Monday, January 12, 2015

2015 Golden Globe Awards

For the first time... and perhaps last time ever... Prince and Robert Downey Jr., two men who've become a big part of my life and have inspired me, are at the same venue at the same time. And happened to grace the stage at the Beverly Hilton where they presented awards roughly 2.5 hours apart.

More on that later... just wanted to lead with that because I may never get to say that again :P



Much Ado about Television
As if it wasn't already frustrating enough that Robert Duvall didn't win the only Golden Globe "The Judge" was up for... with many winners from the TV categories, I was mildly annoyed because none of them were from shows I knew or watched.

Jeffery Tambor winning for the Amazon series "Transparent" was predictable (if this was another night, the word "Oscar bait") would be thrown around. But he gave a great speech supporting the transgender community and what a blessing it was to work on such a project... it was hard not to be moved.

The same went for Joanne Froggatt who won for "Downtown Abbey"... I was backing Michelle Monaghan (as a huge "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" fan) and the media was backing the woman from "Orange is the New Black," Uzo Aduba... but from hearing pieces of her storyline, which involved rape, talking about the fan mail she got in response to it... I doubt there was a dry eye in the house.

Never heard of "The Affair," yet it won twice... one was for best actress, Ruth Wilson (it should have been Viola Davis for "How to get away with Murder"... great series and she's great... plus I don't watch any of the other shows).

The love for "Fargo" didn't come as a surprise because the series has gotten a lot of praise. I just haven't gotten around to it cuz it's an FX series likely on during something else I watch.

Other than that, I was really happy with everyone else. So many people were talking about Matt Bomer's performance in "The Normal Heart," and his win was my first cheering moment of the night.
[Coincidentally, we had our first public appearance of "50 Shades of Grey" co-stars Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan... I'm sure there are still plenty of women upset Matt Bomer didn't get cast as Christian... and I still balk at the trailers romanticizing the book, which read very hostile to me (I'm going beyond the sex scenes here)]

Maggie Gyllenhaal won for "The Honourable Woman," which I know nothing about, but I'd had a soft spot for her since she and RDJ were on "Finding Your Roots" and she gave a moving performance in "Won't Back Down," which is about school systems failing children behind the learning curve.

Jane Rodriguez won for "Jane the Virgin," which didn't come as a surprise at all. So many accolades for that series and as a first-time winner (one of several that night!), her reaction was priceless. That bundle of nerves and all those tears :P

Kevin Spacey won for "House of Cards," the highest acclaimed Netflix series in existence. He dedicated part of his speech to Stanley Kramer (looking him up, he directed "Judgement at Nuremburg, Guess who's coming to dinner" and many others). He said while meeting him how he said what his films had meant to him, marveling at the performances he got out his actors, and so on. The response he got back was "thank you" and "I just wish my films could have been better"...
so he ends his speech by saying "I want to be better... but this [the award] is very encouraging"... I don't know why, but that speech just stuck with me. I guess because I want to keep learning about movies and I love hearing actors speak so highly of other filmmakers they either worked with or were inspired by.

Prince and "Selma"


Anyone who knows me or saw my "Purple Rain" entry knows the impact Prince has had on my life. Me as a person, a music-lover and a blogger.
http://moviegoerconfessions.blogspot.com/2014/10/4-purple-rain-1984.html
He awarded "Selma" its only award, which happened to be for best original song.
"Glory" by John Legend and Common.

It's ridiculously eerie that this movie came out during a year where it had remarkable relevance. And for me, it's kinda hard to ignore the fact Prince gave this particular award... like it was planned in advance...
Back in the day, Prince promoted harmony between races and creeds in such songs as "Uptown" and "Dance Music Sex Romance"... it's hard not to speculate the reasoning behind this being his first public appearance since he left the Internet [again]... but it's best that I don't.
So many of his fans are negative about him online and I've always done my part to not be one of them... if anything, my theories will be heard by one other person. Who loves his music even more than I do.



Best Foreign Film

I should have gone with my gut on this one :P didn't know any of the nominees going in and my gut literally said before they read the names "pick the one from Russia"... given how much my mind has been on Russia since the Sochi Olympics... based on the titles and the scenes, I changed over to the one from "Israel."

But the winner was "Leviathan." I definitely picked up the accent in the man who accepted the award. Meanwhile, my dad's saying they picked from their country to play nice... something we kinda did last year by picking "A Separation" from Iran.
Per my understanding (despite all those commercials promoting "The Allegiance"), Russia has plenty to worry about besides us. Unless of course you take those sanctions into account...

anyway, moving on...

George Clooney- Lifetime Achievement

My first Clooney film was "Ocean's 11," which he has an amazing catalog of movies and TV credits behind him. Naturally, we got plenty of camera shots of him and his new wife. Maybe it's because I hadn't seen many pictures of her or they had a heck of a hair & make-up team, but she's freaking gorgeous. In a very exotic way too.

But anyway, after Don Cheadle and Julianne Margulies argued about which of them knew him better, he got up for his own speech. Which covered pretty much everything. Talking about how he's gotten a lot of award buzz but didn't always win. He took a moment (as did a member of the Hollywood Foreign Press earlier in the show) to support free speech. He was one of many (Jared Leto is the only name I currently remember) who spoke in support of France with the words "Je Suis Charlie."

If anything, George Clooney on that stage... the man is a class act. There's no other way to explain it.


Best Animated Film

Of the five nominees, we saw two. "The Lego Movie" and "How to Train your Dragon 2."
It would have been WILD if "Lego" won after all the doubters and such... but it went to the latter, which was just as good.



Acting, Writing and Directing Awards

As we started getting to the big awards, I kept thinking to myself "Man, I really wish I'd gone to see all these movies just to see what all the hype was about."

I'd considered "Birdman" several times, but kept thinking how it wasn't the typical movie I see in theaters. It won for best screenplay (co-credited to the director, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, and three others) and best actor.
Michael Keaton had gotten so much hype in the press over this movie. Not just the irony of the plot (him turning down a 3rd Batman and disappearing from movies several years since) but his acting in general. So his win, I absolutely expected. His speech was one of 3-4 that ran long and seeing as he won for acting, he already had a lot of leeway.

I also considered, "Boyhood," which got a lot of attention for its intriguing premise.
Taking a moment to speak about the people who introduced the Best Picture nominees, most weren't surprises because they knew the directors well. But usually they don't have so many people who were IN those moments promoting them...
Jack Black, I don't believe, was in "Boyhood," but I knew he'd be promoting it because he worked with Richard Linklater (who walked away with Best Director) on "School of Rock." It was pretty hilarious how he dispelled the myth they spent 12 years filming this movie (it was more like one week of shooting a year over a span of 12 years).
Patricia Arquette won for Best Supporting Actress (we were all just glad it wasn't Meryl Streep... again).

Amy Adams won for "Big Eyes," her 2nd Golden Globe win in a row. She always looks amazing at these award shows, but tonight she looked like a goddess. This is a movie I might wait to see on Showtime or whatever channel shows it.

Unfortunately, "Into the woods" won absolutely nothing. "The Imitation Game" won absolutely nothing. Despite all of Ellen's hype, "St. Vincent" won absolutely nothing. But overall, the awards were very well spread out.

"The Theory of Everything," which looks like something we'll watch once on HBO in the near future, won twice. The first for best original score (Johann Johnnsson beating out Alexandre Desplat and Hans Zimmer among others).
Eddie Redmayne winning for Best Actor in a drama... one of two huge cheering moments in my house that night. Firstly, because I called it the moment he was cast (c'mon, someone playing Stephen Hawking... who can compete with that?) and secondly, we're big "Les Miz" fans.

A Few Downey-related moments(because this is ME we're talking about, I couldn't help myself, and also because I credit RDJ for my tradition of watching the Golden Globes... all beginning with him winning for "Sherlock Holmes")

Sadly, "The Judge" lost its one and only award nomination to J.K. Simmons for "Whiplash." But in a reoccurring theme that night, it was hard for me to be mad at any of the people who won over the people I picked... except for maybe Julianne Moore. [I still believe "Wild" will earn Reese Witherspoon her second Oscar]

One person from "The Judge" DID win... for something else entirely (FX's "Fargo"). Billy Bob Thorton gave probably the best speech. About anything you say might get you in trouble, so it's best to say "thank you" and move on LOL

During someone's speech (perhaps George Clooney's), I caught a glimpse of Robert's wife, Susan Downey in the audience. Looking gorgeous as always.

RDJ has certainly moved up in the world. Last year, he presented for Best Actress in a comedy/musical. This year, he presented for Best Picture (comedy/musical)... maybe with that momentum, next year he'll be accepting an Oscar.
But it was pretty sweet he was the one to present "The Grand Budapest Hotel" with its only award. Wes Anderson spent his speech running through a million names while his cast and crew got on stage with him.

[In case anyone cares, our biggest celebration moment was "The Grand Budapest Hotel" winning Best comedy/musical... other than maybe "The Lego Movie" and "How to train your dragon 2," it was probably the only movie we saw of the ones on all those "best of 2014" lists]

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