Hola, Iggy Here!
Well, the 2018 Oscars have come and gone. So the full pageantry and magic of Hollywood was on display last night, and I fell asleep before it even started. But I’ve caught up on YouTube now, so let’s get going!
The Lowest-Rated Oscars Ever
While I can’t guess why this would be the case generally, I know why it was the case for me. Preparing for an exciting night of Oscar watching and note-taking, I ordered my Uber-takeout of 3 buckets of KFC with the necessary accoutrements of several pounds of mashed potatoes, a few gallons of gravy, and a bushel of coleslaw.
Also a dozen chicken tacos from Guillermo Del Taco to go with my chicken-themed night, and as a shout-out to my very good friend Guillermo del Toro, who was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay! And 10 other categories! Way to go, good personal friend Guillermo del Toro!
Also, I had a good quarter of the bottle of Patron X that good friend Guillermo del Toro gave me a few years back, and I thought this was as good a time as any to break it out.
After all, Guillermo had a very good chance of winning the Best Picture Oscar this year for The Shape of Water, which I was very excited about. It’s a movie about a beautiful woman who falls in love with a grotesque man-creature, and then they make sweet love together. Talk about a movie in my wheelhouse! Wow!
KFC and Tequila is Like an Orgasm In Your Mouth!
But anyway, I took a few tentative bites of that original-recipe chicken from the first bucket, and then a sip of that Patron X tequila. Why had I never discovered this gustatory orgasm before? It was incredible!
So I sucked the meat off a drumstick, and then took another shot of tequila. Better than the first time! So then I had to throw in some mashed potatoes, and by that time I was taking shots of Colonel Sanders’s delicious gravy with the tequila . . . and soon, two-and-a-half buckets of chicken and all of the Patron X were gone. And several chicken tacos. After that, the red carpet turned into a red blur!
And then I woke up 13 hours later in a pool of gravy, potatoes and coleslaw, with chicken bones all around me. I can’t tell you how many times that’s happened to me! But this was the first time it had happened to me at Oscar time!
Spoilers! Guillermo del Toro Wins!
So I was a little late to the after-party, so to speak. But I did get there thanks to YouTube and other sites covering the Oscars. And I can’t tell you how delighted I was to learn that my good friend Guillermo del Toro had won the Best Picture Oscar! I immediately sent him a congratulatory Tweet, although I’m afraid he may have accidentally blocked me. Of course, I also sent him an email, but I think all my emails to him may be going into his spam folder, as I haven’t gotten a reply in quite a while.
Well, if you’re reading this Guillermo, go check your spam filter! Also, I could really use another bottle of that delicious tequila, as I’m afraid I’m all out!
Anyway, on to my in-depth Oscar coverage!
Women Were Still Second-Class Citizens At This Year’s Oscars
First, of course, Jimmy Kimmel did an incredible job of hosting the Oscars once again! He was hilarious, from what I could find on YouTube, but also sensitive and caring about justice. Good for him! He’s really grown since The Man Show.
Showing this sensitivity, he had Ashley Judd, Salma Hayek, and Annabella Sciorra—women who were all victims of Harvey Weinstein’s casting-shower antics—present a movie about the #MeToo movement. I had a small tear in my eye while I watched a snippet of it on NBC.com this morning.
However, I’m sad to say neither Greta Gerwig, only the fifth female director ever to be even nominated for an Oscar, nor Rachel Morrison, the first woman EVER to get an Oscar nod for cinematography, won an award. We’ve still got a LOOOONG way to go, people!
Best actor went to Gary Oldman, for getting old and fat in Darkest Hour. I still remember when Gary Oldman came to our house to give us a special screening of The Professional. What a talented guy, he really deserved it!
Best actress went to Frances McDormand, who was great in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, a documentary about how the South is still full of racists and the police can shoot black people with impunity! Good for them exposing those racists down there! Also, Frances McDormand was so good in Fargo. I love that movie!
Of course, Guillermo del Toro, my good friend and colleague, won for Best Director. Totally deserved.
African-Americans Finally Acknowledged With Awards at #Oscars
As I’ve already touched on, Roger Deakins, a white man, stole the Best Cinematography award from Rachel Morrison. Don’t get me wrong, Blade Runner 2049 had GREAT cinematography. But is that really what matters most when a woman has NEVER won the award, and it’s 2018? I don’t think so! It’s sad that we still have so far to go!
Best Original Screenplay went to Jordan Peele for Get Out! Finally, the Academy has realized that black people really exist and make GREAT MOVIES! Really, this is a moment for celebration, even as we all acknowledge that we still have a long, long way to go.
Best Adapted Screenplay went to James Ivory for the excellent story of how emotionally-healthy it is for older men to sleep with teenage boys, Call Me By Your Name. Well-deserved! I don’t know about you, but I’ll never eat a peach the same way again after seeing that movie!
Best Original Score went to Alexandre Desplat for The Shape of Water. It was a good score, but really, there weren’t ANY women who scored a movie recently?
You’d Think Only White Men Deserve Awards in Hollywood!
I’m afraid that despite Jimmy Kimmel hosting, it doesn’t get any better. The Academy Award for Visual Effects went to John Nelson, Gerd Nefzer, Paul Lambert and Richard R. Hoover—all men!—for Blade Runner 2049.
Best Animated Feature was Coco—a film about a male boy! But at least he was Mexican, so it’s not entirely a bad thing.
Best Film Editing went to Lee Smith for Dunkirk, a movie about war that was full of men. And Lee Smith is a man, too. I really don’t think Hollywood has learned its lesson yet. I really don’t.
On the bright side, the Best Foreign Language Film was A Fantastic Woman. Finally a movie, other than The Shape of Water, that really deserved a win! Because it was about a woman. And that’s fantastic!
You can find the other Oscar winners elsewhere, I’m sure. You can read more about the nominations from Low Dog and his 2018 Double Super-Secret Oscar Ballot! But as for me, I’ve still got half a bucket of KFC to get to, and seven cold chicken tacos left. So . . . eat ’em if you’ve got ’em! I sure am going to!
Later, Peeps!
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