mid-year globe predictions
It’s mighty fun to predict the Golden Globes. Mostly because of their unpredictability. In that same regard, though, they can be utterly frustrating – case in point, almost every 2010 nominee. But for an early stab, I have my predictions in six film categories and six television categories.
remember when: CAST of MODERN FAMILY
It’s time to take another trip back. It’s been a while – then again, everything’s been a while on this here blog – so it’s time to honor television casts with questionable history in the business. Let’s take a look at one of the best casts working currently – those zany adults on Modern Family.
Though he’s still probably best known as lovable lug Al Bundy on Married with Children, before Ed O’Neill was Jay, patriarch of the Pritchetts on Modern Family, he took a little trip south to Florida, for a 1984 episode of Miami Vice.
Julie Bowen had regular roles on Ed and Boston Legal, but before she was neurotic mom Claire, she was part of the melodramatic history of Dawson’s Creek, playing Dawson’s hippie-dippie Aunt Gwen in a 2000 episode.
Sure, he’s had his stints on stage, but before playing Mitchell, uptight lawyer, Jesse Tyler Ferguson had a television role in 2000’s miniseries sudser, Sally Hemings, detailing the sordid affairs of our former president Thomas Jefferson. He played their love child.
Before Eric Stonestreet graced Modern Family‘s presence with his over-the-top theatrics he had a bit part as a clerk in the 2000 music-biz flick Almost Famous.
Ty Burrell now plays bumbling screwball Phil Dunphy on MF, but he once had a small guest part, like so many others at the time, in a 2001 episode of The West Wing.
Before she became the resident bombshell of the family, Gloria, Sofia Vergara played a housekeeper who falls for Jason Lee in the Tim Allen comedy Big Trouble in 2002.
best films: #1: BRINGING UP BABY (1938)
What better way to return to the blogging world than by officially wrapping up the very first series I ever featured on Journalistic Skepticism, my 100 movies countdown. (FYI: This list is circa 2009, so it’s about time for an update, seeing as though I’ve viewed quite a few movies since then… a FYC for a revised Top 100 will be coming your way in the coming months!) After all the sweeping epics and goofy comedies and sentimental kids flicks and harrowing thrillers, my #1 movie of all time all comes down to Baby. The tamed, house-trained leopard that is. One of the reasons I fell in love with movies, to be honest, it’s an enduring classics that I could never see too many times and that elicits laughter unlike most anything that’s come after it. Bringing Up Baby is my all-time favorite. You can’t get a much better pair of actors than Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. They’re both legendary talents who are best known, perhaps, for their more serious roles but truly shine in comedy. Particularly this screwball affair in which an eccentric heiress, a bumbling paleontologist, and a runaway pet leopard chase each other around the countryside.
It sounds like the plot of some terrible CGI-ed Adam Sandler vehicle now, but the movie is sheer brilliance. Hepburn plays high society type Susan Vance to outstanding effect. Her natural lilt works great in this setting, and her timing is beyond. Grant is her overly able straight man who gets worn down by Susan’s endless charms. It’s goofy, to be sure, but it purely defines what I find most wonderful about the cinema. It tells a seemingly simple story in such a way that anyone who watches it leaves with pure joy. Howard Hawks’ now-classic is all the more incredible considering it was a catastrophic flop when it was released. Thank goodness it wasn’t lost into obscurity due to its ill will. It’s an astounding piece of comedy gold, and I am hard-pressed to find anyone who’s watched it that doesn’t agree with that.
reading material: SCREENPLAY predictions updated
All right folks – still easing my way in. But I had a day off, so I thought it was time to continue those ol’ predictions to the left there. Just added in the screenplay categories as well. A few upheavals thanks to Cannes, so feel free to check ’em out!
I have returned… tentatively.
All right, so I couldn’t stay away from you crazy kids forever, now could I? Though my newly employed self is putting in some serious overtime in my day job, I’m excited to get back to blogging now that life is starting to revert back to a sort of normalcy. I’m starting with the important (and most fun) stuff. To the left you’ll see I’ve started updating my Oscar predictions for May. Starting with Best Picture tonight, and hopefully the acting categories tomorrow. Please do check it out, and come back to this here blog post for discussion!
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