Academy Awards Preview.

Hurrah, it is the Oscars. It should be interesting to see how the 10 best picture nominees will affect the viewership numbers. The hosts, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin, don't inspire much of anything, unless one is approaching retirement age.
On too the picks.

1) Best Picture Nominees (in order of how much I like them)

1. The Hurt Locker

2. Inglorious Basterds

3. Up

4. Precious

5. District 9

6. A Serious Man

7. The Blind Side

8. Up in the Air

9. Avatar

10. An Education

And the winner, should be, The Hurt Locker. By far the best movie made this year. No other movie on this list will suck you into the plot quite like this one. There's been a lot of speculation that Avatar may win. For humanity's sake I hope that doesn't happen. As an aside, if you want to see any of these movies, I can give them to you on a USB. Except Avatar, I wouldn't make Satan himself watch that, or An Education.

Best Director

• "Avatar"

  James Cameron

• "The Hurt Locker"

  Kathryn Bigelow

• "Inglourious Basterds"

  Quentin Tarantino

• "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire"

  Lee Daniels

• "Up in the Air"

  Jason Reitman

I suppose James Cameron sort of deserves this. Despite making a sucky movie, it was a really epic sucky movie. I personally am disposed to the Hurt Locker, as I thought it was the finest war movie made in a long time. The tense shots and skillful storytelling was really made the most of by Kathryn Bigelow. Also, she would be the first woman to win. The other movies were pretty conventional, so I don't think the directing was so special.

Best Actor

• Jeff Bridges in "Crazy Heart"
  
• George Clooney in "Up in the Air"
  
• Colin Firth in "A Single Man"
• Morgan Freeman in "Invictus" (Warner Bros.)
• Jeremy Renner in "The Hurt Locker"

I didn't see Crazy Heart or A Single Man, but apparently Jeff Bridges is going to win. I thought Clooney and Freeman were fine, but nothing spectacular. Renner was better, but I guess the movie wasn't as character driven as Crazy Heart is. And The Dude is long overdue anyways

Best Actress

• Sandra Bullock in "The Blind Side"
• Helen Mirren in "The Last Station"
  
• Carey Mulligan in "An Education"
  
• Gabourey Sidibe in "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire"
  
• Meryl Streep in "Julie & Julia"
  

Honestly have no clue who will win. Definitely not Bullock. Thought Mulligan and Sidibe were just ok. I'll say one of Streep and Mirren.

Best Supporting Actor

• Matt Damon in "Invictus"
  
• Woody Harrelson in "The Messenger"
• Christopher Plummer in "The Last Station"
  
• Stanley Tucci in "The Lovely Bones"
  
• Christoph Waltz in "Inglourious Basterds"
  

Only saw Invictus and Basterds, but everyone has already given the award to Waltz. And he was great in his role, despite being a Nazi.

Best Supporting Actress

• Penélope Cruz in "Nine"
  
• Vera Farmiga in "Up in the Air"
  
• Maggie Gyllenhaal in "Crazy Heart"
• Anna Kendrick in "Up in the Air"
  
• Mo'Nique in "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire"
  

Without a doubt Mo'Nique gave the best acting performance of the year. I have no clue why she isn't up for best actress. One will not see a better portrayal as a hurt, angry, and generally f***ed up person on screen. It's worth seeing Precious just for her.

Best animated movie

• "Coraline" (Focus Features)

  Henry Selick

• "Fantastic Mr. Fox"

  Wes Anderson

• "The Princess and the Frog"

  John Musker and Ron Clements

• "The Secret of Kells"

  Tomm Moore

• "Up"

Gotta go with my boy Roald Dahl and Wes Anderson here. I love the book Fantastic Mr. Fox, and the movie was just about its equal. Nothing against Up, which was also a great movie, but Fantastic Mr. Fox was just the bomb. Didn't see the others. I hear Coraline is pretty messed up though

And I'm too lazy to pick anymore. The other categories are pretty bleh. Just hope the Israeli film wins best foreign picture. I though Food Inc. was a decent documentary. Fantastic Mr. Fox should have been up for Best Picture.

Comments?

Khaled Abu Toameh on Israel Apartheid Week.

Khaled Abu Toameh gave a very interesting talk tonight about what it means to be pro Palestinian, IAW, and Israeli-Palestinian relations in general. I'll just introduce his background, and then summarize some of his main points.

Khaled Abu Toameh is an Israeli Arab, who works for the Jerusalem Post and many other media organizations. He used to be a journalist for the PLO, but felt it would better to work in the international media, where one could actually write freely.

Some of his points:

1) Saying one is pro Palestinian by participating in IAW is a useless label. He said IAW is just fanning hatred on both sides, and does little to actually help Palestinians. The Palestinians are in their terrible situation because of Palestinian corruption, more than Israeli 'Apartheid'. He said one should advocate for reform and democracy in Palestine, rather than delegitimizing Israel. As an aside, I have always thought events like IAW is just an attempt by people to say I'm helping Palestine without actually helping them. Slandering Israel may make one feel good, but doesn't help anyone.
2) Freely admits Israel has done terrible things, this does not make it an Apartheid. One has to realize that both sides are in a war. There is a cycle of violence. He asked the group how would you react to 8000 rockets?
3) Says the peace process can only move forward once a stable and transparent partner is found. How can Israel make peace if there is both Fatah and Hamas? Although he said Fatah would collapse without Israeli support.
4) Said the Goldstone Report does nothing to help the situation. He can understand why Israel acted in the way it did.
5) Said Gaza also borders Egypt. Why do they never help the people of Gaza. He says why should Israel have to support the Palestinians. Where are the other Arab countries?
6) Says when terror stops, Israel will loosen its restrictions.
7) Said both sides are there, and must be respectful of each other.
8) Believes Israel truly does want peace, but is just looking for a partner.
9) Jamal Zahalka, a member of Knesset, is speaking at IAW, saying Israel is an Apartheid state. Says Zahalka should be focusing on helping Israeli Arabs, i.e his job. All his words are doing is making the Israeli Arabs look like a fifth column. He is actually hurting them.

In summation, he was very critical of corrupt Palestinian politicians, and says the Palestinians must take responsibility of their own future. They should earn a state, not have one handed over to them. Unilateral moves by Israel will not work. Says calling Israel an Aparthid state inflames passions. Inflamed passions leads people to become suicide bombers.

This was a very interesting speech, and I actually do think it may have changed some people's perspectives.

Europe is a crazy place, and other news.

I noticed while reading online this week that a lot of the article were about Europe. Some of them were quite unusual.
Enjoy.
1) Headline: Austrian straight couple applies for gay marriage.
2) Some British politician calling the President of the EU a bum. Pretty funny video. Makes the 'you lie' controversy seem lame in comparison.
3) The brilliance of French advertising.
4) Headline: Vienna museum hosts swingers club to expose sexual inhibitions. Such an enlightened place.
5) Greece is going bankrupt. They are blaming Germany for their situation by invoking the Nazis. That will surely help them get bailed out by the EU. For a country that invented Democracy, not very impressive.
6) Spain- a country where little children write anti-Semitic stuff in postcards. So adorable.
7) Article about Phil Jones being interrogated by the UK Parliament. He was the head of the University of East Anglia's climate research facility. Telling line:"And he claimed it was not 'standard practice' to release data and computer models so other scientists could check and challenge research. " Sounds like we should give this guy a trillion dollars to fix climate change!

Stuff about Israel.
1) A guy in Haaretz doesn't think Mossad would be so sloppy in killing this arms facilitator. I would agree. And who can trust the Dubai police. They just scream competence.
2) Satirical article about many things Israel related. Quite funny.

Stuff about Obama.
1) Good article on how Obama needs to become more pragmatic to succeed. I agree. He really does seem like good guy.
2) If your parents ever get on your case about smoking cigarettes, remind them that Obama does it.
3) Article claiming to have found the Republican Obama. It seems every week there's some dark horse Republican ready to win in 2012. EG: John Thune, Tim Pawlenty, Mitch Daniels, Marco Rubio. I still believe in you Mitt. And Ron Paul, he would be hilarious.

Other stuff.
1) Article showcasing the resiliency of people in third world countries.
2) Robert Mugabe eats a feast for his birthday on live TV. His country is starving. Still more interesting than Leno. Boom!
3) Not only did we win gold in hockey. Our economy expanded at a 5% rate last quarter. Whoo!

Now I can finally close all those tabs....
I will do another article this week about IAW, and one about the Oscars. I saw all 10 best picture movies. And surprisingly, I am wearing pants, and do not live in my mother's basement.