This is bullshit.  Early this morning in Beverly Hills, the Academy Award nominees (see the entire list here) were announced, and as expected "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" leads the pack with 13, including Best Picture, Best Director for David Fincher and Best Actor for Brad Pitt.  Also as expected, Heath Ledger was nominated for his work in "The Dark Knight".  Now this is where everything goes to hell, because "Knight" didn’t get a nod for Best Picture or Best Director and "Gran Torino" was shut out completely.  "Torino" and "Man On Wire" were the best movies of the year, and they're gonna be ignored.   I'm sure "Wire" will lose to some hippie nonsense about war.  "Milk" was like watching a fish tank for two hours it was so damn dull, but of course it got the nod in all the major categories.  I’d rather have watched actual milk for two hours.  Just pour it in a bowl and I'll stare at it until noon.  There's no way that could be any more dull.

4:46pm - I don’t know who most of these people are, and I hate many of the ones that I do know, and also I didn’t see most of these movies, but I have heard of many of them, and I have seen several other movies, including Die Hard and one with dinosaurs.  So with that, here we go, live blogging the Academy Awards.

5:06pm - Conan O'Brien looks awful. Is he sick or something? 

5:27pm - What's red and has big teeth?   

5:30pm - I like the opening.  It's about time the actors got some of the attention.  For too long they've toiled in anonymity. 

5:37pm - Tommy Lee Jones looks like he'd be a lot of fun.

5:38pm - I'd rather watch "2 Girls 1 Cup" again than "Atonement".

5:50pm - So they did one award and then kissed their own ass for 10 minutes?  I hope they have time for Best Picture.  They have a pretty full plate. 

5:55pm - I'm glad that French movie won best make-up.  That lead actress went from a brunette to a brunette with her hair in a bun!  Sorcery!

6:16pm - Jennifer Hudson like's to.  Read.  The cue cards.  Haltingly.   

6:31pm - Do I have the wrong channel on?  Is this is English?  Are there subtitles available for this.

6:39pm - I think Javier Bardem should have won for Best Supporting Actress as well.   I know he wasn't nominated for that but so what.  He was that good.

6:53pm -  The chick singing that song is dating Seth Green.  Combined they're almost 18 inches tall.

7:05pm - The Oscar for Sound Editing is chosen by picking a name out of a hat, because no one has any idea what the fuck that is.

7:12pm - In case you’d forgotten, the Academy Awards would like to remind you that actors, even ones who aren’t nominated tonight and may or may not be alive, are fucking awesome.

7:12pm - I don't think it's a huge leap to announce that the chick who just won Best Actress must have given a ton of blowjobs in the past month.  Marion Cottiwho?  Who the fuck is that?

7:21pm - I don’t know who is singing this fourth song.  Does it even matter?  God this is fucking awful.

7:37pm - You know those vapid bourgeois fucks in the audience don't care about this old guy.  "Me me me!" 

7:49pm - Remember Monchichi?  It was a toy monkey.  If not, one is presenting Best Song right now. 

8:00pm - This is pretty much the only way "Atonement" is tolerable.

8:14pm - I'm so sick of hearing about discrimination.  It's nothing but an urban legend. 

9:20pm - The guy who won best documentary mentioned the Extraordinary Rendition program.  And the hippies all clapped and said, "yeeah".  How many people there do you think know it was created in 95 under Clinton.

9:32pm - The winner for best original screenplay used to be a striper in Minneapolis.  I won a Hot Buns competition in Panama City and am also a screenwriter.  Coincidence?  Umm, yes, actually.

9:42pm - was there any doubt Daniel Day Lewis was gonna win for Best Actor?  And that his acceptance speech would be confusing. 

9:43pm - Paul Thomas Anderson got screwed.



The Academy Awards are scheduled for Sunday, February 24th, but at this point no one knows what it will be like because of the ongoing writers strike.  Jon Stewart is scheduled to host but has said he won't cross a picket line, a sentiment shared by many actors.  Most actors are pretentious dicks but they have been extremely cool in their unwavering support of the writers.  It just goes to show you can't judge a book by it's cover.  Or by the pages inside apparently, because actors really are insufferable.  Anyway, in the sprit of optimism, the nominees were announced very early this morning.  Some of the highlights:

Best Picture: "Atonement," "Juno," "Michael Clayton," "No Country for Old Men," "There Will Be Blood."

Actor: George Clooney, "Michael Clayton"; Daniel Day-Lewis, "There Will Be Blood"; Johnny Depp, "Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street"; Tommy Lee Jones, "In the Valley of Elah"; Viggo Mortensen, "Eastern Promises."

Actress: Cate Blanchett, "Elizabeth: The Golden Age"; Julie Christie, "Away From Her"; Marion Cotillard, "La Vie en Rose"; Laura Linney, "The Savages"; Ellen Page, "Juno."

Supporting Actor: Casey Affleck, "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"; Javier Bardem, "No Country for Old Men"; Hal Holbrook, "Into the Wild"; Philip Seymour Hoffman, "Charlie Wilson's War"; Tom Wilkinson, "Michael Clayton."

Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett, "I'm Not There"; Ruby Dee, "American Gangster"; Saoirse Ronan, "Atonement"; Amy Ryan, "Gone Baby Gone"; Tilda Swinton, "Michael Clayton."

Director: Julian Schnabel, "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"; Jason Reitman, "Juno"; Tony Gilroy, "Michael Clayton"; Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, "No Country for Old Men"; Paul Thomas Anderson, "There Will Be Blood."

It seems the big story is all the nominations for "Juno".  I never saw that one.  It sounds like a board game that involves steady hands and cunning.  The big surprise is probably Angelina Jolie not getting a nod for "A Mighty Heart", a movie seemingly made for that one reason.  Their mistake was making Angelina all ugly.  No one wants to go to a movie and look at ugly people.  It could have been the same movie but with Angelina in a half shirt and boy shorts, and with way less talking and way more car washing.  These people have a lot to learn about how to make a good movie.