Cracked's Oscar Rundown (Part Two)
Yesterday, Karla and I looked at the Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Actress categories. Today, we'll be analyzing Best Director, Best Supporting Actress, and the coveted Best Picture category. But first: our handy CRACKED Pronounciation Chart: |
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Jay: If you're unlucky, you might have a friend who thinks it's a great idea to throw an Oscar party every year, and nobody's told them yet that's somewhere between scrapbooking and TiVoing The O.C. on the Fruit-Meter. Karla: If you do get roped into this, there's nothing more embarrassing than fumbling around in front of everyone, trying to talk about an actor whose parents decided to give him a name composed entirely of consonants. Below, we've listed some of the more indecipherable monikers on the nominee list this year, and the proper way to pronounce them in your damning armchair criticisms. |
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Indecipherable Name: Joaquin Phoenix |
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Indecipherable Name: Jake Gyllenhaal |
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Indecipherable Name: Keira Knightley |
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Ang Lee, Brokeback Mountain Lee's poignant, touching drama sparked controversy earlier this year for its depiction of two homosexuals who wander into an atomic explosion, gaining awesome strength, green skin and unstoppable rage. Lee silenced his critics by letting the film speak for itself, and later through threatening phone calls. |
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Bennett Miller, Capote Many told director Bennett Miller that Capote should not be made. Production studios. His wife. Truman Capote. Miller made it anyway, mostly out of spite, because let's face it, he's a spectacular asshole. |
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Paul Haggis, Crash As the writer, screenwriter and director of Crash, Haggis is the one nominee who most closely followed his own singular vision for a film. That it's all about not liking black people and giving continued film roles to Sandra Bullock shouldn't detract from this. |
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George Clooney, Good Night, and Good Luck With a Best Director nomination for GN&GL and a Best Supporting Actor nod for Syriana, one thing is certain: whatever George Clooney does, he won't stop until he's the motherfucking best. Look the hell out if you're in his way. "I will crush you if you oppose me!" as the director likes to say. |
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Steven Spielberg, Munich After his 1977 directing nomination for Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Steven Speilberg disappeared from Hollywood to raise coconuts on a faraway island, where the only rules were that there weren't any. He returns from thirty years of silence in Munich, a slapstick comedy about the tragic slaying of eleven Israeli athletes. |
WHO OUGHTTA WIN Karla: I'd pick Ang Lee for this one, except I think there's still a five-year moratorium on him winning any awards after Hulk. Spielberg just wouldn't be grateful enough on-screen. The guy's won so many of these things, I can't see his speech being longer than "Thanks, I'll throw this on the pile." Paul Haggis and Bennett Miller are both total unknowns, so there's no big dramatic moment for the audience. I think that leaves George Clooney by process of elimination. Jay: Interesting. I, of course, will be going with Christopher Nolan, Batman Begins. Karla: I have to ask: did you watch any other movie besides Batman Begins last year? Jay: Um. Sin City and Fantastic Four. Other than that, no. Karla: How did you get hired to write this? Jay: I managed to turn the conversation to Batman a lot at the job interview. |
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Amy Adams, Junebug Former Hooter's waitress Adams portrays a knocked up child-bride in this artsy film about how white trash are people too. You might recognize Adams from her previous appearances as Hot Girl, Hot Girl #2 and Busty McChestycans (voiceover). |
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Catherine Keener, Capote Keener plays Truman Capote's razor-faced partner Harper Lee, as they exploit cold-blooded killers, race against time, and escape Boss Hogg in a series of hilarious adventures that will change the way you think about cars diving over ravines. |
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Frances McDormand, North Country McDormand plays Glory, a spunky Minnesotan coal miner who doesn't act or sound anything like the spunky Minnesotan sheriff from Fargo, for which she already won an Oscar. Her mitterns are totally a different color, for one. |
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Rachel Weisz, The Constant Gardener Weisz is Tessa Quale, a shrill font of privileged white liberal guilt who marries an ambassador so she can go to Africa and save the world. Luckily for the viewer, she's brutally murdered in the first ten minutes. Hooray! |
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Michelle Williams, Brokeback Mountain The slutty chick from Dawson's Creek is all grown up and married to a gay cowboy. Life imitates art, as Williams managed to get Heath Ledger's baby batter into her some five minutes after she stepped onto the set. |
WHO OUGHTTA WIN Karla: Nobody will care, less will remember. Unless Adrian Brody actually mounts and penetrates the winner on stage. Jay: You need to pick someone. Karla: Frances McDormand, then. Jay: Keeping with my proposed Batman Begins Oscar sweep, I'd be forced to pick Katie Holmes for this category. And since that's lunacy, my pick is: Cillian Murphy, Batman Begins.
Karla: This is getting creepy. Jay: Go get your Cillian mask. |
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Brokeback Mountain Critics who said that two well-muscled young cowboys tonguing one another's assholes wouldn't make for great gay porno are proven wrong in this touching, sexalicious drama about two young men who find themselves unable to resist the romantic setting of late-season cow herding and succumb to their unspoken passions. |
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Capote Murder turns deadly in this pulse-pounding thriller set in the Kansas heartland in the year 3409. Truman Capote, a bounty hunter, is tasked to solve a series of gruesome killings, each bloodier than the last. But in order to catch a madman... he must become one. Or, alternatively, look for clues! |
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Crash Sandra Bullock is brought face to face with racial tension. After racial tension frames Bullock for a crime she did not commit, it is a race against time to convince the police she wouldn't murder anyone... and especially not all those murdered guys. |
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Good Night, and Good Luck It is 1950's-era America, and Communists lurk behind every corner. One brave man, Senator Joseph McCarthy, has the courage to pursue a fear-mongering witch hunt, while Commie CBS employees try to stop him, eager to turn our once-great country into a seething cauldron of Christ-defying, baby-eating anarchy. |
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Munich After eleven Israeli athletes are killed at the 1972 Munich Olympics, a top secret assassination squad is formed to track down the killers. The squad is later told not to bother, after it is learned the athletes were actually Special Olympians, and hadn't been killed so much as they just wandered off to a McDonalds Playroom while their handlers weren't looking. |
WHO OUGHTTA WIN Karla: Let me guess. Batman Begins, Best Picture. Jay: What? No. That's retarded. You're retarded for saying that. Karla: You weren't going to say Batman Begins? You were going to take the entire thing seriously and actually pick a film from the nominees? Jay: Fuck yes. Karla: Okay. Without looking at them, pick one. Don't look. Jay: Um. Karla: You have your choice written down right in front of you. You shouldn't have to think. Jay: I know that. Broke...barn... Madrid...Crushed? Karla: So you've chosen a random collection of words for Best Picture. Jay: I feel the critics will support my decision. Karla: It says Batman fucking Begins on your card, doesn't it? Jay: No. What? That's just... gowmph Karla: I'll just dial 9 and 1 and leave the cell. I'll be downstairs at the bar. Jay: |
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