Stumbled onto the Oscars 2021

 

I spent two posts last year on the Oscars; one before and one after Scarlett Johansson was snubbed. This year, I decided to be a bit more mindful of my brother’s time, who is kind enough to read all my posts, and combine the two into one. I am actually combining three posts into one, as I will also include my ongoing complaint about the Oscars going hostless. Efficiency should be my official middle name, I say. Although is it efficient if this ended up being one very large post? You’ll be the judge.

Let’s start with the ceremony as a whole. This year was very different because of Covid and we were all very understanding; I will forgive them for the uglier venue and restricted red carpet, it was expected and applauded. I am not entirely sure, however, if this also justifies that god-awful blue curtain they used as a background to the stage. There are no Covid guidelines for interior design, as far as I know. My biggest complaint about the ceremony is how stiff it was. The Emmy’s did a much better job adjusting to the Covid circumstances and typically the Oscars always have a few gimmicks to keep you going through the 3+ hour runtime. This might seem less important to people in LA, but for us who stay up until 6.30 am to watch the Oscars, we do it for moments like #DaButt. Thank god for international treasure, Glenn Close. If there ever was a year to bring back hosts, this was it. We definitely needed someone to throw a few zings here and there. There are always opportunities for a host or two to make things flow a little bit better, even with Zoom. We are all on Zoom for over a year now; such bits would be welcome just fine. And even without a host, they could, like last year, have someone do something of a monologue, someone fly down with an umbrella to honour Mary Poppins, someone crack a joke other than my new Korean idol, Yuh-Jung Youn. I hope Brad Pitt bought her a drink after. It was a little bit cringe-worthy too, as presenters spent a lot of time awkwardly praising nominees, as if the nomination itself isn’t the sort of praise that I imagine keeps you going for a couple of years confidence-wise. Maybe next year they can have Daniel Kaluuya host, because I still have a few unresolved questions about his parents’ sex life.

I also minded the lack of musical numbers, but I will accept that perhaps this was to avoid unnecessary spit. I am all for avoiding unnecessary spit. The last thing I minded was that unwarranted switch of awards; the Best Picture award is usually the last award to be announced and that makes sense as it sort of encompasses all else. This year, someone decided they would have Actor in a Leading Role as the last award and we all rightfully assumed that they would wrongfully award Chadwick Boseman, as a sort of tribute. However, Anthony Hopkins gave a breath-taking performance and rightfully won that award making the last and seemingly most substantial award of the evening a white male recipient. Which upset people. And it also upset my OCD, which has been used to a certain order of awards all these years. But enough about the ceremony, let’s take a look at the awards! It is not as if these are available at every single website since Sunday.

I am being a bit cheeky and starting off with the more interesting awards, will then continue with awards I have invested no time in, and will then complete the post with the big one. I am trying to sustain readership as much as I can.

Adapted Screenplay

‘The Father’ won. If it were up to me, this movie would have won any award it was nominated for; it crushed my soul and sent me to a very dark place, but it was perfect. I loved all of it; the screenplay, the direction, the performances, everything. I found it very original and very sentimental. Which was the case for last year’s Adapted Screenplay winner, ‘Jojo Rabbit’. I seem to have a special bond with this particular category.

Original Screenplay

Everyone thought it would be Aaron Sorkin’s political tale, I hoped it would be ‘Sound of Metal’, but ‘Promising Young Woman’ won. It was a great movie and my only disappointment is that Camilla won an Oscar. My fellow ‘The Crown’ watchers will know what I am talking about.

Actor in a Supporting Role

Daniel Kaluuya won and proceeded to thank God, and his parents for boning. A great speech, with a bit of help from what I believe was weed and a beautiful performance. Again, I was insanely moved by Paul Raci in ‘Sound of Metal’, but I understand that it wouldn’t necessarily be fair for the Academy to award my two favourite movies all of their awards.

Actress in a Supporting Role

The aforementioned legend Yuh-Jung Youn won for Minari and decided to make the most of it by taking a shot with Brad Pitt. Minari is the one film left on my list, I should have watched it last night, but the effects of the Oscars were that I was asleep by sundown. I am, however, very glad she won and if she could win things every week so we can watch her acceptance speeches, I’d be a much happier person.

Short Film (animated)

Now that I am to discuss the short films, I should disclose I have watched nothing of the sort. The winner, ‘If Anything Happens I Love You’ is available on Netflix, even; I don’t have much of an excuse. I was sort of hoping for another short film to win, just because I was feeling rebellious and didn’t want Netflix to round up half of the evening’s awards. This might seem inconsequential, but so did Lex Luthor. I therefore voted for ‘Genius Loci’, mostly because I can’t wait for ‘Loki’, the TV series.

Short Film (live action)

For this category we trusted our friend who had watched a couple of nominees and supposedly could remember which one was which and so we all voted for ‘The Letter Room’, which she had not watched after all and ‘Two Distant Strangers’ won instead. Ironically, this is very much what I would call me and said friend now that she failed us.

Documentary (short subject)

We voted for ‘Colette’ and it actually won! A shot in the dark alright, but a marksman shot nonetheless.

Documentary Feature

This one said friend got correct; ‘My Octopus Teacher’. This was apparently about a man who became friends with this one octopus and documented it. If I were the octopus I would be weary of his motives; did he actually want my friendship, or did he just aspire to be in the same room with Regina King for an evening?

International Feature Film

‘Another Round’ won. Said friend said it was definitely not worthy, but I guess if I were part of the academy and was shown a film with Mads Mikkelsen, I might have also given the award to that film. But that’s just my pheromones talking. Unfortunately, I have wasted all substantial arguments for my choices on stuff I have actually watched and now I have resorted to the so called ‘horny criteria’.

Animated Feature

I was so happy about ‘Soul’ winning; I have heard good things about ‘Onward’ too, but for me Soul was eye opening and inspirational. I really do wish I had watched this as an early teen. Or on drugs. Works either way as a film.

Visual Effects

‘Tenet’, obviously. Say what you will about Tenet. Where there scientific gaps? Sure. Was it incomprehensible and flat out illogical? Yes. Is anything done by Nolan visually stunning? Always. I actually liked Tenet, come at me, Internet!

Film editing

This technical award was won by ‘Sound of Metal’. This was an amazing film that felt very intense, which, from what I understand, depends on film editing. For those reasons, though, I had voted for ‘The Father’, but as these two were my favourite films of the season, I was happy either way.

Sound

‘Sound of Metal’ very obviously won this award. We should say, however, that they put the very name of the award in the title; bribe much?

Production design

This one went to ‘Mank’. If you have not watched ‘Citizen Kane’, I doubt you will have much incentive to sit through ‘Mank’. I had and I am still not all that grateful about my time spent on ‘Mank’. But I do understand that the production was dreamy and you never once broke out of that Old Hollywood trance.

Costume design and Makeup and Hairstyling

‘Emma’, ‘Mank’ and ‘Pinocchio’ were also nominated for both categories and lost both times to ‘Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom’. I personally did not like ‘Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom’ as a film, but the costumes were beautiful. What was also astounding was Viola Davis’ make-up; you could tell the year, the weather and the struggle on that make-up. As Lisa Eldridge is teaching us now, make-up can be much more than superficial.

Original Song

The winner was ‘Fight For You’ from ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’. Had they presented the songs during the ceremony as they do each year, I would know if this was indeed the best song out of this category. But as they didn’t, I had no choice but to vote for ‘Husavik’ from the ‘Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of the Fire Saga’ and do not need to explain myself.

Original Score

This one was won by ‘Soul’. I guess this sort of explains why ‘Soul’ wasn’t nominated for best Original Song, even though the music was great! Personally, I was just happy the award went to someone from the Colbert team. Now that the Oscars organisers have an in, maybe get someone from that group to host next year (wink).

Cinematography

Now for the big ones. I count cinematography for a big one, because I feel it is directing adjacent, anyway. This was surprisingly won by ‘Mank’. I think most of us expected ‘Nomadland’ to win, with those out-of-this-world sceneries, but as the annoying Greek commentators pointed out during the ceremony voiceover, ‘Mank’ had a more difficult job to do. And it was pretty, which is how I interpret the criteria for this award.

Directing

This was probably the most expected win. Chloe Zhao won and no one batted an eye. ‘Nomadland’ was beautiful and the direction was special; of course, it won. I don’t remember much about what happens in the film, but I remember it was magnetic and suppose that is the very reason it won best direction and not best adapted screenplay.  

Actress in a Leading Role

I was rooting for Carey Mulligan as a promising young woman, but I am always happy to see Francis McDormand win anything because I love her and want to adopt her. Or have her adopt me. They are both equally unlikely, but I love her is what I am trying to say. And she is always great, ‘Nomadland’ was no exception.

Actor in a Leading Role

This one I have a lot to say about. There was a rumour going round that Chadwick Boseman would win and some felt (including yours truly) that this would be partly because of his untimely death. I didn’t enjoy Ma Rainey much, mostly because it felt like they put no effort in transforming it from a play to a movie. That was my complaint about Boseman’s performance as well. It was theatrical and didn’t really resonate with me in a movie setting. Betting sites had Boseman as the sure winner; Oldman as the runner up. I was very frustrated because in my mind, Anthony Hopkins was amazing and the non-negotiable winner this year. And if not him, then Riz Ahmed, who gave an incredible performance that I would otherwise swoon over. Unfortunately, I am not a betting gal, because Anthony Hopkins was indeed the rightful winner. Luckily, others I know were and even made money off this justified win. I am currently trying to be happy rather than envious for them. I will let you know if I succeed.

Best Picture

And here we are. The big one. The one that should have been presented last, but wasn’t. For this one it is worth mentioning all the nominees; ‘The Father’, ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’, ‘Mank’, ‘Minari’, ‘Nomadland’, ‘Promising Young Woman’, ‘Sound of Metal’ and ‘The Trial of the Chicago Seven’. I regrettably haven’t watched ‘Minari’, which I hear is really good, but I therefore have two films that, for me, were the core contenders; ‘The Father’ and ‘Sound of Metal’. I found them both to be very special and as I have said before, I would have loved to see ‘The Father’ win any category, even Short Film (animated). However, we all knew ‘Nomadland’ would win. I do not exactly object to this outcome, but I do feel as if the importance of the film was already reflected in its win for Directing. As long as ‘Mank’ did not win, I am satisfied. Every year, I need an antagonist movie and this time round it was ‘Mank’. I am sorry it had to be this way, Gary Oldman, but I am sure our interests will align again someday in Oscar season.

And so, here are the reasons I spent most of my Monday asleep. It was possibly less worth it than any other year as the ceremony was dull, the duration long, the premiere was two hours later than back in England and we had Greek narration on top of the speeches. Maybe the ceremony was slightly better during the Original Score and Original Song segments; I wouldn’t know, I was very much asleep during these two. It was a sad but beautiful collection of movies this year, but I am very much looking forward to watching such movies on a big screen next year and spending three different posts on the Oscars. Sorry bro.

Stumbled onto junk food troubles

 

This would have properly been a post in anticipation of the Oscar’s this Sunday, but I had much greater things to discuss that required immediate attention (that, and I haven’t covered as much ground with the nominated films as last year). And is there any greater idea in human history than food delivery to your door? Is there any progression more important than food delivery apps? Be it Deliveroo, Uber eats, e-food, Wolt, Domino’s house system or any of the lesser known ones, they have taken the one necessary trouble of eating in out of the equation; human contact. I would not dare extensively complain for this feat of humanity; in all the good it has done for me, I can take a few mishaps here and there. But some are just funny, and deserve to be mocked. Lovingly and respectfully, but mocked nonetheless.

One such instance was this weekend. Let me start by saying that I was once again attempting a vegan month. Notice the past tense in that sentence. I have prior managed a maximum of 22 consecutive days, but this time round motivation was scarce. I lasted a good four and a half days. And yes, the half day counts, because I didn’t add feta cheese to my aubergines and it deeply pained me. I had already given in to cheese, eggs, milk, chocolate and meat by Sunday night, but they were all on the relatively healthy side. This is what I tell myself to make me feel better for my nutritional treason. Nonetheless, Sunday evening I was to be healthy and, frankly, vegan once more with a roasted sweet potato and carrot soup. But then McDonald’s was suggested and it all went south. Who in their right mind would stick to their 'liquid vegetable' guns instead of that sweet, fake, plastic chicken nugget? These were great, by the way; excellent chicken nuggets by the old fast food clown. The problem was with the sweet, fake, plastic hamburgers we ordered. More specifically, with the filling. Meaning the lack of filling. We literally got two empty buns. No toppings, no burger, just bread. And listen, I am very understanding; Covid has obviously placed a huge amount of pressure on fast food chains and delivery services and mistakes are bound to happen. I can handle mustard sauce instead of mayo, but I most definitely need something to spread either on top. This was another level of forgetfulness or, as I like to imagine, another level of vengeance from a fed-up employ. I like to think they sent out empty burgers all around the area as a small-scale plot to cause an uprising and, slowly but surely, begin their world domination. Maybe I am enjoying this prospect so much, because I, for one, got the chicken nuggets, which, as I mentioned, were excellent.

This was not my first time dealing with main ingredients missing. Again, mistakes are justified, especially in times of pressure, as long as they regard the secondary characteristics of the junk food. A couple of years ago, back in Guildford we had made one of our standard Domino’s orders. They were relatively frequent, now that I think of it; I am not sure how well this reflects on us. We would always go for Pepperoni Passion, and at this stage, I would like to ask anyone who isn’t on a special diet, why they wouldn’t go for pepperoni in an American style pizza. It should be a prerequisite. We ordered our two pepperoni pizzas, waited for ages because it was a busy night and when the pizza finally arrived, noticed something missing. The pepperoni. The sole topping of the pizza. Nothing in its place. In retrospect, and after my recent McDonald’s experience I guess I should be grateful there was any dough in the box to begin with. We called the store and they informed us that they had just run out of pepperoni, so they proceeded to send the order ahead without it. So there was a logic behind it; but not a particularly good one. What were the chances we would appreciate this imaginative solution in that particular case? Thankfully, a friend took it upon himself to call the store and deal with it, because deep inside I know that, had I called, I would most likely have ended up apologising for asking for pepperoni in the first place. The outcome that night was excellent; I got reimbursed, I think they brought us new pepperoni pizzas (including pepperoni this time), we kept the pepperoni-less ones as well and also got a voucher for two free pizzas at another time. Which is precisely why I am adamant; these stories are more entertaining than a trouble with the system. I am still eternally grateful for food delivery.

I guess the McDonald’s mishap was a necessary slap in the face for betraying my healthy soup alternative. I don’t remember what kind of karma I might have been paying back at those Domino’s days, but I have no doubt in my mind that there might have been a fresh salad that I discarded for the sake of fried carbs. I might have created some brand new karma by manically laughing during both those scenarios’ instead of sharing other people’s frustration, but then again Joaquin Phoenix got an Oscar for similar behaviour’s in ‘The Joker’. I managed to squeeze a pop-culture, Oscar-related reference at the very last minute. All is in order. Unlike the orders I described.

Stumbled onto postgraduate marking

 

This is a tricky post as I need to make sure I do not breech any confidentiality guidelines. I mean I couldn’t, because all the scripts we mark are anonymised and I’ve never met the students. But you know, it is in my nature to worry, so I must. This will be a non-pop cultural account of my experience with marking postgraduate students and a horrible choice for a guide to anyone who might be preparing a postgraduate assignment, which will be marked by a poorly paid, frustrated PhD student. There are ways to get on our good side.

First of all, it might come as a shocker that PhD students do some of that marking, but said shock can be easily overcome when you start counting heads in your classroom (or Zoom meeting, as of late) and acquire a ratio of students to lecturer from said head counting. If this did not make sense to you, you would likely be one of the students I would bitch about while marking statistics. In other words, it is not feasible for one lecturer to mark all assignments, so it is most likely that we will do the initial marking and then the main lecturer will second mark some of those scripts. If one wants to ensure that they will get marked by the main lecturer, they could write a terrible assignment that will most likely fail. Then, as PhD students are filled with such guilt that Matt Murdock (aka Daredevil) himself would envy, we will most likely ask the main lecturer to fail them instead. That is what I do, anyway and it is an ironclad technique for better sleep. However, rest assured, we are doing our best to mark you fairly, as we feel that we are being judged on our marking ability as well. We wouldn’t jeopardise future income just so that we can take out our rage for when we were unfairly marked as Master’s students. And we were. I still believe that whoever marked my developmental psychology assignment should burn in hell.

Also, I might have not mentioned this enough, but we are poorly paid. This is precisely why we are the markers of choice. Sometimes to the extent that our formal responsibility accounts to spending 15 minutes per script. Regardless, the only way for me to spend the minimum allocated time on a script is for the student to have gotten a secret copy of our specific marking criteria, ticked off every box, travel forward in time and read my feedback and go back to make additional corrections. Otherwise, most of us reduce our occupational worth in the name of fairness. It is not just marking  each script. I mean, everyone has their own way, so what if mine includes an Excel sheet in order to find key characteristics in each submission, team up all the similar scripts and check that they all fit in the same, beautiful grade band? Does that make me a bit obsessive? Have I wasted a lot of unnecessary time so I can then get complaints from students that they feel I have simply glanced over their scripts?

We have collectively stumbled onto some nice, further advice for students here; please refrain from complaining about your low grade if you have submitted bullet points for an essay. I generally find that the scripts that are on the verge of a better mark, but fall just below hardly ever complain; it is the shitty scripts that I barely gave a pass that come back to haunt me. I guess it makes sense, if one considers something of that sort as an acceptable submission for a postgraduate degree, it must all seem pretty uniform in their world.

Having said that, I must now admit to something that I probably shouldn’t for my future state of mind. PhD students are notoriously stricter markers that seasoned academics. Supposedly, because we have seen less insanely bad scenarios and because we ourselves must reach a higher standard for our work, we do mind when students forget to dot their I’s. And I must admit, the first year I marked assignments, my instinct was to furiously mark down anyone who didn’t properly italise. We must all bow to the God’s of font! But then I realised I would have to fail whole cohorts and decided to overlook the odd, misplaced comma. Sometimes. Some comma’s are very important! Now I find myself writing kind, encouraging feedback to students that dealt with a formal assignment as a ‘Dear diary’ entry. I wish I was exaggerating, but I have actually read assignments about how their best friends were shy and that affected their results. With that type of language.

Okay, time to be sincere. Please do not actually take advice on assignments from this post I wrote up as a break from my marking. It is filled with sorrow and unnecessary irony. However, if I did have to advise anyone submitting anything is to look after their assignment, groom it and make sure that it reflects a good amount of time and effort. I propose that you do for two main reasons; first of all, we do mark good academic language, structure, flow and presentation. These do reflect actual points that can get you from one grade band to another. The second reason is that if we feel that you have put in a lot of effort and perhaps misunderstood or made a genuine mistake, we will be on your side. We will skim that script for extra marks, fight the second marker for that morale boost, or if you have really otherwise fucked up, write a more polite and instructional feedback section. You can’t lose.

Well, look at the time. Time for me to go back to my crazy Excel sheet and see if I can bump up anyone who took the time to read APA guidelines for tables and figures. Those are my favourite people in the world. Run free, my friends, and spread the word to your fellow classmates about when to use indents for headings.

Oh, and reference everything. When in doubt; reference. When not in doubt; become in doubt and, again, reference.

Stumbled onto a (non-existent) head bump

 

Remember when the coronavirus era had only just began? I do. As a hypochondriac, I remember stocking up on antiseptic and pretending to be Bradley Cooper from Limitless, chucking a brainwave amplification pill, but calculating the direction of spit molecules in slow motion. This pandemic has been so overwhelming for my anxiety, I almost forgot about all the other ways I was afraid of dying. But just like everyone else, my mind is just about bored of this situation and a bit more numb to the undeniable danger. This left space for previous fears to reoccur, just so I never feel bored. Or, you know, calm.

I have been avoiding check-ups for obvious reasons (obvious for me, that is) but it was about time that I get a blood test to make sure that my incredible paleness is within the lower, yet acceptable, bounds of Fe levels. I am not sure if this goes for all countries, but here in Greece you are asked to eat nothing for 12 hours prior to the test and preferably be off your period (the second one goes for half the population mostly). I chose to follow the former instruction and forego the latter. The blood test was interesting in itself, as in my anxiety actually stopped the blood mid flow. I wasn’t even aware that was possible! The nurse looked perplexed; she had to pierce a different vein and asked me to think of a beach, or puppies, or whatever calms me down, anyway. I went for James Welsh’ latest video bashing Gwyneth Paltrow; different things work on different people. Once the test was over, I imagine I looked significantly paler than usual, because no one had suggested I sit down for a while prior to the test, but they sure did after. I was guided to a nearby couch and instructed to hang out there until walking was a negligible challenge for my blood pressure. I fondly remember singing ‘My Shot’ from Hamilton in my head, if anything a bit faster than the original tempo, and was pretty sure I wasn’t annoying anybody. I clearly remember going through the first verse, but the next thing I remember is staring at the ceiling surrounded by four torsos staring at me intensely. This confused me as I was expecting the Mulligan’s verse about how the American rebellion was also motivated by caste and socioeconomic status, and that verse never came. I eventually deducted that that the doctor holding my legs up wasn’t inspecting the dirt on my shoes, but I most likely fainted and fell off the couch. My first thought was, of course, embarrassment. This was a public place I chose to faint in and my loss of consciousness involved a number of people I inconvenienced. Is there a greater horror than that for a socially anxious person? Once I got over that particular anxiety, I remembered that as a proper hypochondriac, I should also panic about having hit my head.

I apologised about 50 times for fainting and then proceeded to ask the staff about 50 more whether I hit my head. I was assured that my head was fine and that I fell in a polite and conservative manner from a small height, which we all know is code for PERMANENT BRAIN DAMAGE. I drove home, regardless, as nobody else was convinced that my consciousness was forever compromised. Since then, each day has been a struggle not to Google my potential head bump. I say potential, because the bump admittedly never formed. From previous experience, Googling such events leads to anything from a concussion to multiple personality disorder.  Problem is, I don’t need Google to come up with insane conditions regarding head bumps; I have seen too many movies.

Amy Schumer’s ‘I Feel Pretty’ features the protagonist bumping her head and suddenly seeing herself as much more beautiful than she did before. I am not ready for such a confidence boost at the moment, and cannot even imagine the disappointment of re-bumping my head and thinking I look like that failed Fresco restoration painting. In ‘What men/women want’ the lead characters bump their heads and end up hearing all the thoughts of the opposite sex. And that just sounds immensely boring after a couple of days. Sure, I would find out a few interesting things that people wouldn’t say to my face, but all in all I prefer getting the filtered, edited version of what people around me are thinking. Remember, not all thoughts are interesting.

According to the movies, I might also get amnesia; and just like in ‘Overboard’ someone might pretend to be my wife and steal my fortune. They would have to convince me that I was a lesbian for this scenario and that I have some fortune worth putting up with me for. I might be taken advantage of, but I am definitely not getting the worst end of that deal. Amnesia could make me feral like a wolverine and send me on a quest to figure out my adamantium skeleton and my ageless looks. As a hypochondriac, this not a bad option; Wolverine had self-healing powers and was therefore safe from loads of my other worries. Nonetheless, I would still need to get in writing that my origin story will not include a botched Deadpool and bad CGI.

The world may change once I regain my consciousness. I could be risking a zombie apocalypse where I could be the least prepared person. I’ll set up a reminder to pack a survival bag in case of future head bumpings. I might be the only person left to remember the Beatles and simply rebrand their songs as my own. That is good enough motivation to both practice the piano and trip down the stairs, now that I think of it. On second thought, probably in the opposite order as the piano might otherwise be a waste of time. I might be a mild hypochondriac but I am sure as hell lazy. Seeing as Hamilton was the last thing I remember before fainting, maybe I could claim the hit musical as my own, rather than the Beatles musical anthology. How I would convince people that I came up with two and a half hours of rap lyrics about one of the founding fathers of the US, I am not yet sure; it is not very on brand.

Okay, some of my non-googled, imaginary scenarios were indeed worrisome, but all in all more fun than cancer and paralysis. Therefore, I am happy to conclude that WebMD is officially worse than a zombie apocalypse. Maybe it is worth starting a forum for all anxious people to write down their mountains out of molehills, so that we can all get together and write up the next superhero origin story. Bring down Disney! Get Zack Snyder out of a job (I am still slowly working my way through my Snyder frustration)! Oh my God! I need to bump my head! The world depends on it!

(Is this post indication that I should have my head looked at after all?)