Golden Globes 2012

The Golden Globes presentation ended about an hour ago.  They are awards for both movies and television handed out by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.  They have been given since 1944 and are sometimes considered a good indicator of what awards will be handed out at the Oscars.

The key movie awards:

Best Motion Picture, Drama – The Descendants

Best Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy – The Artist

Best Animated Film – The Adventures of Tintin

Best Foreign Language Film – A Separation

Unlike last year I have not yet seen any of the four films that won, so I cannot comment on them.  Like last year, I will be reviewing as many of the Oscar nominated films as I can and all four of these will likely be among them, so I will write about them then.

In case you are interested in the television awards, Homefront won for Best Television Series – Drama and Modern Family won for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy.

A few thoughts:

The Hollywood Foreign Press seemed to want to avoid tough choices so they moved The Artist into the Comedy/Musical category to get it away from The Descendants.  They then really avoided choosing a favorite by picking Martin Scorcese as Best Director for Hugo.  Best Screenplay went to yet another movie – Midnight in Paris.  They even awarded George Clooney (The Descendants) and Jean Dujardin (The Artist) Best Actor for each of the movies, while not awarding either of the Best Supporting Actress nominees from the movies.  The only thing separating them at all is the Best Score award that went to The Artist.

As expected, both Meryl Streep (Drama) and Michelle Williams (Comedy/Musical) won Best Actress in their two categories for The Iron Lady and My Week with Marilyn, respectively.

I’m kind of surprised that Rango didn’t win Best Animated Movie, considering it seemed to be a favorite of critics and it starred Johnny Depp, who the Hollywood Foreign Press has a huge crush on. 

I have not seen Homefront, so I cannot judge how it stacks up to Game of Thrones, but I was disappointed the latter did not win.  At least Peter Dinklage won for Best Supporting TV Actor for his role in the show. 

Octavia Spencer won Best Supporting Movie Actress for playing a character, who among other things, defecates into a pie plate.  She beat out Melissa McCarthy, whose character defecates into a sink.  Boy, it sure is good seeing that women can be just as gross as men onscreen [sarcasm].  Hey Hollywood, how about we don’t have any defecation – male, female, or otherwise - onscreen anymore?  While you’re at it, get rid of all the projectile vomiting scenes, too.

And as I wrote last year – if you were hoping to read snotty comments about what the women wore to The Golden Globes then I’m afraid I’m going to disappoint you.  You see, I have a Y chromosome and what the actresses wore means little to me. 

I’m sure you will be able to find any number of critics who are willing to trash some of the women for not paying enough attention to them on the red carpet.  If they go beyond insulting the woman’s dress, hair, shoes, weight, etc. and get into comparing her to movie monsters or serial killers then you know that the actress really must have done something to piss off the critic.

You may be saying, “But Chip, just because you’re a man doesn’t mean you won’t notice what they were wearing.  I see men on TV commenting on fashion all the time.”  To that I would say, “You are correct.  Unlike those men, though, it’s not the clothes that a woman wears on the outside; it’s what’s on the inside that matters to me.”

Special Exception to this – Jayne Mansfield at the 1960 Golden Globes.  It starts at the 16 second mark.  Keep watching for Mickey Rooney to join her.

In case you are wondering who they are talking about, Cantinflas was a Mexican comic actor.  He was actually the biggest star in the world in the 1950s.  He is probably best known to American audiences for playing Passepartout in the 1956 film (and Best Picture Oscar winner) Around the World in Eighty Days.