Birthday Bloggage: Reflection Time!

Tomorrow, yikes!, is my birthday. I don't want to say I've been depressed, exactly, about this approaching birthday, but I have at least been nigh on discomfited, mostly along the lines of "why the !@#$%&* haven't I accomplished everything I wanted to have accomplished by now?!"

But that's never a really useful birthday-approaching thought process, now is it?

So I decided to give myself some good advice: "Accentuate the positive!" (so original, I know), and to take said good advice from myself, that is to say, to think about things that I DID do during the past year.

Some things I did while I was (*) years old:

• Worked on the writing of three new books -- yes, I now have three books in active progress.
  Negative spin: I have so many works in progress and haven't finished any of them.
  Positive spin: I have put into action THREE new book ideas and made progress on all of them! 
• Wrote a bunch of songs.
  Negative spin: What am I going to do with them? And they might all be terrible.
  Positive spin: Holy shite I've been writing songs! Like, lots of songs! I've discovered this whole new part of myself over the past nine months. It's incredible and I seriously don't know what to make of it, but I'm digging it. 
• Traveled all around the Midwest and even some other parts of the U.S., with no small number of road trips during the last year, having driven to: Iowa (twice), Nebraska, Wisconsin (several times), Michigan, Indiana, and we mustn't forget St. Louis for the total solar eclipse which was AWESOME and, related to the point above, was the genesis of the first song I wrote, an eclipse metaphor about the universe/love/life that just kind of poured out of my brain while I was sitting on the highway in post-eclipse traffic trying to drive back to Chicago.
  Negative spin: I didn't get to go on the Habitat for Humanity trip to Prince Edward Island I'd been planning to attend. Positive spin: So f-ing what? I got to see family, friends, three weddings, and the super-cool eclipse event that was apparently the opening of a new chapter in my life. 
• Lost weight - I finally shed all those back-in-the-U.S.A pounds.
  Negative spin: Don't really have one. Except that so many of my clothes are too unwearably big, ha! 
• Took even more classes at the Old Town School of Folk Music aka my second home these days, adding to my regular weekly guitar class several more including guitar fingerboard theory, vocal techniques (twice), songwriting (see above!), and perhaps foremost in my joy the Modern Country Ensemble, which I enjoy so thoroughly that I am now taking it for a fifth session in a row. It is a joy and a treasure, and every sixteen weeks we perform a real live gig. My Monday nights at the Old Town School are such a given, and now Tuesdays too...
  Negative spin: I'm busy. Positive spin: I love it. 
• Became a regular volunteer at the Old Town School of Folk Music, which enables me to afford everything I just mentioned in the previous point.
  Negative spin: Yup, really busy. Positive spin: I love it. 
• Made new friends. Building community is hard enough when adults stay put, and I gallivant about the world so much that I may have had it even harder, plus I actually really need solitude and seriously carve out time each week to be alone, but whether it was the whole staying-in-one-place-for-three+-years thing, or the whole hanging-out-with-music-people and hanging-out-with-books-people and hanging-out-with-yoga-people things, I have definitely made actual new friends during the past year, which is interesting and nice. I mean, I'm disgusted with so much of humanity (negativity!) that it's rather nice if rare when I find humans I like (positivity, check it!) 
• Finished my Prez Bio reading up through Dubya, which technically is the completion of my Prez Bios reading project, which you'll recall was launched during Dubya's administration and was called Reading a Biography of Every President In Order, To See Where We Went Wrong. Of course, since then we have gone even wronger, and I am going to also read books about Obama (after which point the presidency dies and my project dies with it so don't you even dare suggest...) but I did technically make it to the "end" of what I set out to do. Finally!
  Negative spin: What took me so long? Positive spin: I did that! 
• Speaking of books, some of the great ones I read this past year: A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, Under the Big Black Sun: A Personal History of L.A. Punk by John Doe et. al., Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process by John McPhee, Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Enlightenment by Robert Wright, American Plays of the New Woman ed. by Keith Newlin, and La vida util de Pilo Polilla  by Vivian Mansour Manzur, along with a bunch of other good and some not-so-good ones, AND I recently led in my local store the book group discussion of The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer, which was the inaugural selection of the Barnes & Noble nationwide book club. 
• Found interesting English/ESL teaching work with some non-profits, mostly teaching immigrants, which led me to discover how much more enjoyable it is to teach these classes as opposed to the for-profit school for which I'd been working (and which I swear drove me to drink) the previous couple of years here in Chicago. That was interesting to learn.
  Negative spin: I seriously didn't want to go back to the classroom at all... Positive spin: Work. Work earns money. Work accomplishes things. Work it. 
• Speaking of work, at all three of the part-time jobs that I had one year ago and still have, I have had my accomplishments recognized with different positions/training/new responsibilities kind of things. Negative spin: They weren't promotions to full-time massive-money-making career ops. Positive spin: Employers recognize that I am smart and do things.

And ya know, those are just a.) the easily listable things b.)that I'm willing to discuss on a public blog. I have also done other things on philosophical, personal, introspective, and psychological levels that either aren't as quantifiable or easy to notate or don't really need to be delineated here or whatever. But my point is - it was quite a year, now that I stop to think about it.

AND I saw Indigo Girls perform four times during it, plus Emily Saliers' solo show. So there. Not to mention dozens of other bands and singers, and totally I didn't mention how much new music I came to know about because of Spotify. I even succumbed to Spotify Premium this year. Consider me thoroughly Spotified. . 

AND I saw a bunch of good movies. 

AND I spent so much quality time with my kittens like you would not believe. 

AND I de-cluttered my closet and got rid of clothes I don't wear anymore and got rid of some other stuff around the house, too.

AND I continued to discover new restaurants and happy hours and hiking (walking) spots around Chicago and to look at the Lake on a regular basis. 

So although I did not in fact really conquer life, the universe, and everything in the ways I had planned to do... I did other things instead! 

Let's see what the next year brings. 

A Brief History of My Week

What happened was, on Tuesday night I was on Facebook, engaged in multiple conversations on my and others' pages/status update threads, about three horrible things that had all happened, to wit: #trumptydumpty firing Tillerson and all the retaliation goin' on in the #trumpsterfire, plus the dog killed in the overhead bin of a flight, plus the 7,000 pairs of shoes outside the Capitol calling for gun sense. None of these conversations was a pleasant conversation. Even with people who agreed with me on whatever aspect of the topic, the discussions were filling me with outrage, because there was so much, well, outrageous behavior that had happened on Tuesday on the part of humans. So I spent a long time Tuesday night, up too late for sure, feeling increasing outrage and disgust, pretty much all directed at humanity out there.

Over and over in the comments of these various anger-inducing conversations, Fb-friends (or, as I call them, Fbriends) made comments along the lines of, "Well, people are stupid." "Yeah, people are terrible." "Humans don't deserve what they've got/" "Humans are the worst." And so forth. 

Which, frankly, I feel is all true. But it was making me feel awful, and I had SO much outrage. More, even, than the usual outrage felt on any given day since 2016.  

Amid all that, the only other news story piercing these swirling topics of doom was another sad story, that Stephen Hawking had died. 

That reminded me: there are some really smart people in the world. Geniuses, in fact. Why, then, was I wasting my time fretting so fiercely about all the stupid people? 

Why was I engaged in fruitless arguments, dealing with the nonsense babble of #trumptydumpty supporters and other hideous specimens... why? When I could be reading the words of smart people instead? 

Wednesday I found myself in a Barnes & Noble, where I picked up a copy of A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and resolved not to go back on Facebook until after I had read it. Simply, replacing the stupidity with the smarts. 

Boy, it's been a nice four days! 

Some unanswered questions that I will try to answer: 

Q: Why hadn't I read A Brief History of Time before now? 

A: Seriously, have you seen my to-read piles? Egad. But it is now proudly shelved in "read" -- and "finally." 

Q: Didn't I hate being "that guy/gal" reading it the week he had died? 

A: Well, duh. But I got an excuse note from a supervisory book related figure in my life who understood the nature of my predicament (the outrage, the step away from Fb, the normally-I-wouldn't-do-this ... and oh yeah, p.s., also the uh, we're not exactly worried people will think we're not smart). 

Q: So...did I like the book? 

A: Hell yeah! So funny and personable! So the story of the universe! So worth reading, y'all seriously. It won't even take you four days -- you'll be able to return from your Brief History of Facebreak much faster than I did, if you have anything resembling free time/a normal life, which I do not. 

Q: Is it hard? 

A: Well, the universe is hard. So there's that.

Q: What is a singularity? Is time travel possible? Will we ever have a Grand Unified Theory? Is the weak anthropic principle a valid outlook? What's a gluon? What would happen to an astronaut falling into a black hole? Can we really know the mind of God?  

A: Uh, guess who tackles these questions? Not me! That would be, our boy Stephen. Come on, go buy the book folks. AT A BOOKSTORE, PLEASE, THANKS. 

I recommend the illustrated version. 

You are not in my future light cone, #TrumptyDumpty. You are in my elsewhere, and you can damn well stay there. 

DST: Daylight Saving Time, or Demanding Sloth Time?

And so we have sprung forward once again, completing this silliest of human rituals, advancing our clocks one hour so as to have "extra" daylight in the evenings. On this Monday, a day often seen as the start of a new week, a day in which many people will think something like, "Wow, it's still so light!" upon leaving their traditional workplaces, I'll quickly summarize something I've realized about daylight saving time cheerleaders. Beyond the absurdity of semi-annual clock changing and the nonsensical extending of DST to eight months of the year so that it now lasts even longer than standard time, I now see that DST enthusiasm reveals how simultaneously lazy and demanding humans are. 

And if you know me, you know I loathe the combination of lazy (or helpless) + demanding. I firmly believe you should pick one or the other. If you're lazy or helpless, fine, but when people do stuff for you, you'd best not complain about how it's done. If you're demanding, fine, but then you'd best get on top of things and get your stuff done, not whine that it has to be done a certain way but then expect someone else to do it. 

Think about it, though. You hear a lot of positive comments in these early days after the spring forward time change along the lines of, "Wow, it's light until 7 p.m.!" or whatever. But...

1. Demanding. More light - uh, this is how summer works. This is just how our planet works: as summer approaches, the days get longer -- that is to say, there are more hours of daylight and fewer of darkness. Everyone knows this, and for the most part everyone understands why (loony-tunes-flat-earthers notwithstanding). (There are a bunch of absurd things about Daylight Saving Time but one that has always baffled me is this, that the days are getting longer anyway -- and this is the season you choose to change your clocks for?) Springing forward is a weird attempt to make it happen sooner. Like, the functioning universe isn't enough for you people -- you just have to speed things up and instead of passing through each March, April, May day with sunset getting later and later, you have to accelerate the process with this jolt, because you want light at 7:00 in the evening NOW and not in April when it would come along. "Hey universe we know you have this whole sun, light, and changing seasons thing totally worked out, but we're just gonna come along and demand a little improvement, 'k?"  Seriously, what is WRONG with humans? 

2. Lazy. And yet... lest we forget the main absurdity of DST to begin with, namely that there is no extra daylight when you move your clocks forward, just a shifted hour of daylight, these demanding humans simultaneously reveal themselves to be lazy as sin. You want more daylight? You want to enjoy that "extra" hour of sun? All you have to do is get your sorry slug self up out of bed in the morning when a little thing called sunrise happens. I mean, my everloving gods, humans are seriously a terrible species, we know that, but this really takes the cake. You want to enjoy this hour of light but are convinced that you are incapable of doing so in the morning when it happens. You'd rather create a system of semi-annual clock changing rather than just get your lazy bones out of your bed in the morning. What. The. Actual. 

Demanding and lazy. Bunch of sloths - no offense to the sloths, who are nowhere near as demanding and absurd. 

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 12: Foreign Language Film and the Big One You've All Been Waiting For

Oscars Day is here!

It has been a busy and complicated time for me, and sadly I was not able to make it through my entire checklist of 34 films before today, but I am definitely ahead of, you know, some people who aren't obsessed with such things. And of COURSE I've seen all of the nominees for Best Picture, silly. What do you take me for?

Best Picture: Call Me By Your Name, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, Get Out, Lady Bird, Phantom Thread, The Post, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Foreign Language Film: A Fantastic Woman, Loveless, The Insult, On Body and Soul, The Square

Foreign Language Film is kind of like a Best Picture award, too. I love the Foreign Language category - and I'm aware that there are those among you who basically never see anything from it ever - so it's fun for me to pair it with the Best Picture category that everybody pays attention to. I love watching foreign films and I do pretty well getting to all the nominees eventually, but there are sometimes a few hard to come by in any given year that won't be released in the U.S. until after the ceremony. This year, I've seen four out of five, including the most recent I watched, Loveless, which opened at the Music Box Theater here in Chicago just  two days ago, Friday. You know I don't normally go to movies on their opening weekends or any movies on Friday nights, but I made an exception for a totally dismal bleak some-(all)-might-say-depressing Russian film nominated in the foreign language category playing at the ever cool Music Box. Needless to say, I loved the film. I love me some dark Russian art portraying the misery of the human experience. So good. Does the plot even matter? In this one, a divorcing couple who absolutely hate each other are too busy fighting to notice their suffering 12-year-old son, who goes missing. It's so damn good.

Also really good? The Insult. That one's from Lebanon, and has all my favorite themes (that aren't the dismal bleak Russian summation of our pathetic human existence - but on a grand scale) such as redemption, human rights, a feminist lawyer, family, grievances, forgiveness, international conflict resolution, all the good stuff. Loved it.

Didn't like as much: A Fantastic Woman, but I fear it could win because people are going to be proud of themselves to vote for its depiction of the cruelty toward a trans woman. I wish trendy factors like that weren't a factor, but they are, which annoys me. The film is kind of weirdly cliched with heavy-handed symbolism at parts, but it was good - I just don't think it was the best. And I hated The Square. If that wins, I will throw things at the television. If On Body and Soul  wins I won't do anything except remember that I still need to watch it.

All right then. Best Picture!

Man, I did not know, until I saw Call Me By Your Name, if I was going to think any of the nominees was most triumphant. I enjoyed The Post, Dunkirk, and Darkest Hour in many ways, but each of them had a bit of formula in their cinematic trajectories and Post and Darkest Hour had very specific flawed scenes where you're just like, really? He *had* to step into the street and be startled and almost hit by a car because he's in awe of The New York Times? Pointless. Dumb. Really? He had to go conquer his Underground fears and find the common people? No, obviously, in real life, not exactly like that on the way to that meeting. He apparently did some stuff like that, but not in such ...storytelling climactic style. Dumb. (If not pointless.) I enjoyed Get Out a lot but didn't think it was the best of the year. Ditto Lady Bird - I think the outsized reaction to it (i.e. "There's never been anything like it!") is utterly baffling. I did like Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri and don't totally agree with the backlash against it, as I get what Martin McDonagh does/is trying to do, but it still wasn't my "oh-my-god-so-good-#1-pick!" And I don't care for The Shape of Water (as I've mentioned on many, many other Days of Oscars) despite my recognition of Guillermo del Toro realizing his vision, and I hated Phantom Thread. Really, though. Ugh. But Call Me By Your Name  was lush and engrossing and pretty and full of intellectual people who like to read and be in different countries and have fun and even though it was male, it achieves a stunning brilliance during a certain emotional monologue delivered by Michael Stuhlbarg that I could just watch forever on an endless loop.

And so there you have it.  Picks: I'm on Team Call Me By Your Name.  But I think something else will win. If it's The Shape of Water I will want to throw things (though it's a bit late in the night by then for throwing things,  the ceremony ending) so I'm just going to stick with my theory that Get Out is the second or third favorite of everyone who doesn't have it as their top pick so through preferential voting it will triumph. Maybe.
Foreign: I want Loveless. It might be A Fantastic Woman, ugh ugh ugh.

But I want to know what YOU  think! What's going to win?
What's your pick for Best Pic?
Or any other category?
Did you join an Oscar pool? Are you confident in your choices?

OSCARS DAY IS HERE!!!

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 11: Documentary Feature and Documentary Shorts

Let's talk docs!

I love documentary film. Love, love, love. This is one of my favorite Academy Awards categories, and I love seeking out and watching the nominated films, though they can occasionally be a little harder to come by than the feature fiction film noms. It has definitely gotten easier over the years, what with Netflix and online streaming and more web site accessibility to the filmmakers and whatnot. It was fifteen years ago that I really started paying tons of attention to this category, specifically with my boy Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine, and that very memorable Oscar win which happened the same week we (Dubya/"we") went to war in Iraq and I quit smoking and... that's a story I tell elsewhere.

Here, let's look at this year's nominees:

Documentary Feature:
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, Faces Places, Icarus, Last Men in Aleppo, Strong Island

Documentary Short:
Heroin(e), Edith + Eddie, Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, Knife Skills, Traffic Stop

Unfortunately, I have been busy and scattered and unable to complete my Oscars checklist before today's ceremony, and the Documentary Feature category, despite being one of my favorites, is my least complete. I've only seen Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, which I really liked. It's about a family-owned bank in New York City that serves the Chinese immigrant community and was prosecuted in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis for, well, nothing to be guilty of, really, while "too big to fail" banks kept on doing their greedy illegal things. The family in Abacus... is so awesome and it's a really good documentary. I'm so lame for not having seen the others; I've been hearing about Faces Places for months, and I have Last Men in Aleppo recorded off of PBS but haven't found time to watch... I don't know if Icarus or Strong Island will be able to beat the appeal of voting for Agnes Varda's Faces Places, because she is getting an honorary Oscar this year and she would be the first woman to get an honorary and competitive Oscar in the same year. That would be such a fun fact. (Some men have done that, including Walt Disney.)

Documentary shorts, though, I saw. I love Heroin(e) a lot. It follows people, including three main women, dealing with the heroin epidemic and overdose crises in Huntington, West Virginia. The three women are helping heroin addicts in very different ways, some through official work, some through less official outreach, all through compassion, problem-solving, and tackling the problem in ways our societal systems are clearly not. You'll find yourself smiling so big while watching drug court scenes. It's great. But it's also a sobering reminder of how desperately this good work is needed. I would love for this short to win the Oscar.

Knife Skills also documents outreach to people who've had trouble, in this case former convicts who go through a culinary training program and work at a fancy restaurant, and the troubles that ensue along the way. Traffic Stop, very timely, is about a black woman body slammed to the ground by a cop during her traffic stop, and I think it does a really good job of exploring how that was preventable while doing more than issuing general platitudes. It was a strength of that film that you watch what happens and then later hear the cop describe what happened. He never speaks a lie or distorts the facts, really, and when you hear them from him perspective you're like -- oh my god. Yes, that's what happened. And why couldn't you - or thousands of other cops - in that situation make it better instead of worse? It was very interesting. I think a lot of people like Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, which has very little to do with traffic and is instead a weird, trippy examination of a traumatized woman who grapples with her life and issues, among them childhood and mental health issues, with art and other tactics. Edith + Eddie is a sad story - an old newlywed couple (like 95, seriously) separated when the daughter and legal guardian of the woman take over because she is judged not competent to make her own legal decisions. It wasn't as well made of a film, but was kind of like watching a long, fairly interesting news story.

All right, who's going to win?

Documentary Feature: I can't pick mine, because I'm ignorant here. I think Faces Places might win.
Documentary Short: I want Heroin(e).  It could be that or either of the Traffic ones though.

This is Oscar weekend, people! My own personal "New Year's Eve"-level festivity!

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 10: Animated Feature and Visual Effects

I was very nearly thwarted on my way to seeing the film that is my pick to win one of these categories! Specifically, I was trapped in an elevator for a few minutes. (Not knowing, of course, as one never does when the elevator fails to function correctly, whether it would be a mere few minutes.) I was in the parking garage at the cinema and the elevator went to the ground floor where I needed to get off but the doors opened just an inch or so and then stayed stuck, unmoving, unable to be moved. I couldn't push or pry the door open from inside. It opened that inch or so and then just sat, stuck. Definitely not enough room to get any leverage or squeeze through. It was trippy, and I didn't feel particularly scared, as first of all I had my phone in my hand, and secondly there was an emergency call button right there on the panel, which I used to speak to a man who promptly sent help. But. My initial thought was that, oh no, I was now going to be late to see Coco!

Animated Feature: The Breadwinner, The Boss Baby, Coco, Ferdinand, Loving Vincent

Visual Effects: Blade Runner 2049, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Kong: Skull Island, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, War for the Planet of the Apes

And indeed, after my elevator misadventure I was just a hair late getting into the Coco showing, but I could tell it was still the very beginning, with the kid voiceover narration introducing his family and his background. Let me just say, Coco is fantastic and deserves all the accolades it has been getting. Until that fateful elevator day when I saw it, I wanted Loving Vincent to win an Oscar. I absolutely adored Loving Vincent. It's unique and brilliant, and it's about my boy Vincent! (Van Gogh) The film is, as I understand it, painted. The process of painting animation is explained here, and it ends up looking really, really cool - Vincent's paintings, alive and fluid, telling his story. It was magical and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I was sure it deserved the Oscar. 

Then I saw Coco and thought - uh-oh. 

I really, really, really wish they could tie. It's the most fervently I've ever wished for an Oscars tie, or a tie for anything, really. 

Coco  is Pixar magic, and this year the magic tells a vibrant story set in Mexico Día de Muertos land. It's a boy who just wants to play guitar and release the music inside him who is thwarted by his family. I don't even want to describe the plot, because it's so much more than that, and the story hums and zips along as he wanders to the land of the dead. It's thrilling, touching, and spectacular. If it was any other Pixar film beating Loving Vincent, I'd be angry. If it's Coco, I understand. I seriously think if I was an Academy voter this year I would try to find one person to vote for one and I'd vote for the other, and encourage everyone I knew to do the same thing. 

As for the other nominees?  I didn't see The Breadwinner (really want to), and I really don' know that I'll make it to The Boss Baby, which is by all accounts terrible, and which is my absolute last priority on the checklist of all the nominated flicks. After the ceremony, I probably will lose interest  in checking that one off. I did see Ferdinand, and found it weirdly traumatic. It's about bulls who want to excel at bullfighting so as to avoid going to the slaughterhouse, who don't yet know that murder awaits them either way, but it's all talking animals/crazy characters/jolly times, so it's this kind of disconnect between the brutal truths of the plot and the song and dance and games you're watching. It was hard for me to experience. 

But Coco and Loving Vincent  are better films, seriously. 

As for the visual effects in otherwise "real" live action movies, I've seen three and a half nominees there: Blade Runner 2049, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Kong: Skull Island, and half of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Haven't yet got around to War for the Planet of the Apes - which, by the way, I hear is fantastic. But how are the visual effects? I don't know. Guardians...2's plot was so not interesting to me that even as I was watching (half) of it I kept forgetting what was happening, but it all did look really cool. Star Wars is, well, Star Wars. I might root for Blade Runner 2049 here, because I think that movie pulled off every visual thing that it did wonderfully. Kong: Skull Island was ridiculous, but enjoyably ridiculous, and you kind of believed that these various creatures and island things were interacting with the characters, so it's definitely no slouch in this category. 

What to do, what to do. 

My mother used to ask me, when I would rant about this or that person I "hated" (like, an annoying celebrity, or George Dubya, or whoever) versus some other awful person, "Whose elevator would you rather be stuck in?" It really makes you think. Like, Dubya is terrible, but you'd rather be stuck in his elevator than Charles Manson's, right? Whose elevator would you rather be stuck in, Anne Hathaway or James Franco? O.J. Simpson or Caitlin Jenner? Trump or Putin? Like such. Well, I really did get stuck in an elevator this week trying to see my animated features, and maybe that's a helpful way to make Oscar picks: which elevator would I rather be stuck in, one playing Coco on an endless loop, or Loving Vincent? 

That's actually quite hard, but it would probably be the latter because it's kind of calmer. What about a Blade Runner 2049 elevator or a Kong: Skull Island? Definitely either of those over the Star Wars: The Last Jedi elevator. 

Picks!

Animated Feature: PLEASE can we have a tie? I'll vote for my pick, Loving Vincent, and you vote for what I think will win, Coco. 

Visual Effects: Blade Runner 2049, I think, is my pick. And I think that either it or maybe the ...Apes will win? 

Previous Day of Oscar:
Day 9, Animated Shorts and Live Action Shorts

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 9: Animated Shorts and Live Action Shorts

You know what's fun to do every year during awards season? Go see the nominated short films! 

This fun activity is available in more and more cities in recent years, as opposed to twenty years ago, when it seemed to be a much more obscure pursuit. I first started going regularly when I lived in New York, and have been happy to continue hitting up a theater to see them in Chicago. Definitely took time off from this hobby when I lived abroad. 

Animated Short:
Dear Basketball, Garden Party, Lou, Negative Space, Revolting Rhymes

Live Action Short:
DeKalb Elementary, The Eleven O'Clock, My Nephew Emmett, The Silent Child, Watu Wote/All of Us

The whole shorts-watching thing varies from year to year. Sometimes I like the animated a ton better, and sometimes the live action are better overall. I often LOVE the Documentary Short category, but we'll get to that another day. For now, let's think about fiction. 

And the first thing I have to say is that the Live Action Shorts this year were weirdly not-that-fiction like. I mean, they were fictional films, with actors, portraying a story but they were so reality-based, so ripped-from-the-headlines, and even so based-on-a-true-story for a couple of them, that they almost feel similar to the doc shorts in my mind. It's weird. DeKalb Elementary involves a man walking into a school with a gun. My Nephew Emmett is about a specific Emmett, namely, one who traveled from Chicago to the Deep South decades ago, and whose legacy we all now know about.  The Silent Child is about a deaf child whose parents haven't taught her sign language and now she's about to start school, and at the end credits it provides stats about hearing-impaired children. Watu Wote deals with tension between Christians and Muslims in Kenya and depicts an inspired-by-true-events experience on and around a bus in a hot-spot border region. The only one that's really a flight of fancy is The Eleven O'Clock, about a psychiatrist and a patient and some zany confusion. 

And they're all really good! Another tough race to call. 

The animated shorts were good this year, too, although one of them was overlong and didn't do as much for me, and that was Revolting Rhymes, which brings to (animated) life Roald Dahl's poems that parody/reimagine a few classic fairy tales - The Three Little Pigs, Red Riding Hood, etc. It went on and on and on and I'm like, OK, I get it, Roald Dahl was clever, but can this wolf stop talking now? I thought Garden Party and Negative Space were OK. Simple, intriguing, well-rendered. (Don't forget, y'all: animation and animated film aren't my thing to begin with, but I do enjoy the five shorts each year more than the five animated features, generally. That is, if I even get around to watching the five animated features. This year I've seen three.)  The two I liked best were Dear Basketball, Kobe Bryant's letter to basketball that was fantastic and is about his feelings toward his sport, his gift, his passion, and our (all of our!) need to do what we do best before our time is up. Make use of your talents, everyone! The day I saw the shorts, I declared Lou to be my favorite. It's Pixar, and we know they are at the top of their game. This one's content, though, was right up my alley: redemption!

So, let's pick: 

Animated Short: I want Dear Basketball or Lou. I think those are the two that might win, too. 

Live Action Short: Ugh...hmmm... I'd be happy with ANY of them winning, seriously. But I think I'm pulling for DeKalb Elementary. I think it will be that or The Silent Child, although My Nephew Emmett  could sneak in there. It's equally as topical as DeKalb Elementary. 

Yay, shorts! 

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 8: Original Song and Makeup/Hairstyling

What do *these* two categories have to do with each other? you might be asking yourself. I think a better question would be, how intertwined is success in these categories with the greatness of the film? And my answer to that question is.... not at all.

Both Original Song and Makeup/Hairstyling (which was pretty much just "Makeup" until, like, five minutes ago, in the scheme of things) are these weird categories that can totally 100% merit an Oscar nomination while just being part of abjectly ridiculous, terrible films. And even if you're not hating on the films, subjectively, you can acknowledge, objectively, that they are not relevant to any part of the Oscar discussion other than these two categories. Seriously. This is a thing that happens. That is totally a thing that can, and does, happen. Let's check out the nominees:

Makeup/Hairstyling: Victoria and Abdul, Darkest Hour, Wonder
(and by the way, see, only three nominees? it's totes one of those weird categories that just does whatever the eff it wants)

Original Song:
"Mighty River" - Mudbound
"Mystery of Love" - Call Me By Your Name
"Remember Me" - Coco
"Stand Up For Something" - Marshall
"This Is Me" - The Greatest Showman

Seriously - these movies. The songs can exist separately from them, or they can be an important part of the movie, but they're never really, truly related to the greatness of the flicks like other categories are. OK, for a second I forgot that I even saw The Greatest Showman, by the way, which I absolutely did. It was weirdly entertaining and fun to watch, despite being objectively kind of not great, the exact opposite of The Florida Project, which was MISERABLE to watch but acknowledged by me to be "good" - or, well done, anyway. So, that song from The Greatest Showman was all right, I guess, but I didn't love it. Confession time: I haven't seen Marshall yet, so I'm not 100% equipped to judge. But. Is this category Coco's to lose? Or does "Mighty River" have a chance? I loved Mudbound. I'm cool with it winning here.What about the song from Call Me By Your Name, though? I don't know that that film, which I like lots, is going to win anything...

Clearly, another hard-to-pick category. Seriously, this is a category, though, in which I legit don't care if I don't check off seeing all the films; for example, when some Fifty Shades of  nonsense was nominated for Original Song a couple of years ago I was like, "NO thanks! Goodbye! Not completing the checklist this year!" Yeah. Don't care.

As for Makeup, do we all remember that Suicide Squad  won this category last year?

I haven't seen Wonder yet, but it could be triumphant here. So could Darkest Hour, I suppose, more so than Victoria and Abdul.. Since I haven't seen what they did in Wonder, I'm not really equipped to judge this small category.

So we'll leave Day 8 at that: two categories that include one-off nominees pretty much every single year and linger at the bottom of my priority checklist.

Will we get good performances of the nominated songs this year? What do you think?

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 7: Lead Actor and Supporting Actress

The Academy Awards are nigh, my Twelve Days of Oscars are passing quickly, and it's time to face facts: I might not get to every single flick before Sunday. I'm still trying my best, as any true awards-season-obsessive-with-a-checklist would do, but in one of the categories we'll examine today, I have not seen all five of the nominees. Shocking, I know! 

Supporting Actress: 

Mary J. Blige, Mudbound
Allison Janney, I, Tonya
Lesley Manville, Phantom Thread
Laurie Metcalf, Lady Bird
Octavia Spencer, The Shape of Water

Lead Actor: 

Timothee Chalamet, Call Me By Your Name

Daniel Day-Lewis, Phantom ThreadDaniel Kaluuya, Get Out
Gary Oldman, Darkest Hour
Denzel Washington, Roman J. Israel, Esq.

The movie I have not yet seen is Roman J. Israel, Esq. I'm going to, seriously. Netflix is going to help me out here. This week, I hope, before the ceremony. But I haven't yet. And with sincere apologies to Denzel, who gave an absolute master class in acting with his nominated performance in Flight a few years ago, when he lost to Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln, really the only contenders this year are Day-Lewis and Gary Oldman. Everyone wants Gary Oldman to win his Oscar and he totally Churchill jowl and bark and sputter and leadershipped it up to do so. But Daniel Day-Lewis is "quitting acting" and people might want to give him one last Oscar. SO. 

Who deserves it? Hmmm. I mean, the performance by Gary Oldman is a tour-de-force. You are drawn into Darkest Hour and along you go, totally buying in to the drama, even though you know what's going to happen. On the other hand, Phantom Thread and specifically Daniel Day-Lewis' character in it are all kinds of weird. I don't know that it's his best work nor the best of the nominees this year. Timothee Chalamet and Daniel Kaluuya both did great, but I think their movies and roles were so well written and made that they didn't have as hard of a job, not that that strictly makes sense, but just as a tiny factor. Without having seen Denzel, I hate to pick in this category -- I like to know all the competition even when one is widely agreed to just have been honored to be nominated. 

I've seen all the Supporting Actress performances, though. Loved everything about Mudbound, including Mary J. Blige's performance. Enjoyed Allison Janney and Laurie Metcalf, who are the two that everyone has agreed are the actual competitors here. I love Allison Janney - love her - if I could see into my future to make the movie of my entire life right now I'd want her to play the future older version of me. And I thought Laurie Metcalf was great, but, once again, I don't understand Lady Bird to be revelatory in the way that everyone else understands it to be. Does that mean I'm pulling for Janney here? Maybe... I'm not pulling for Octavia Spencer in the weird weird weird The Shape of Water although I will say I liked her better in this than in many other roles I've seen her in (don't even get me started on how god awful The Help was). You know who was totally awesome? Who did what everyone says Laurie Metcalf did, subtly and powerfully pulling off her role? Lesley Manville, that's who. I really didn't care for Phantom Thread - like, at all - but if I'm rooting for one aspect of it, and that's Lesley Manville. Most of her role was performed sitting at dinner/breakfast tables, and yet she delivered this incredible and absolutely fully realized character. It was phenomenal. 

Supporting Actress: My pick is Lesley Manville, but I think it will be Allison Janney. 

Lead Actor: My pick is -- don't know -- maybe Oldman -- and I think it will be Oldman. 

**when I see Roman J. Israel, Esq. I will come update this blog entry as necessary **

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 6: Cinematography and Directing

For a lot of people, such as, you know, the people who maybe AREN'T obsessed with making a checklist of Academy Award nominees each year and being sure to watch them all (except when the song from Fifty Shades of What-the-hell-ever gets nominated because just no), there are categories that are variously called technical, minor, obscure, other... and then are the "big" ones. Setting aside the obsessive ones among us (ahem) for a moment, it does sadden me to divide things up that way, number one, because the creative, proficient, talented human being who did the work in a "lesser" category is just as valuable as the one who did the work in a "major" category, and number two because sometimes the winner in a "lesser" category delivers the coolest or most heartfelt speech of the night while the actors just rattle off a list of names which is SO ANNOYING but not quite as annoying as playing people off in the first place and have I mentioned that shut the fuck up please about how "long" and "boring" the annual ceremony is because no one is forcing you to watch please thanks?

My point (and yes, I do!) is that today we are looking at what is routinely considered a "major" category, Directing, along with Cinematography, which would never be considered lesser by anyone who likes film but is maybe a bit less paid attention to among the plebes.

Cinematography: Blade Runner 2049, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, Mudbound, The Shape of Water

Directing:  Dunkirk, Christopher Nolan; Get Out - Jordan Peele; Lady Bird - Greta Gerwig; Phantom Thread - Paul Thomas Anderson; The Shape of Water - Guillermo del Toro

Well, we have two overlappers, Dunkirk and The Shape of Water. And as much as I have been reiterating everywhere and to anyone who will listen (and some who won't) that The Shape of Water is goddamn weird and so not my thing, I actually will have zero problem if Guillermo wins here for Directing, because I think he actually perfectly realized his (weird!) vision, with both finesse and technical competence and creativity. Even though it's just not necessarily for me.  That said, I would not award Cinematography to The Shape of Water. I think Directing is pretty much the only category I'd want it to win. As for Dunkirk, it could get Cinematography, which was definitely an achievement and a half, involving as it did big battle scenes, airplanes, cramped boat quarters, vast waterscapes, and just all kinds of skill.

But. There were other fantastic Cinematography nominees, specifically Blade Runner 2049 and Mudbound. I am pulling for Blade Runner 2049 in other technical categories but I think I'm totally behind Mudbound here. I thought that movie was just wonderful.Well done, and really visually engaging - there were some simply gorgeous shots of farm vistas and, well, mud... which looked a lot cooler than you might think!  The more I think about that film, the more I want it to win stuff.

Also, I would be letting you down as an Oscar trivia aficionado and feminist if I didn't mention here the fun fact that Mudbound cinematographer Rachel Morrison is the first woman ever nominated in this category and WHAT THE HECK TOOK SO LONG?!

Additionally, a new CNN story reports that she at first didn't even want to win because she wanted her competition, Roger Deakins, who is nominated for Blade Runner 2049, to win; this is his 14th nomination and he still has never won. Basically, I guess we can all be happy if either of those films wins for Cinematography, eh?

Darkest Hour is a weird nom here and I think it's a non-factor...I guess all the filming in underground spaces was skilled work and all, but...I don't think it will win.

Now, if Guillermo del Toro does not win for directing The Shape of Water, another distinct possibility is Get Out's Jordan Peele. There is a lot of love for this film and for the somewhat out-of-nowhere-ness of it, and for the fun-fact-ness of  Peele being the first African-American to be nominated at once for Best Picture (as a producer), Directing, and Screenplay. I don't personally think Get Out is the best film of the year, but I am not opposed to a Directing win here... I just think I'm a tiny bit more behind Guillermo's (weird!) visionary directing achievement. This category is very interesting because it also has Greta Gerwig, and we all know (don't we, though) how damn rare Directing nominations for women are, sheesh. I feel the same about her Lady Bird achievement as I do about Peele's, I think - it was great. I won't be mad and throw things if it wins, but I just don't think it was necessarily the best. While this category did have diversity this year, and thanks for that Hollywood amiright?!, there are still a couple of white guys - the aforementioned Nolan and Paul Thomas Anderson. Here's what I think about PTA winning for Phantom Thread: no. Just no, please. That movie is also weird, but more annoying weird than bizarre-o visionary fable weird. I am well aware that there are people, including a person I live with, who vehemently disagree with me on this point. Don't care. I'm 100% not about Phantom Thread.

And so....
Cinematography: My pick is Mudbound.  I think it might go to her or to Blade Runner 2049...but, hard to call. It's not out of the question that The Shape of Water sweeps a ton of categories, so...
Directing: I'm good with Guillermo for The Shape of Water. I think it will be him or possibly Nolan or Peele.

My Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 5: Adapted Screenplay and Original Screenplay
Day 4: Supporting Actor and Lead Actress
Day 3: Production Design and Costume Design
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 5 Redux: Adapted Screenplay and Original Screenplay

Well, I failed at delivering a Day 5 post on Day 5, so here we go, a dollar short, with a couple of my absolute favorite categories, the screenplays.

Adapted Screenplay:
Call Me By Your Name, James Ivory
The Disaster Artist, Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber
Logan, Scott Frank & James Mangold and Michael Green
Molly's Game, Aaron Sorkin
Mudbound, Virgil Williams and Dee Rees

Original Screenplay:
The Big Sick, Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani
Get Out, Jordan Peele
Lady Bird, Greta Gerwig
The Shape of Water, Guillermo Del Toro, Vanessa Taylor
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Martin McDonagh

Oh, I do love me some writers and writing. Let's think, shall we, about which of these writerly persons will take the stage on Oscars night for a moment of glory, and, it is hoped, a clever word or two in their brief allotted speech time (broadcast director: stop playing off the winners! folks at home: stop whining that the ceremony is too long! ain't no one forcing you to watch!)

Regrettably I have not read ANY of the source material for the adapted screenplay nominees, although I have touched the four real books and contemplated reading them (as opposed to the graphic novel, which, yes, I did just judge as "not a real book" in case you're wondering). It's fun to know the source material, but it's also kind of fun this way, being in the dark, and noting which movies make me want to go read the original book, which in this case is all of them (except Logan, because I don't ever want to read graphic novels, which is not I repeat NOT a content thing but just my inability to enjoy reading books of pictures. Give me prose or give me a drawing, but not both together. I physically cannot stand reading graphic novels and comic books. It makes me uncomfortable. Do not enjoy.)

People love to praise Aaron Sorkin and Diablo Cody and other screenwriters who fill actors' mouth with long, winding phrases of snappy discourse, which is fine with me because my own writing of dialogue is decidedly in that direction sometimes, so praise away, people! Although I personally think they go a little overboard about just how complex Sorkin's writing is at times, I thought the Molly's Game screenplay was quite good. There was quite a bit of back and forth between voiceover narration and on-screen action that was well handled. Mudbbound also had to decided when to weave in and out of voiceover, and I take it from how the film was done that the book, too, had multiple first person narrators? That story had a lot going on and everything was clear. (Clear as Mudbound! There's a fun new phrase for a screenwriting standard to aspire to. Don't say I never gave ya nothin'.) Having absolutely been down the path of The Room hate/lovewatching cult madness, I was eminently curious how The Disaster Artist would be, and I thought it was remarkable. Call Me By Your Name, as I've mentioned in previous posts, is one of my favorites of this year's nominees but so much of that is from the emotions of the book itself; in fact, in recent days I've read many articles about how faithful James Ivory was to the book, with, for example, Michael Stuhlbarg's stunning monologue being evidently lifted right from the novel. Which is great - I'm just not sure that means Ivory merits an Oscar, for leaving well enough alone? Always a tough call in this category. As for Logan, sorry y'all, and it's NOT because it was a comic book that I don't want it to win but for reasons of cliche and gee-didn't-see-that-coming-except-we-all-totally-did with which the screenplay was riddled.

I really think the two best efforts here were Mudbound and The Disaster Artist. And I think either one has a chance of winning, and, to complicate matters, they both have outside factors that might influence people to vote not just on the merits. James Franco was an early favorite as a sure-nomination-thing in the Lead Actor category for playing nutso Tommy Wiseau, the not-genius behind The Room, in The Disaster Artist, and there is much speculation that late revelations about his inappropriate sexist and awful behavior are what made the #TIMESUP Academy not nominate him. So, will people be more inclined to reward what they can from the film, the writing, here, since it's the only nomination it got? Or less inclined, because it's still associated with James Franco? As for Mudbound, Dee Rees' nomination is the first for a black woman for an adapted screenplay, and it's always fun to make history. So who knows where voters minds will go?

On to Originals... well, we all know by now that Greta Gerwig wrote Lady Bird and people's minds are blown by this. I have found Lady Bird to be great and overrated. Sometimes people misunderstand me and say we shouldn't call things "overrated" because one person loves something and another person doesn't and that's just differing opinions. True that -- but that's also not what "overrated" means. I'm not saying it "wasn't that good" - then I'd say adequate or mediocre or whatever. I'm saying the frenzied reaction to it is weirdly outsized and kind of off-kilter. That can be true of reaction to something fabulous, something terrible, or something in between. In the case of Lady Bird, I've been mystified by all the people including critics who get paid to watch hundreds of movies a year saying that they've never seen anything like it because, um, what the heck have they all been watching, I wonder? But it was good. I don't think Gerwig is going to win in the Directing category, but she might win here for Writing. It was well written. Speaking of directors realizing their vision and writing it too, we've got Guillermo del Toro and the (SO WEIRD!) The Shape of Water. As I have been saying, this (weird!) movie doesn't do it for me the way it does for many, but I recognize that del Toro is creative and realizes his visions and renders them as art for many to enjoy... this doesn't necessarily make me advocate for him to win the screenplay Oscar, though. He was nominated for writing another weird fable, Pan's Labyrinth, a decade or so ago, losing then to Michael Arndt for Little Miss Sunshine. I don't think writing was The Shape of Water's main strength, and don't want it to win this. (Do I think it had strengths? Weeelll..even though it was damn weird, honestly, the directing was all right. We'll talk about that tomorrow, maybe.)

Yet ANOTHER nominee who both wrote and directed this year, Martin McDonagh, is the current recipient of backlash right now for his Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri white privilege racism. It's hard to discuss without spoilering the movie, so I won't, but I will say that he leaves some things very much up for debate and in my interpretation does not come down on the side of ever saying this or that majorly flawed character is redeemed, despite indications that maybe he's holding out hope everyone is redeemable. I think some people just generally also have an issue with Irish Guy writing about small-town, racially divided USA, which is fair on one hand, but on another hand, Irish people have in our very lifetimes lived in a place of extremely divided violence and ethno-religous strife so it's not like he's all smiles and flowers and bunnies and roses and then trying to make some commentary from a place of utter b.s.  Man, I was SUCH a huge fan of his previous movie, In Bruges, which may be affecting my understanding of what he was trying to do here ("Save the next little boy!" <--one of my all-time favorite movie moments. just go watch In Bruges, please, thanks)

And then there are the movies that are definitely written funny. Now, I know there was some consternation about Get Out  being in the Musical/Comedy category at the Golden Globes because it is addressing pretty much the most serious topic but first of all, that's just a big misunderstanding of the Globes, where part of the fun is mocking their weird Drama and Musical/Comedy categories and predicting what will inappropriately be relegated to the latter, and secondly, seriously, though, Get Out was funny. While also being serious. But it was written funny. Like VEEP. Ya know? OK, maybe not exactly like VEEP. But serious while being funny. And Jordan Peele is another person whose previous film I liked very much indeed (yay, Keanu!) I also think Kumail Nanjiani is hilarious, and while I love everything about watching Silicon Valley, he is definitely one huge part of the hilarity of that show, and I relished watching him in The Big Sick, which he co-wrote with his wife Emily V. Gordon, with whom I was unfamiliar before this. It was really good! I blew it off when it came out in theaters, despite all the good things I heard about it, and just got around to watching it recently, after the nominations came out. I really, really liked it and stayed up to watch the whole thing even though I started it at 11:30 p.m., which in itself is some kind of testament to the writing.

And so, my picks? This is hard. Way too hard. Help.

Adapted Screenplay: I want The Disaster Artist or Mudbound to win. I think Call Me By Your Name might, though.
Original Screenplay: I guess I want The Big Sick or Lady Bird, and I think it's going to be either Lady Bird or Get Out.

I really wouldn't have a problem with most of the possible outcomes here. But it's so hard to pick. I want to reward all the writers! Shower the writers with prizes and accolades!

Which screenplays are you rooting for?

My Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 4: Supporting Actor and Lead Actress
Day 3: Production Design and Costume Design
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 5: Screenplays!

**I straight up fell asleep Sunday night instead of keeping up with my awards season tasks and Oscar bloggage, so this discussion will have to wait until Monday.**

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 4: Supporting Actor and Lead Actress

All right, here are a couple of categories that some of you might actually be into. Yeah? Ye whose eyes glaze over at my Sound Mixing/Original Score/Production Design jabber? Here, we're talking about actors today, OK?  Ahhh, actors - gorgeous, famous, Hollywood-groomed stars. Gotta love 'em. Specifically, let's check out the nominees for Actor in a Supporting Role and Actress in a Leading Role.

Supporting Actor:
Willem Dafoe, The Florida Project
Woody Harrelson, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Richard Jenkins, The Shape of Water
Christopher Plummer, All the Money in the World
Sam Rockwell, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Actress:
Sally Hawkins, The Shape of Water
Frances McDormand,  Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri
Margot Robbie, I, Tonya
Saoirse Ronan, Lady Bird
Meryl Streep, The Post

Now, you may be asking yourself, why am I talking about the supporting actor nominees and the lead actress nominees, instead of lead and lead, or supporting and supporting, or supporting actress and lead actor?  Is it some kind of statement? A feminist commentary? An existential note...?
Uh, no. Those happen to be the two categories I can write about tonight because I've seen all of the nominees (which is how I'm trying to do this thing). Just how it all shook out, it seems.

Right so. Supporting Actor: a lot of people have said that Michael Stuhlbarg and Armie Hammer from Call Me By Your Name  were snubbed in this category. Maybe so. You'll hear more from me about that flick in coming days - oh, but yes - but for now let's stick to what we've got. Yes, I agree, it is very likely that Christopher Plummer's last-minute filling in for the disgraced Kevin Spacey in All the Money in the World was kind of a "hey, check out what we can do here, Academy! TIMESUP!" nomination. All the Money in the World was, frankly, forgettable - just blah. But that's only one spot. Anyway, I definitely don't think anyone's really thinking Plummer'll win. It was a statement nomination.

We also have, as it turns out, this always interesting phenomenon of two nominees from the same movie, but from a different movie - instead of Call Me By Your Name's actors it's Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri's Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson. I could see Sam Rockwell taking this, not Woody. But. There's a total backlash happening against the (racist? racially clueless? not sufficiently woke? cinematically flawed? all charges have been lodged) Three Billboards...  and that might dash Sam Rockwell's dreams. Then again, Sam Rockwell the person is widely well-liked, and may be sufficiently separated in voters' minds from screenwriter/director Martin McDonagh's Irish not-woke-about-U.S.-race-relations-ness. (Which is itself up for debate, but we'll save that for the posts that deal with him in his categories.)  I personally thought Sam Rockwell gave a great performance, as he ever does, and I also think that Woody Harrelson gave a great performance, as he ever does, and they were two very different performances in a very weird movie doing battle with Frances McDormand's indomitable performance at the same time. Either one, in my opinion, was better than Christopher Plummer's, but Plummer did pull it off at the last minute, so, degree of difficulty?

As for the other actors: Richard Jenkins was a little creepy along with his weird in The Shape of Water, which, as I have said and will continue to say is one weird-ass film. I don't know why I can't be bothered to say anything else about it; I'm all kinds of willing to talk about the major philosophical, animal rights, human rights, existential, societal, world peace questions presented in it that are so up my alley, but no one wants to talk about those with me so we just keep thinking about the weird fishman and how weird the movie is. Richard Jenkins managed to make me not hate him even as he delivered bad news about a cat, which is in itself an achievement in my book, so I'll say he has a chance in this category, especially if there's a (weird!) The Shape of Water sweep of everything-but-the-biggies, which I'm kind of half-predicting. Lastly, which is one of the first Oscar contenders I saw this season, we have Willem Dafoe in The Florida Project. He was definitely great, but I also think he was kind of not really a supporting role. That movie did not have one star, so naturally the agents/producers/ Hollywood awards season machine leapt at their chance to position him as a supporting actor for awards season and THIS IS ONE OF MY TOP TWO AWARDS SEASON PET PEEVES as anyone who has known me for even one awards season knows. It usually happens in the Supporting Actress category (Viola Davis, Alicia Vikander, Renee Zellweger, et. al.) but this year we're doing it in the Supporting Actor category instead. Great. Equality in the nonsense.  So anyway, Dafoe's not-supporting performance was quite good but have I mentioned how much I hated watching The Florida Project? I hesitate to say it wasn't good, but it sure was a miserable experience watching it and nothing I would want to repeat any time soon.

So, who do I want to win? I'll get to that. Let's talk about the Lead Actress noms first.

In short, I think this is a contest between Frances McDormand in Three Billboards... and Saoirse Ronan in Lady Bird, with Sally Hawkins as the possible but probably not upset for the (weird!) The Shape of Water. I think Margot Robbie was great in I, Tonya but definitely being honored just to be nominated, and Meryl Streep who is in fact great in The Post is probably not going to win because the movie was formulaic - I don't even think it was bad, just that Steven Spielberg directed it in tried-and-true Hollywood formula with a few cliches style - and with her billions of nominations, voters are more likely to give Meryl another Oscar when she's in something unique, or when it's been a few more years since her most recent formulaic (The Iron Lady) win.

Do I think Meryl or Margot should have more of a chance than they do? Perhaps. I think Meryl Streep's performance had fantastic subtle moments where we watched changes taking place in Katharine Graham's mind and behavior. And Margot Robbie really inhabited her character, too. I was particularly struck by how she flinched when being abused, both by her mother and her husband/ex-husband. But I don't think she'll win. Also worth considering: she did some ice skating (not all of it - of course there were stunt doubles), and the Academy LOVES to reward actors who learn to skate/run/box/dance/play baseball/do karate/whatever for a film, even when the actor still has a stunt double. See, e. fucking g., Natalie Portman's travesty of a win for Black Swan over the incredibly deserving Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right, which was perhaps the greatest Oscars injustice in my lifetime this side of the not-Supporting Actress category, and which was propelled through the awards season juggernaut with a LOT of talk about how much Natalie Portman danced when she in fact ALSO HAD A BALLET DANCER DOUBLE who was apparently strong-armed into hushing up while the Academy was voting and that all just pisses me right off. But. I digress. Margot and Meryl are likely not going to win.

Sally Hawkins is great, and she was quite good in the (sooo weird!) The Shape of Water, and I would be fascinated if she swept in here somehow to steal this from Frances/Saoirse. But let's talk about Frances vs. Saoirse. Frances is beloved because she's fucking awesome and hard core, and that's what her Three Billboards... character is, in a film by an Irish guy examining small town USA, while Saoirse, who was born in the U.S. but is kind of Irish is in a film by a quirky (by reputation if not in reality) U.S. gal about growing up in a small U.S. city. Everyone loves Saoirse and the Academy does LOVE to give Oscars for Actress in a Leading Role to twentysomethings. I mean, they really dig that. But Frances is also uniquely awesome in their eyes. In my opinion, Frances McDormand had a harder job. I loved Saoirse Ronan's performance and think it was superb and I could watch it again. But I am going to have to say I think Frances McDormand had more to do, and did it.

I really have no idea what's going to happen on the big night, though. Really. But what the hell....

My picks: Supporting Actor: I really don't know who I want. Harrelson or Jenkins.  Lead Actress: Frances McDormand
Who I think will win: Supporting Actor: Sam Rockwell, Lead Actress: um...ugh...argh...Frances McDormand

Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 3: Production Design and Costume Design
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing 

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 3: Production Design and Costume

The Oscars are getting closer, I've seen all of the Best Picture nominees and the majority of the multiple nominees, and you all know what that means: I start checking off the boxes in those "other" categories - the one-off, the randoms, the make-up nominations, things like that.  Tonight, I watched Beauty and the Beast (2017, Emma Watson, you know...), which means I have now completed the Production Design and Costume categories. Time to unleash judgment!

Production Design: Beauty and the Beast, Blade Runner 2049, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, The Shape of Water

Costume Design: Beauty and the Beast, Darkest Hour, Phantom Thread, The Shape of Water, Victoria and Abdul

Once again, as with yesterday's look at Editing and Score, I have chosen to look at  overlapping categories: three Production Design and Costume nominees are the same, two in each are different. I suppose this isn't altogether surprising, what with sumptuous visuals being a common feature in both, right?

We might as well get my freshly watched Beauty and the Beast out of the way here: I don't want it to win in either category. Not because this movie is, with all due respect to Emma Watson (seriously, I like her), a snooze-fest that really has no need to exist. Although it definitely is that. But because:
Production Design? Really? More like CGI design. Half of this "live action" remake was STILL dancing, prattling on clocks and teacups and whatnot, so obviously digitally rendered. Who even knew how much castle/village backdrop was a set? And Costume? Weeellll... I get it, why it was nominated and all, but I am so NOT a fan of the color yellow that the iconic Belle dress turns me right off these costumes. Sorry, B and the B!

Moving on, then. Also nominated in both categories, we have Darkest Hour and The Shape of Water. To be honest, I'm a little surprised at Darkest Hour being nominated here. I guess there were a LOT of costumes, but were they really THAT hard? And the production design... well, the maze of undergroundy offices and things was cool, I guess. I doubt it'll win, though. The Shape of Water, on the other hand, is definitely a contender to just kind of sweep a bunch of awards. It's nominated all over the place and people really dig it. Will these be two of them? I think it would be a waste to give The Shape of Water a Costume prize, but Production Design is definitely something it might get, especially if it's on its way to winning the "big" prizes when the big night comes.

But I personally think I'm leaning toward Blade Runner 2049 for Production Design (sorry, Dunkirk - nice ocean, though). It was such a cool, realized world with many, many, many different settings and moving parts, and so imagined and non-traditional.

And for Costumes? Really, it could be Victoria and Abdul, and I'd be totally OK with that. What about Phantom Thread?  Such a strange nominee here. I mean, there are some cool clothes in that movie, mostly appearing as plot points of the movie, and it's kind of weird to think of an Academy Award for something that's part of the spoken plot. Then again, they did have to be designed - even if we were to believe Daniel Day Lewis' character did all that work.

We'll get to acting categories soon, in the next couple days. For now, I've completed only about a half dozen categories, and have now shared with you my inability to decide them. What do you think?

Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing 

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 2: Editing and Original Score

Welcome back to my Twelve Days of Oscars! For Day 2, let's examine two categories that are very much post-production, and very much what give us the movies we actually watch, as opposed to the footage that was filmed for weeks/months.

Unlike yesterday's analysis, which featured two categories with the same five nominees, today we explore categories with overlapping but not identical nominees.

Editing: Baby Driver, Dunkirk, I, Tonya, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Original Score: Dunkirk, Phantom Thread, The Shape of Water, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

We'll talk about the overlappers first. The Shape of Water, you may know, received the most nominations  this year; during the announcement that early morning, it was a while before we got to a category in which it wasn't announced! As I've said elsewhere, that movie is not really for me. While I get the successful realization of artistry that it was, and can't point out any flaw or failure -- that is to say, if I were a teacher (unarmed, naturally) assigning "Make a movie realizing your individual vision" as homework and my student handed in that trippy thing, I'd have to give an A -- it's just weird and not-for-me weird, as opposed to so-up-my-alley weird. Now, what bearing does that have on whether I think it should win for Original Score? Well, mainly that I can't really remember the score. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. But I don't know. Editing, though, you could make a strong case for. Lots of water, weird fish-man stuff, back and forth between the home and workplace scenes, a climactic chase sequence, all that good stuff. A solid job, editing wise.

The other overlappers are Dunkirk and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (I predict getting real tired of typing that last title soon). I don't particularly remember the score of Dunkirk moving me, but I remember it kind of doing its job well. As for Three Billboards.... (yup, definitely abbreviation time), as I recall it was good as background and not bad when it came to the foreground at certain dramatic times. But did I love it? Was it the best? I don't know.

I guess I should confess that this isn't a really new or strange feeling. There are lots of years when I'm not wowed by any particular score -- unlike the There Will Be Blood sorts of absolutely stunning scores which make me sad when they are ineligible to be nominated -- and that lack of being wowed might surprise some people who know that I like music and even have known a couple of peeps who do scoring work, but there you have it. I will say that I don't see it as a crucial part of the success nor of the what-the-hell-ness of Phantom Thread.

That's right; you heard it here first. Not a big fan of the Phantom Thread, despite it being the aforementioned There...Blood scorer Jonny Greenwood reteaming with those peeps. We'll talk more about my lack of Phantom Thread love in coming days. Today, I guess I'll say I'm not going to be surprised if it wins this category, although I'm thinking it's more likely The Shape of Water will sweep a bunch of categories, including this one. Star Wars: The Last Jedi might not really have a chance just because John Williams might get the been-there-done-that eye roll of voters.  I think of all the categories I've thought about or seen at least three of the contenders in, Original Score this year inspires the least passion in me. I can't pick.

How about Film Editing, then? Now, I think the degree of difficulty in editing I, Tonya should not be understated. It might seem simple, cutting back and forth between faux-interviews and action, but it was pieced together really well to move us through the story, hold our interest, present questions about contradictions at the right pace, and so forth. Three Billboards...  was actually much more linear of a story (the occasional crucial flashback notwithstanding). I already mentioned that the weird-ass The Shape of Water's editing was good work, and Dunkirk  was well put together, too - multiple settings/characters to manage converging to one storied meeting point. But we also have to think about our good friend Baby Driver, which I did give Sound Mixing props to yesterday. This was a matter of a lot of fast and furious editing in the action sequences, but also it was such a weird and moody film that it's pretty well crafted when it pulls itself off.

In short, there's no bad apple in this bunch, but I think I'm pulling for either I, Tonya  or Baby Driver to win Film Editing.

It's been a rough 24 hours, and I'm tired. Day 2 of the Twelve Days of Oscar is hard. What do you all think? The Shape of Water?  A different overlapper? Or one of my outlier picks? Who should win? Which of those films did you enjoy as a finished, scored, well put together final product?

Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Welcome to the Twelve Days of Oscars! That's right, we're just twelve days away from my favorite special occasion of the year, the Academy Awards. Let's spend these last twelve days of Awards Season having a look each day at some of the nominees! This is not even close to a judgment-free space. Laissez les opinions rouler!

First, a brief check-in: how am I doing this year with my progression through the checklist of nominees? Well, as of the day the nominations were announced (another special occasion - I always take that morning off work) I had seen 9 of the feature-length films with 33 still to go, plus I had seen none of the shorts (five each for Animated, Documentary, and Live Action shorts). As of this writing today, I have now seen 25 of the feature-length films with 17 more to go. Progress! I also still have to see all the shorts, but the Live Action and Animated have only just arrived at Landmark Century Centre this week, while the Documentary Shorts come to Music Box starting this weekend, so those will be attended to over the next week or so. (Those are Chicago-specific references, and obviously peeps elsewhere will find them unhelpful. But you know. Check your local listings, eh.)

Right then. Let's begin with two categories that are related to the point of being indistinguishable for many an Oscar pool ballot-filler-outer, and which this year are EXTREMELY closely related in that they have the exact same five nominees. I refer, of course to Sound Mixing and Sound Editing.

Sound Mixing: Baby Driver, Blade Runner 2049, Dunkirk, The Shape of Water, Star Wars: The Last Jedi
Sound Editing: Baby Driver, Blade Runner 2049, Dunkirk, The Shape of Water, Star Wars: The Last Jedi

Most years, those categories have three or four of the same nominees and we can try to use the one or two different noms to help our friends understand the difference between the two categories. Not this time! But this does make it exciting to maybe place a side bet on whether the same one will win both awards with the exact same competition... 

To review, sound mixing is basically the soundscape of the film - the final mix that you hear, the levels of everything, a kind of overall masterpiece of finessing the sounds. Sound editing can be thought of kind of as sound effects - what sounds did they make and create to put into this movie? Yes, both categories do post-production work, but they're different jobs. Even though this year they are the exact same nominees.

I don't feel particularly passionate about these categories in general, even though I have done my share of audio work in the past, both in live theater and in radio jobs, but I appreciate them, plus I've seen all of the (same!) movies nominated in them, which is why I began with them today, this first of the Twelve Days of Oscars. So, let's consider.

I'm immediately eliminating Dunkirk from contention for Sound Mixing because I spent a great deal of my time watching that flick asking, "What did he say? What? Huh? I couldn't hear. I couldn't understand."  (Note: duh, I was watching it at home on DVD and would never dare to utter those or any other words out loud in a theater and neither should you, obviously.) On the other hand, Dunkirk had a lot of Sound Editing and effects that might deserve an award.

The Shape of Water has a really good chance of winning these, especially if it's going to win a bunch of other stuff, too, like Directing and Screenplay and - who knows? - maybe Best Picture. I personally find the film to be visionary and well done but so not my thang at all, but that's nothing against the Sound Mixing chances of it. Sound Editing, though? I don't think it was that special.

Blade Runner 2049 and Star Wars: The Last Jedi are interesting to consider here. They're such big, bold action flicks that are very much made of their cool effects, not just in sound and visuals but in building alternative worlds to immerse us in for two hours. Are viewers jaded because however many Star Wars films later we just expect it to be well done at this point, dismissing the Sound Editing skill in making sounds for all those spaceships, fake planets, lightsaber fights, and the like? What about the many different life forms/A.I./technology bits of Blade Runner 2049 that were rendered so realistically as they spoke to us?

Baby Driver, which is a bit of a different ride, does what I thought were stellar, emotionally magical things with the music and remixes woven throughout it both as sound effects and plot points. It definitely has an intriguing and I thought fantastically successful soundscape, and that is why I'm hoping it wins here.

So, I think  Baby Driver is my pick for Sound Mixing, and what the heck, Blade Runner 2049 for Sound Editing. If nothing else, I will defiantly keep reminding everyone these are two different awards and do my part by picking two different movies!  No, seriously though - I'm not saying it's wrong to want the same movie to win both of these. But I do have two different picks.

What do you think? What struck your ear when you watched the five films nominated in these two categories?

I Need to Read More Black Authors

It's MLK Day, a holiday to honor the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It just so happens that on this particular MLK Day, the first since drumpty-the-vile-twit's inauguration, I mean usurpation of the White House, one might feel a little depressed, either when one contemplates the racism emanating from the mouth and thumbs of said vile twit or when one just looks around one's society at all the work still left to do in the attempt to secure freedom and justice for all.

But. As they say, start where you are.

Where am I? As usual, reading, thinking, and thinking about what to read.

This morning I posed the question of what would be a good Martin Luther King Day read -- something by the man himself, perhaps, or some books that increase understanding of what black people have suffered in U.S. society, what injustices have gone into creating and perpetuating the racism we still practice, what power structures are in place, and so on. A couple of days ago, I posted about the writers from "shithole countries" whose books I've read over the past year and asked my Fbriends what authors not from Norway they have been reading since the occupation began. Last night, as I thought about what book to read next, I decided to make a conscious effort this year to make sure less than half of the books I read are by white male authors.

Today, these thoughts led to curiosity about the exact numbers, of how many authors I've read are white males and how many are not. Luckily, we have Goodreads! Which means I was able to sign in to my account, where I've tracked the books I've read since joining the site in 2008, and go ahead and count 'em up. First, I did a quick tally for the 46 books I read last year, calendar year 2017, and it was: White Guys: 16, Not White Guys: 30. That's not so terrible, I thought (other than the fact that I read only 46 books last year, but that has already been addressed and my New Year's resolution to get back to higher number-of-books-read-per-year levels has already been enacted, fear not), and I was a little proud of myself that I had read more authors who were Not White Guys than I had read White Guys.

Pride, ya know, goeth before the fall.

I then checked out my 2016 numbers. First of all, I read only 42 books that calendar year, which is even lamer than 2017 but we all know how distracted I was by teaching...or drinking...or being driven to drink by teaching during 2016. Or by Quincy coming from China...or by the Cubs' World Series...or something. Anyway, that year it was White Guys: 15 and Not White Guys: 27. Still a similar ratio. Let's have a look at 2015, with 54 books read. White Guys: 32, Not White Guys: 22. Yikes! Now, to be fair (although why should you be?) you could recall that that was the year I read about ten books of Edwin Arlington Robinson poetry -- basically all of his poetry I could. *What do you mean WHY he won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry three times people THREE and I had to read his collected poems for hundreds and hundreds of pages and ... yes, I said "had to"*  But even though that's just one White Guy taking up ten slots, it's also ten slots that didn't go to books by Not White Guys. So anyway....

Clockwise fr top left: Danticat, Colbert, Achebe, Adichie, Coates

I know -- we probably all know -- that in general I read a fair amount of books by women. But guess what -- the majority of them are white. Damn it.

After checking out these initial numbers, I decided on this particular Martin Luther King Jr. Day to continue perusing my Goodreads "Read" shelf to see how many black authors I read last year, in 2017. The answer is: five.

In case you're interested, they were Chinua Achebe, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Brandy Colbert, Ta-Nehisi Coates, and Edwidge Danticat. One of them I had read before last year as well. Two I had been meaning to read for quite some time. But, well, that's not very many. Five black authors out of 46 books read.

Um...it gets worse. In 2016, I read one. (Assata Shakur)  In 2015? One. (Maya Angelou)

Yes, I've read authors from a variety of countries and of a variety of ethnicities and races, this year and last year and every year. And yes, I've read as many writers who are Not White Guys as are White Guys. But I need to do a whole lot better.

I mean, it's one thing when you sit in your canon-driven literature classes and read a lot of old/dead white guys (although to be fair -- and this time, I will be, to my teachers -- I was actually exposed to quite a lot of Not White Guys over the years, in my English major classes, I daresay at a better rate than in some of the rest of academia....) but now in my "real" life I am not beholden to a syllabus. I can read whatever I want by anyone. So. Why don't I read/haven't I read more black authors?

Now, I do love me a reading project. A lot of my reading projects are list driven, and a lot of those lists tend to get populated by some of the same Old/Dead White Guys over and over again. Just to name three of my life-reading-projects-in-progress, the Pulitzer-winning fiction, the Modern Library Top 100 Novels, and the 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die feature no shortage of White Guys. Still, there ARE other races and genders on those lists. And I don't JUST read books from those lists (obviously, or my projects wouldn't take me so long), so I do read other novels. But I pretty clearly need to start some kind of African-American novels project. Who's got a list for me?

And this is not to mention my oh-my-god-it's-been-going-on-so-long-but-is-almost-finished Prez Bios project, launched during the Dubya administration, in which I've been reading a biography of every U.S. president in order to see where we went wrong. I've made it through all the men (White Guys a-plenty!) up to Dubya himself now, and the vast majority of the biographies have been written by, you guessed it, White Guys. White Guys write a whole lot of our history. It's just, like, totally in their hands.

What are we all going to do about that?

All of your suggestions are welcome - suggestions of novels written by black authors, suggestions of non-fiction written by black authors, and suggestions for how we can all do more to speak truth to power, fight entrenched injustice, and keep working toward freedom and making Dr. King's dream a reality.

Oprah and the 2020 Vision

Well, I wasn't exactly plotting this as my Happy New Year! post, but since there are about fourteen different arguments I'm involved in on various Facebook threads regarding this topic, thought I might as well weigh in here for all and sundry...

We're here to talk about the Golden Globes, Oprah, and the trending idea of "Oprah for President."

First and foremost, it has come to my attention that a significant portion of y'all, whoever y'all may be (feel free to mis/interpret that to include yourself or not - I don't really care), missed the set-up in Golden Globes show host Seth Meyers' opening monologue. Just last night I had to explain this to someone in a bar who had no idea it had happened. I'll explain it again here, because if you're coming late to the party and claiming that the #Oprah2020 response to her lifetime achievement award acceptance speech is half-baked, you should probably know that you are the half-baked one, in that you have only been served half of this entree. To wit:

-In 2011, Seth Meyers and Barack Obama famously roasted and jabbed and mocked TheDonaldTrump at the White House Correspondents Dinner, where rich and powerful people do that to each other annually (usually including the current president, except not this past year because we don't currently have a president, just a usurping twit), and since then there has been a kind of ongoing half-joke rumor that Seth Meyers pitilessly mocking Trump to his face about wanting to be president is what cemented the decision in TrumptyDumpty's mind that he'd run. Is it true that Seth Meyers' words had that effect on Trump? Don't know/don't care. But it has been a recurring theme since then to ask Meyers about it in interviews (see, e.g., him on Fresh Air) and for him to half-jokingly/half-wistfully say maybe he accidentally is responsible for the disaster through which we're all now living. Ha.
-At the Golden Globes this past Sunday, January 7, 2018, Seth Meyers referenced his "responsibility" for #TrumptyDumpty and said that he doesn't know if it works, but just in case... and then he riffed along these lines: "Oprah, you can NEVER be president! You should not run in 2020! Tom Hanks, you can never ever be vice-president! You're too nice!"  Reaction shots of Oprah and Hanks in the crowd. Laughter all around. Then, Seth Meyers staring into the camera: "And now, we just wait and see."

Get it? It was funny, and brilliant, and spot fucking on, as comedy should be.

So if you missed that, you missed the entire planting of the night's seed, as it were.

Anyway, then later in the evening Oprah got the Cecil B. DeMille Award for her outstanding contributions to the world of entertainment. Remember when Meryl Streep got that award last year? I sure do. See, e.g., this most wonderful of Tweets. In keeping with the evening's/Hollywood's/the world's life moment theme of #TIMESUP and declaring a new day in terms of the shite women must endlessly face, especially when they dare to have power or have their voices heard (see, e.g., Hillary Rodham Clinton, you goddamn vast right-wing conspiracy that has absolutely ruined for the rest of us what could have been a perfectly nice life), Oprah gave a rousing speech that many, many, many of us found moving and inspiring. Because she is, among other things, moving, inspiring, smart, experienced, a leader, a visionary, talented, philanthropic, gutsy, bold, powerful, eloquent, life-affirming, and - not to be missed - a black woman. You're goddamn right I'd be happy to hand her whatever job she wanted.

I highly doubt she wants to be president. Neither does the unstable, decidedly non-genius, usurping twit currently pretending to do that job.

I am not starting or joining any #Oprah2020 campaign.

No, I don't think we should be plucking our presidential candidates out of the "world of entertainment" - see, e.g., Ronald Reagan and Pat Robertson, two such pluckees who should never have been presidential candidates.

But y'all (again, if you're not part of that y'all, don't take it personally, but if you are, please take it VERY personally indeed) made Hillary Rodham Clinton, one of the smartest and most qualified presidential candidates of all time, run against just such a pluckee and you acted like he had any business being there. Any of you who did that -- any of you who ever for so much as one second pretended he had a legitimate claim to being a qualified presidential candidate - goddamn you to hell.

All of the racism and misogyny that has built this nation has led us to this moment: we have an actual usurping twit unstable "button"-wielding cretin in charge of actual things, and instead of being outraged about that this week (and every week), you want to point out to me that it is ridiculous that people are hashtagging #Oprah2020.

Yes, it is ridiculous.

Your bed is made. Lie down.