Academy Awards Coverage: The Hurt Locker takes down the mighty Avatar; our own Douglas Maynard asks the tough questions

Posted by Paul Little | Sunday, March 7, 2010 @ 9:03pm

As the Academy Awards draw to a close, I'm reminded of something said at Friday's press conference in Hollywood with Oscar co-producers Adam Shankman and Bill Mechanic and Academy president Tom Sherak. I can't recall which one of the three said it, but we were told that there would be more excitement during the first hour of this year's Academy Awards telecast than ever before. Things would be fast-paced, you see, and this ceremony would be more appealing to younger viewers than ever before. Looking back on that first hour, and the show as a whole, I'm not quite sure what they were talking about.

Sure, the opening musical number featuring Neil Patrick Harris was phenomenal (should he host next year?); the banter between hosts Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin has been mostly really funny (who knew Meryl Streep had such a bit Hitler memorabilia collection?!); the John Hughes tribute was nice to see; Ben Stiller in Avatar make-up (when Avatar wasn't even nominated in that category!) was one of the funniest moments of the night; and there were of course some memorable acceptance speeches. But the most exciting first hour ever? Hardly. And a fast-paced extravaganza? Well, the show ran long once again.

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The Golden Monkey Awards: Our Best in Film for 2009

Posted by Paul Little | Sunday, March 7, 2010 @ 3:20am

Tonight the film world came together to celebrate the best in motion pictures with the 82nd Academy Awards. We love the Oscars here at ShowbizMonkeys.com -- the movie stars, the spectacle, the whole thing -- but we also like picking our own favourites in movies. Since this site began under our old name in 2001, we've been choosing our own top movies of the year. But beginning this year, we're running things more like the major awards shows themselves -- minus the stars and the spectacle, of course!

So, we present to you the Golden Monkey Motion Picture Achievement Awards, honouring what we believe to be the best in film for 2009. There are 10 categories: Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Animated Film, Best Documentary, Best Original Song, and of course, Best Picture. Our staff, which stretches across North America, submitted their choices for their favourites in each category, and from those selections, we put together our nominees. Then we put our nominees to a vote, and came up with these winners -- our collective favourites from the last year.

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The 82nd Annual Academy Awards: Viewing Tips

Posted by Paul Little | Sunday, March 7, 2010 @ 3:04am

ShowbizMonkeys.com is currently in Los Angeles putting together pre-show Oscar coverage, but we won't be at the actual Academy Awards Ceremony. But if you're like us, you'll be tuning into ABC or CTV to watch the biggest awards show in the world tonight -- and not just the ceremony itself, but all the Red Carpet coverage.

If you want to really get the inside scoop and be a part of the Academy Awards experience, the place to be is actually online. Oscar.com has partnered with Facebook this year for Oscar.com Live from the Red Carpet, which will give you the opportunity to interact with your favourite stars in real-time! Tonight, from 6-8pm EST (3-5pm PST), visit http://oscar.go.com/red-carpet/live-from-the-red-carpet and submit your questions to hosts Lisa Guerrero and Brett Chuckerman (who we actually spotting roaming the Red Carpet on Friday). And who knows, your question may be asked to George Clooney, Brad Pitt, or Quentin Tarantino!

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Review: Shutter Island

Posted by Elizabeth Hughes Belzil | Saturday, February 20, 2010 @ 12:11am

Despite a Best Director Oscar and numerous accolades, the last decade hasn’t been Martin Scorsese’s best: his films either lumbering behemoths or modest retreads. Gangs of New York was uneven, The Aviator overstuffed (in the way biopics habitually are), and The Departed a throwback to the mob genre which made him a household name. Sure, the latter won an Oscar, but arguably as a consolation for previous triumphs overlooked. In retrospect, it would seem as though he had lost some of that natural gift for storytelling that allowed his work to captivate and gave him the freedom to experiment with genre in a way that few directors can. That having been said, Shutter Island is his best work in a long time, serving to remind us of his versatility as a filmmaker and revitalizing the psychological thriller in one fell swoop. It is inspired but not confined by the classic Hitchcock mystery thrillers it seeks to emulate. Scorsese infuses his film with his distinctive but oft overlooked visual proficiency, creating tableaux at once nightmarish and indescribably beautiful.

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Review: The Wolfman

Posted by Elizabeth Hughes Belzil | Friday, February 12, 2010 @ 11:26am

In the post-Twilight Era it is difficult to take werewolves, vampires, and their ilk seriously; and even more difficult to find them scary. The Monster Movie, while it sputters in anemic existence by coupling itself with romances, comedies and action flicks, is, in the purist sense, dead. To our grandparents, couched in their Freudian paradigm—a world where unknown terrors lurked in the subconscious and civilization served to repress man’s bestial nature--a monster embodied a fear of an unknowable internal darkness, a man disassociated from societal restraint. Vampires substituted blood sucking for transgressive sexuality and a werewolf indulged in forbidden bloodlust. Our modern value set leaves a lot less to repress—civilization has become more relativistic and permissive in its acceptance of “aberrant” behaviors. Even what is not accepted is explained by modern psychology—you are perhaps sick, but not damned. It is no surprise that monster-dom has become a mere affectation.

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Hot Tub Time Machine stars visit Toronto Maple Leafs game

Posted by Paul Little | Friday, February 5, 2010 @ 2:45am

Actors Clarke Duke (Sex Drive, ABC Family's Greek) and Collette Wolfe (Observe and Report) were in Toronto earlier this week for a press tour of the upcoming Hot Tub Time Machine. If you haven't yet heard of the film, which comes out March 26th, you're missing out on what promises to be the most ridiculous -- in the best way possible -- movie of the year.

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Oscar nominations: Avatar and The Hurt Locker lead the way with 9 nominations each

Posted by Paul Little | Tuesday, February 2, 2010 @ 7:38pm

For the first time in over half a century, there are ten films nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Many thought that this may dilute the prestigious category, while others hoped it would open up the door to certain types of films that deserved nominations but are often ignored by the Oscars. Now that the nominees have been announced, it probably leans more to honouring deserving films that would normally be ignored, with dark sci-fi film District 9 and brilliant Pixar film Up scoring Best Picture noms.

Avatar and The Hurt Locker are the big winners as far as nominations go, each receiving nine, while Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds picked up eight nominations and Up in the Air and Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire each garnered six. Not surprisingly, the directors of the five films leading the nominations are going head to head in the Best Director category (and likely would've been the five films vying for Best Picture had they not expanded that category).

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Review: When in Rome

Posted by Elizabeth Hughes Belzil | Friday, January 29, 2010 @ 1:49am

For several days now I have been deliberating how to write this review. I considered an ironic approach (e.g. ‘Wow! Comedy doesn’t get anymore sophisticated than running into telephone posts, spinach stuck in teeth and clown car routines.’ or ‘Kristen Bell’s tour-de-force performance causes audience members to forget that acting is about more than a pretty face’.) Next I tried hyperbole (e.g. ‘This film is as vacuous as space, only significantly less intriguing.’) Finally, I conceded defeat—neither of my approaches seemed suited to the material. When in Rome is one of those films so ordinary in its badness, so unexceptionally ill conceived that it hardly warrants a review. It’s unpleasant but routine, like a daily dose of castor oil or the annual trip to the dentist’s office.

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Avatar takes home two trophies in a largely predictable (or at least safe) Golden Globes ceremony

Posted by Paul Little | Monday, January 18, 2010 @ 6:02am

Amongst a largely unexciting group of winners, Avatar stood as the only feature with multiple Golden Globe victories, winning for Best Picture (Drama) and Best Director (James Cameron). And while Cameron himself said he expected ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow to win the Director award for The Hurt Locker, handing the trophy to the director of what will probably end up the all-time box office champion wasn't exactly a daring choice for the Hollywood Foreign Press. The only other multiple winners were Showtime series Dexter (Michael C. Hall finally winning as Best Actor [Drama] after 3 previous nominations and John Lithgow winning as Best Supporting Actor) and HBO TV movie Grey Gardens.

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Review: The Lovely Bones

Posted by Elizabeth Hughes Belzil | Saturday, January 16, 2010 @ 1:44am

Alice Sebold’s best-selling novel, The Lovely Bones, is many things: a sentimental ghost story, a literate crime novel, and, in its best moments, an intimate character study set in 1970s American suburbia. Director Peter Jackson’s adaptation grasps the first two aspects but, unfortunately, fails to capture the third. Strong characters are the novel’s musculature, providing its definition and thematic strength; without this asset the film is a murky mess—both facile and unfocused. Conceptually it is a genre mash-up; imagine the mutant hybrid of Seven and What Dreams May Come: in turns too gruesome for sentimentality-seekers and too saccharine for gore-seekers.

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