{"id":2532,"date":"2013-02-22T10:10:37","date_gmt":"2013-02-22T16:10:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/?p=2532"},"modified":"2023-07-20T21:00:06","modified_gmt":"2023-07-20T21:00:06","slug":"its-showtime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/its-showtime\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Showtime"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Oscar_45\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I\u2019m actually going to watch the Academy Awards Sunday night; something I haven\u2019t done in several years mainly because I rarely have seen many of the movies nominated; mostly due to\u00a0 my aversion to movie theaters. Don\u2019t worry, this isn\u2019t another rant complaining about the high price of admittance and popcorn or the deaf-inducing volume or even the noisy inconsiderate clods sharing the theater experience with me who feel duty bound to provide a running audible commentary during the entire show. I generally wait until the films come out On Demand and watch in the comfort of my own big chair surrounded by snacks and beverages provided at no charge; at least not at a thousand percent mark-up.<\/p>\n

But this year, I couldn\u2019t wait that long to see \u201cLincoln\u201d so Linda and I went. It was very good, although as I mentioned here before, I was sort of expecting director Steven Spielberg to provide a couple Civil War battle scenes as only he could..but instead got a lot of long speeches in dark rooms.<\/p>\n

I also went to see the nominated \u201cZero Dark Thirty.\u201d It too was interesting and well acted. It also lived up to the title since the half hour scene at the end.. of the Seals going after bin Laden.. was shot so dark\u00a0you wished they would have passed out night vision goggles in the lobby before the show so we could see it on screen.<\/p>\n

My cousin wanted to see \u201cDjango Unchained\u201d so we checked it out a couple weeks ago. For some reason, Hollywood is in love with Quentin Tarantino who writes and directs these shockingly violent blood splattered masterpieces like \u201cPulp Fiction\u201d \u201cInglorious Basterds\u201d and this silly spin-off, which amounts to a cross between\u00a0 old spaghetti westerns and a Sam Pekenpaw production in which bags of blood explode and spray after every impact of lead on human flesh..and there are hundreds if not thousands of them in \u201cDjango.\u201d The movie is also peppered with expletives in which the \u201cF\u201d word flies as often as the bullets and in such a variety of usages be they adjectives, verbs or nouns. \u00a0Worst of the abusers is Samuel L. Jackson who plays the \u201cUncle Tom\u201d character as longtime head of Leonardo De Caprio\u2019s family plantation. He plays fast and free with the \u201cN\u201d word to the point where it would make an Alabama audience squirm. Anyway, I thought it was just a goofy movie and felt a bit guilty liking it.<\/p>\n

The highly touted Ben Affleck film, \u201cArgo\u201d was On Demand so Linda and I watched it at home and enjoyed it very much. The cast is really good and the plot (even though we know how it ends) is sufficiently tense and exciting but It just didn\u2019t leave me awed like it has some who believe Affleck\u2019s being snubbed for best director is tantamount to treason.<\/p>\n

Last but not least, I took Linda to see \u201cSilver Linings Playbook\u201d Thursday..and, unlike any of the other best picture nominees, it has really stayed in my head for some reason. Again, I don\u2019t know why these movies feel compelled to throw the f-bomb in every other word of the script, especially when it really doesn\u2019t add a thing to the story and will take forever for editors to bleep it all out for TV.\u00a0\u00a0 Anyway, it\u2019s what I\u2019d call a serious romantic comedy that had me hooked from the start. The performances by Bradly Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence truly capture the fine line between crazy and\u00a0normal. Robert Di Nero\u2019s character (his best work in years) also treds on a balance beam between nice and nuts. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cSilver Linings Playbook\u201d is my favorite of the bunch but it really doesn’t stand much of a chance in any of the nominated categories..except maybe for Di Nero as best supporting actor.<\/p>\n

Oh, I know, there were NINE movies nominated for best picture this year which, in my opinion, is four too many. Nominations are getting to the point that they\u2019re handed\u00a0like\u00a0gold stars in grade school. Give ’em to everybody so there are no hurt feelings.<\/p>\n

I just couldn\u2019t get myself into the mood to see \u201cLes Miserables.\u201d \u00a0The clip of Russell Crow singing or Anne Hathaway\u2019s clip of being clipped are bad enough but sitting through three hours of this tired old French fable that even has\u00a0the word miserable in it..is too much to bear..or pay for; at least until it comes out on my home TV and I need something really sad and depressing to get out of my happy mood.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m also not big on anything by director, Ang Lee. Lots of people (including the critics) \u00a0liked that crouching tiger hidden dragon thing he directed a few years ago featuring gravity defying Asian people running through trees. It was 2 \u00bd hours of my life I\u2019ll never get back and wasn\u2019t about to invest in his latest fantasy flick, \u201cLife of Pi.\u201d<\/p>\n

The film \u201cAmour\u201d is up for an Oscar. It\u2019s about a French couple coping with the complexities of getting old and losing one\u2019s marbles. I don\u2019t think \u201cAmour\u201d which is sub-titled, has even been shown here yet. I can wait to see it.<\/p>\n

The other nominee, \u201cBeasts of the southern wild\u201d is now available to watch at home but I haven\u2019t yet although I\u2019m anxious to see the performance by that 9 year old girl with the funny name; maybe i’ll shell out the five bucks to watch it this evening after I CLEAN THE\u00a0 SNOW OFF MY SIDEWALKS.<\/p>\n

I picked up some popcorn at the store just in case<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m actually going to watch the Academy Awards Sunday night; something I haven\u2019t done in several years mainly because I rarely have seen many of the movies nominated; mostly due to\u00a0 my aversion to movie theaters. Don\u2019t worry, this isn\u2019t another rant complaining about the high price of admittance and popcorn or the deaf-inducing volume…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[60],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2532"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2532"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11677,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2532\/revisions\/11677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}