boogie down

finally, dudetube brings us what we all wanted to see from youtube: boys in their underwear, some drunk, some singing and dancing, some both. best idea ever. (via towleroad)

oscars, best adapted screenplay

a good movie usually starts from a good script, and some great scripts are based on previously existing works, so here are the nominees for the best adapted screenplay oscar.

i'll say it again. i enjoyed all these movies. well, except for the part in munich when they intercut a scene with avner having sex with his wife with the massacre in munich. what was that about? mebbe i just didn't look deep enuf to get the real meaning behind it, but i think i'm okay with that. other than that, tony kushner and eric roth wrote some fantastic back-and-forths about faith and revenge and that sort of thing. unfortunately, i didn't feel like it was put together in the best possible way, so it's not my favorite. a history of violence was good, and some of the characters were written very well by josh olson, but i didn't feel like there was anything particularly special about it (except for mebbe them). enjoyable, yes, but best? probably not. dan futterman's capote script was good, and i think it has the most to do with the best qualities of the movie, but parts of it still just didn't connect for me. i felt like there was just a little bit lacking. i really liked the constant gardener, but i think it's missing a nomination. yes, it may just be a great adaptation by jeffrey caine, but where's a director's nod for meireilles? i felt like most of what was best about this movie was the direction, and yet no nom. boo! anyways, i don't kno why i just went thru all that, cuz of course i loved brokeback and hope it wins in this category (as well as others). it's remarkable how larry mcmurtry and diana ossana turned a tiny (tho very wrenching) proulx short story into something bigger while retaining exactly everything that the story had been about. so many things went into making brokeback such an amazing movie, and the script was definitely part of it. go brokeback!

oscars, best animated feature

i love watching movies, and i like the oscars too. you may have heard that the nominations were announced this past tuesday, and while most of them were given, there were a few surprises here and there. as i always do during this time, i start watching all the movies that were nominated, so that i can get a good feeling for what's really good and what movie was just campaigned to death. i think i did pretty good this year in that i'd already seen most of them, but there are a few of those best actor and actress movies i never bothered to see. anyways, i thot it would be fun to make my own picks. let's start simple (tho i'm sure everyone knos what best picture nominee i thot was best).

it's a young category, but i like it. animated movies are usually so much fun to watch. you can do so much wacky stuff that's just not possible in the realm of live action. pixar has won two out of the three times it was nominated in the four years since best animated feature film (tho i thot monsters, inc was better than shrek in 2001), but there is no pixar movie this year, so who will win this year? howl's moving castle was an enjoyable movie, and i love miyazaki's movies usually (spirited away ritefully won in 2002 for this category), but the story was weak and didn't make that much sense, and the happy ending was so sudden and baseless, one wonders why the rest of the story was worth telling. the world was well-shaped and i liked all the little miyazaki touches to diana wynne jones's story, but that doesn't automatically make it a great movie. corpse bride was short and simple. the animation was great, most of the jokes were pretty funny, and i even enjoyed the music. i liked it, but i didn't feel like there was all that much to this movie, compared to the other two. i think it's obvious i liked wallace and gromit in the curse of the were-rabbit the best. it was hilarious from start to finish and well-imagined. there were so many small details that were put in for careful watchers. i enjoyed this movie immensely and want to get the dvd for my little cousins so that i can watch it again with them. i think this category is no contest. wallace and gromit is way better than the other two.

conversation at dinner

someone brot up the fact that one of her friends was getting married, but the friend's mother was disapproving of the guy that the friend was getting married to, since she was a real bitch and didn't really approve of anyone or anything. then it was mentioned that the friend's brother had gotten married without telling the mother, because of what a horrible bitch she was.

anyways, my mother turns to me, and says: "is that why you haven't told me about your girlfriend? because you're afraid of what i'll think?" (note: i don't have a girlfriend.)

and i respond: "yeah, that's rite. my girlfriend is black." (note: i love people of all colors, but many traditional chinese people don't.)

she says: "i wouldn't care. your mother is very progressive, you kno?"

i say: "oh really? are you now?"

she says: "yes, as long as you aren't gay."

i say nothing in response to this. i take another swig of wine.

is james frey fauxtistic too?

i read half of james frey's a million little pieces some time ago and i had to stop because it wasn't interesting and the writing was boring and horrible (i do recall thinking, "what is this shit?"). i don't kno how i made it halfway thru actually. i don't understand why so many people are reading it now (i'm sure oprah is partially to blame) and why everyone tells me it's so good. that's just ridiculous. it's not a good book and that's that.

i recently finished mark haddon's the curious incident of the dog in the night-time, which, in contrast to frey's autobiographical mess, was a fantastic, if rather short, read. i did notice one glaring similarity between the two books tho. the writing styles were so similar! of course, i think it worked much better for haddon because he was writing in the voice of an autistic teenager. if you get a chance, avoid pieces and read incident, or perhaps one could read pieces and pretend the author is autistic. that might work.