Out of Hollywood

I'm a huge movie buff and I've always looked forward to the Oscars, so I figured I'd do a little Bonemanship on the big night. Yes, I sharpened a pencil and settled in for the full nine shmears--from pre-show to "Best Picture" it makes for a long night.

Tuning in for all the "pre-Oscar hoopla" is much like ordering the fruit plate before the main course. I'm not a gay-basher but they do tend to be a tad hung-up on fashion. And, good Lord, whose idea was it to put that nasty old hatchet Joan Rivers in charge? She was never that funny even back in her Johnny Carson hay-day and nowadays to call her annoying would be more than fair. "Who are you wearing?" What kind of question is that? Who are you wearing? It sounds like something you'd ask a cannibal in Neanderthal times, "Actually Joan, I'm wearing Thag of the Lake People. Thag really should've stayed by the lake. Makes a smart little jacket, though--don't he?"

Joan has a gift for getting on my nerves like few other entertainers. By the end of her red-carpet report you find yourself wondering if it would be fashionable to see that velvet rope wrapped around her neck. "That's a good look for you Joan. It really sets off your eyes."

One thing that struck me as a bit odd was the fact that they kept making this big deal about how the Oscars had finally returned home to Hollywood. Call me naive but I thought the Oscars were always pretty much held in Hollywood. Okay so maybe they were held down the street a few blocks at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, which is technically in North Hollywood, but they were making it out like those poor movie stars were being forced to accept their awards in Barstow. "Yay, the Oscars are finally back in Hollywood!"

Anyhow it certainly was a colorful evening. This is an intended pun as it proved to be a big night for the black thespian. First of all, until the show, I had no idea that Black actresses had historically been shut out of the best actress category. A fact that Halle Berry more than filled me in on. Her tearful and pained acceptance speech has to be the longest, loudest and most labored utterance by a Black woman since Mrs. O' Neal had to push Shaq into the world.

Actually, for the first four or five minutes I thought Halle Berry's watershed verbosity was kind of cool--you go girl. But I did find it a bit odd that with the thousands of people (and lawyers) she thanked in her acceptance speech, she left out her co-star Billy Bob Thornton. "What about Bob?" I was thinking--he could've been nominated for Monsters Ball or Bandits or The Man Who Wasn't There? I almost started feeling sorry for him until it occurred to me that he gets to sleep with Angelina Jolie. The Academy must have taken into account the fact that Billy Bob has already got a trophy with gorgeous eyes and sensuous, pouty lips, who's a total nympho. You'll have to pardon my Sling Blade envy.

Another example of someone who had a great year but got stiffed by Oscar, was the Australian beauty Nicole Kidman. Although I wasn't nuts about The Others, she was great in Moulin Rouge and like many of the pundits, I figured the little golden man would be going down under. Perhaps next year she'll win an honorary Oscar for her convincing 10 year performance as the "pretend" wife of a gay dude. Not that there's anything wrong with being a "pretend" wife. You're probably thinking "Mr. Boneman, Tom Cruise isn't gay, that's just a tabloid rumor. Look at the evidence--he hooked up with Kidman while shooting Days Of Thunder and Penelope Cruz during Vanilla Sky?" Granted, but what you may not know is that during the filming of The Firm he was romantically linked with Wilford Brimley.

Though I've yet to see Monsters Ball, I was fine with the "Black Sweep." I've always been a big fan of Sidney Poitier and Denzel is well, Denzel. I've heard a few people grumble about it (First the NBA, now the Oscars), but I thought it was fine. There are dozens of great black actors, but when you stop and think about it, how many can you name? It's like trying to call the Seven Dwarfs when you're on the spot. You can only come up with five or six--especially if you don't count Rappers. If anyone is keeping the black man down it's Hollywood. Try it--see how many you can name? You'll find yourself up around ten, before you're like "what's the name of the dude that was in that one damn movie? Cuba Good Hunting?" Then try the same thing with White actors--you can go all day. Food for thought.

What really had me worried was the fact that Lord of the Rings didn't win any of the big ones. I figured this might prove to be a flash point as dangerous as the Rodney King verdict. I wouldn't have been surprised to see the streets over-run with angry, rioting fantasy-nerds. Mobs of costume-wearing Frodo-freaks brandishing fake swords and storming the Math departments of Universities all over the country. "I got your Beautiful Mind, right here--math boy!" Actually I thought Lord of the Rings was the best movie of the year, but I'd like to make one thing perfectly clear--I'm not a nerd. Not that there's anything wrong with it.

Now it's time to talk about boobs. Historically the Oscars have been a veritable treasure chest of memorable mammaries. Goodness, other than a few choice aerial views of Uma Thurman's lactose engines, this year's show sucked. For example what the hell happened to Jennifer Connelly? She was sporting some co-pilots in Rocketeer and I was extremely impressed by her robust performance in Inventing The Abbotts. Those were golden globes worthy of a couple of rewinds and a pause. Cripes--she looked like a man at the Oscars--kind of cranky with a five o' clock shadow. Maybe it was all that heroin in Requiem For a Dream? And don't get me started on Gwyneth Paltrow. She was wearing a dress that made her sad little lumps look like two POW's smashed underneath mosquito netting. I could go on, but some of you would probably think that there's something wrong with that.