Golden Globes

My friend Suzanne (gradgirl) and I had our usual post award show pow wow via telephone after the show on Monday night. We agreed that the speeches, with a few notable exceptions, were a bore. The Globes like to promote themselves as the most unpredictable and the most fun party in all of Hollywood, but they didn't really live up to their hype this year. As a general rule, the women seemed to handle the proceedings with more aplomb than the men. Emma Thompson was very witty and Geena Davis seemed to be quite in the spirit of things. Felicity Huffman can always be depended on for something pithy. S. Epatha Merkerson definitely gave the most heartfelt speech of the evening, so kudos for that. Steve Carrell was funny and so was Hugh Laurie. Ang Lee kept our attention. Otherwise the men were wooden or bizarre. What the heck was wrong with Jonathan Rhys Meyers? Was he just nervous? He's an actor, he could have acted a little pleased. Instead he seemed like he could give a flying you-know-what. He beat out some of the finest actors working today -- Donald Sutherland, Ed Harris, Kenneth Branagh for crying out loud. He could have at least made an effort. And Philip Seymour Hoffman seemed like he's never stood before an audience before. Diana Ossana was meandering all over the place in her speech, which is a little surprising, considering that she's a writer. And speaking of being on something, what do you suppose Mary-Louise Parker smoked (or snorted) before the show? Because that was more than a couple of appletinis on display. Sheesh. And someone give that girl a sandwich before she blows away in a stiff breeze. There's thin and then there's emaciated. That degree of skinny is just not attractive, not to mention unhealthy.

I like when the winners say something about their fellow nominees, I think that's so gracious. But I don't think anyone did that this year, except Ang Lee. John Travolta, as a presenter, made a really great comment about how the actor nominees have raised the bar for everyone, but his comment got no response from the audience at all. I was surprised and clearly he was too. Too busy getting drunk I suppose.

Suzanne and I didn't have any major complaints about the actual winners. Of course I was rooting for Brokeback Mountain and wasn't disappointed. Suzanne wanted Matt Dillon to win, and Jeremy Piven; they both totally deserve it. We both wondered why Crash was so under-represented. Seems like it doesn't pay at awards time to release your movie before the fall. People have such short memories. Plus it seems like ensemble pictures like Crash just do not lend themselves to the showy performances that elicit awards. Clearly the Golden Globes and the Oscars should add an ensemble category, like the SAG Awards have.

We did complain about the categorizations of some of the performances -- why is Reese Witherspoon in the Best Actress category while Scarlett Johansson is in the Supporting category -- they had about the same amount of screen time. And Maria Bello was probably on screen less than either of these actresses and she's in the Best Actress category too. Were there really so few major female performances yet again this year??? And why is George Clooney winning in the Supporting category when the entire movie is based around his character (and based on the books written by his character). What exactly is a "supporting" role? And what exactly is a "comedy"? Not The Squid and the Whale and certainly not Pride and Prejudice. Maybe these films were happy to get a berth in any category, but I would think choosing films like these tends to shut out movies that really are comedies.