased that The Hurt Locker, despite it being none of our first choices for Best Picture, won out over the box office juggernaut Avatar (one of the few cases ever where I can use the term "box office juggernaut" and feel that cliche is completely justified) in both the Best Director (Kathryn Bigelow) and Best Picture categories. But I didn't post anything on that. My last update was about Sandra Bulluck in which I, not so delicately, said I liked her despite her sorry rep around the movie blogosphere. I stand by that (and thank all those who agreed).
I haven't seen The Blind Side and don't know if she deserved Best Actress any more than 90 percent of all Oscar winners have ever "deserved" their Oscars. I just know she is a talented actress who has been in
a veritable treasure trove of awful movies and it's all those bad movies that helps sink her reputation. I won't judge an actor for taking the movies that come along to keep her career going especially if that eventually leads to a moment where said actor is accepting an Oscar. Besides, she made Love Potion #9 work, and that's one of the silliest movies ever made. You know what else she made work? Speed. If you've just got Keanu Reeves and his deadpan, no, scratch that, corpse-like delivery, that movie is sunk. Bullock made it work much better than it should have. No, she couldn't save Speed 2 but that's like criticizing an ant for not being able to stop the flow of Mount Vesuvius. Jesus Christ could have stayed on the cross for three years and not saved Speed 2. Humanity, yes, Speed 2, no.So maybe the problem, or criticism, of Bullock is that people think it says something about someone so willing to appear in so many bad films. Something about her taste or judgment. Well, how many of our favorite character actors from the past have appeared in their fair share of stinkers? We remember the great ones and forget the countless duds. Fact is, I admire someone for accepting what roles come along in an effort to keep working because too many actors find themselves atop a shining hill in which only those roles "suitable to their grand talents" will be entertained. Michael Caine taught the post-studio controlled movie world that a real actor takes what comes along and doesn't complain. And Bullock does too. And bully to that!
35 comments:
The Thing called Love. Sandy in the pajamas with feet!
Never saw that one. There are soooo many Sandra Bullock rom-coms it's hard to know which ones you've seen and which one you haven't. But adult pajamas with feetsies - I want some!
I couldn't agree more about Sandra Bullock. She also made "The Proposal" work, and with almost any other actress, it'd would have been a steaming pile of crap. I haven't seen "The Blind Side" either and I don't know if she deserved the award, but I was happy for her all the same.
Why don't you marry her, loser?
Pat, there have been so many times when the acting award has gone to the movie rather than the performance. With The Blind Side not being a very big movie in Hollywood like Avatar or The Hurt Locker but rather a smaller film that never gets a lot of attention it feels like she got it for all the right reasons.
Hey Bill, why don't you stop hating, craptard?
It's all about balance. She wins the Oscar for the one she shouldn've gotten for Murder By Numbers. Why isn't "the profile doesn't fit the profile" as famous a movie line as "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn" or "Get the butter"?
Live FaceBooking is where it's at, clearly. What I like about doing that, as opposed to live blogging (which I've never done for anything), is that it's immediate. The page auto-refreshes so the conversations can flow organically and it can take place easily across multiple pages. I didn't plan on live FaceBook-ing it but that's the most I've enjoyed the ceremony in years, frankly (and Cameron's film being snubbed in almost every substantial category didn't hurt).
I used to have a distaste for Bullock but I liked her in The Blind Side and her speech was the highlight of the evening. Many times when the winner is humbled it feels forced. She seems like she really meant every word of it.
Never saw Murder by Numbers either. Just how many movies has Bullock made anyway?
The blogger profile doesn't fit the blogger profile.
That's going to be my new tagline.
She seems like she really meant every word of it...
Ryan, that's how I felt about it too. As if being sincerely modest or self-deprecating means she knows she's a fraud or something. She just doesn't walk around thinking, "Hey I deserve Best Actress, not you!" I'm sure there are several winners who have the "I deserve it" attitude than not. I think modest and humility in the movie industry throws people off. Understandably, mind you.
I also had a great time facebooking it. Live-blogging means you go into "edit", update your post, have people find the update, make the comment, have it approved, etc. With Facebook it's all instant, like an actual conversation. I'm glad you and Bill were Facebooking with me.
Me too. Damn good times.
I really liked "The Thing Called Love."
Well-said, Greg. I thought her speech was lovely and funny, and she showed her good timing by somehow transitioning from the moving stuff about her mom to that perfect closing line about "my lover, Meryl Streep." I also liked her in DEMOLITION MAN (she holds that movie together in the same way you rightly note about SPEED), and THE LAKE HOUSE. She's really pretty amazing in the last one-- funny and sad and wistful, and her investment in the character really sells what might otherwise be a strained fantasy conceit. I'd also second Pat's comment about THE PROPOSAL.
I wish The Thing Called Love were on Netflix Instant so it wouldn't take a DVD slot.
Brian, Demolition Man has long been a sci-fi guilty pleasure of mine. She is a welcome, welcome antidote to Stallone and Snipes in that film. I'm still waiting for the Fast Food wars that movie promised. I just hope Taco Bell doesn't really win.
THANK YOU for posting this! I really like your blog and will be back!!
Steve
Common Cents
http://www.commoncts.blogspot.com
Greg, I like your sensible, generous comments about Bullock. Also I completely agree with your conclusion that an actor isn't degraded for life by appearing in the occasional stinker-- it builds their skills and keeps them afloat. The reference to Michael Caine was spot-on. Once I heard an interview where his interrogator was trying to shame him for his bad movies. Caine said, "The role may have been terrible, but the house it built was magnificent!"
I hated live-Facebooking this with you and Ryan, and thought Bullock came off like an evil lunatic. Howzzat grab ya!?
Word verification: orkobbit!
Margaret, I also love that story Dustin Hoffman told about being offended as an actor when he heard Caine say he sometimes chose movies based on their location but once he (Hoffman) got a little older it all started to make sense.
Bill, I am going to ignore your hateful rants. But I will point out that facebooking is live by its very nature so your addition of "live-" in front of it was superflous.
I have no word verification as I am the author of the blog but I will assume it would have been:
zubtorious
What does "superflous" mean?
Same thing as superfluous only without a 'u' because I find the 'u' superfluous when I'm typing fast.
You should have made your way over to Twitter. The place was jumping last night. Roger Ebert was there and even William Gibson (one of my favorite sci-fi writers) was sharing his thoughts about the awards.
As for Bullock... she hasn't appeared in one film I've enjoyed and I find her utterly forgettable. My feelings for her drift somewhere between bleh and ugh. But I'm glad someone was happy to see her win. I was rooting for Helen Mirren because I'm always rooting for Helen Mirren. I really want to see An Education and if I had, I may have been rooting for Carey Mulligan.
Kimberly, Carey Mulligan was excellent in An Education. I was thoroughly impressed and expect great things from her in the future. And Mirren has always been a favorite. I'm not saying I think Bullock is a better actress than Helen Mirren, just that I'm happy someone who has worked steadily and kept her career going through so much crap got some recognition. I don't think that's such a bad thing, especially when the Oscars never give out awards to the actual Best achievements of the year anyway.
I think Bullock is a very solid actress. She usually doesn't take movies that have the flashy dramatic roles where an actor can shine, but I thought she was very good in the few more demanding roles I've seen her in. To name 3 - 28 Days, Murder by Numbers (where she was very convincing as a slightly disturbed police detective), and in a supporting role in Crash.
Patrick, that's two recommendations now for Murder by Numbers (the first a little further up the comments from Arbogast). I think I'll give it a look. I also think you sum her up pretty well - solid, not flashy and for my money, dependable. The movies may not be all that good but she always is.
tdraicer:
I think I've seen her in only two films (Speed and...something else) but she was very good in Speed and fine in...something else...so I certainly hope she enjoys her Oscar.
She was fine in something else. I remember thinking that too. Actually, something else may be her best performance. It was really... something else.
I caught Murder By Numbers on some cable station a couple of years ago, and remember wondering where it came from, since a Bullock movie usually gets some attention when released and I had never heard of it. Doesn't rate very highly at IMDB, so I may be out of step on that one, but I thought it was good. Also stars Ryan Gosling, who is considered an up and comer....
I've heard it's her best performance so I'll definitely see it.
I thought maybe Arbogast's recommendation of MURDER BY NUMBERS was sarcastic...
I made the same assumption and ignored it so as not to encourage it further. Thanks for bringing it up.
You'd have room for more Sandra Bullock movies on your Netflix queue if you remembered to mail back the ones you've watched. That's how Netflix works.
As to how many films has Bullock made, that's why IMDb was invented.
word: rebologi
I assume that's the study of all things related to Reba McEntire.
I minored in rebologi but never did anything with it.
And the netflix DVDs usually sit around the house for about three to four months on average. Now that instant can be watched on television, I use it mainly for that. And it's a renaissance quite frankly. I see anywhere from one to two movies a day now whereas it used to be one or two a week.
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