The 2009 Oscars: A Peculiar Ordeal

Ah, the Oscars. The annual celebration of cinema where movie stars get to be famous, directors are appreciated, and the sound-editing guy gets two minutes of limelight. Only in America could such an outrageous event occur, and leave it to Hollywood to demonstrate how grandiose they can make an awards show with a multi-million dollar budget during a recession.
This year’s Oscars certainly endeavored not to disappoint, for the Kodak Theatre was lavished with an ill-fated crystal curtain and gaudy musical performances. Host Hugh “Sexiest Man Alive” Jackman, pulling a top hat and cane from thin air, commenced the ceremonies with a raucous musical number using humorously home-made banners and props. Riding a bat-cycle made of cardboard boxes and paper-mache, he admonished the academy for looking over comic book movies, and joked about how he hadn’t seen “the reader.” He went so far as to pull Anne Hathaway up onstage and addressed her as president Nixon (in a Frost-Nixon parody), Hathaway reluctantly braking into song. A later musical number graced lovely Beyonce with a spotlight as she descended a glimmering stairway in the midst of a troupe of showgirls as she and Jackman celebrated the somewhat arbitrary “return of the musical”. These musical numbers were flashy and entertaining, showcasing the voices of unexpectedly talented Jackman and Hathaway, yet, other than being in the extravagant spirit of the Oscars, had little justification within the context of the ceremonies.
Despite these flaws, all the song and dance contributed to the decidedly happy mood of this year’s Academy Awards. Seth Rogen and James Franco laughed at movie clips, baked on a sofa, Wall-E and Eva shared moments of robot-love, and the Kung-Fu Panda paraded in slow-motion.
This year’s Academy awards also featured a new method of award presentation, inviting a number of famous actors and actresses to present the award they had won previously to this year’s winners. This was an unexpected and exciting treat.
The music ceremonies featured the artists Rahman, from Slumdog Millionaire, and Thomas Neuman, from Wall-E, performing their numbers in a brilliant display of myriad musicianship and ethnic intrigue.
Penelope Cruz was especially memorable for her candid, breathless and sweet acceptance speech for best supporting actress. Kunio Kato accepted the award for best animated short film in butchered Japanglish, ending with an extremely unexpected “Domo arigatou, Mr. Robato.” Heath Ledger’s family graciously accepted the award for best supporting actor on behalf of the posthumous wonder, multiple camera angles assuring the viewer that there was not a dry eye in the audience during this respectful presentation. Ben Stiller’s bizarre appearance and gait remain a mystery.
Sean Penn’s acceptance of the best actor award was passionate and honest; he himself was astonished that the academy turned out to be “commi, homo-lovin son-of-a-guns.”
Slumdog Millionaire was decidedly the Oscar’s most celebrated film, receiving seven awards, including best picture.
This year’s Academy Awards were certainly unorthodox, and one can only assume they took the slogan of “a year of change” to heart while planning it. In these depressing times, such a lively and surprising show is refreshing, but a few more weeks of planning couldn’t have hurt.

Outline of Indefinite pronoun

INTRO & LEDE:

Introduce movie, list some featured bands for credibility on the subject, specify it as a movie about romance and music so it can be picked apart

BUT:

It’s a movie about music that’s really about stupid teenagers profiling each other
A. Compare to High Fidelity
B. Indefinite Pronoun shtick
C. Pick apart “Where’s Fluffy” bs

Conclusion:

Wrap it up with a few more scathing remarks on its utter superficiality

Nick & Norah's Indefinite Pronoun (Revised)

“Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist” is a romantic teen-comedy directed by Peter Sollet, based on a book of the same title by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan. It’s meant to be sweet, charming romance between two people who find each other through the eclectic melodies of the modern urban music scene, their near-identical music taste bringing them together in the chaos of high school and downtown New York. Music has served as the impetus for many relationships in this day and age, and “Nick & Norah” seeks to present a unique yet quintessential story of two people who fall into this kind of romance. However, this “Infinite” playlist comes up aggravatingly short. For all the hype the movie gave itself about sporting an indie playlist featuring names like Vampire Weekend and Band of Horses, “Nick & Norah” is not a movie about music whatsoever.
Take a movie like High Fidelity, a romantic comedy centered on music. High Fidelity used its encyclopedic knowledge of great music to explain the inexplicable complexities of life and relationships. You’d think that a movie about two people’s infinite playlist would imply that the film would focus on using good music to effectively accompany some important adolescent-romantic moments, or that they would at least talk about a song or two, of which it does neither. Other than their brief tour of Electric Lady studios and a timid Cure reference, “Nick & Norah” either leaves the music on this infinite playlist as an indefinite pronoun (Nick & Norah’s indefinite pronoun, rather) or stays so cozily in the comfort zone of mainstream music (think of two people reveling in their serendipitous mutual adoration of The Beatles) that it comes off as utterly phony.
The most irritating thing about this movie is how it scathingly mocks the lives of true music enthusiasts by starring two teenage pseudo-music enthusiasts who use the movie’s musical obsession, the fictional band “Where’s Fluffy,” as a superficial social segregator. Protagonists in the movie love “Where’s Fluffy.” Antagonists utter things along the lines of “oh yeah, I love Whose Fluffy,” to which our cool Nick and Norah sigh and roll their eyes. Throughout the movie, our heroes search for this mystery concert. After all their searching, all we see or hear of this illustrious band is a few enigmatic slow-motion clips of them waltzing onto a stage in ripped jeans and dingy converses to plug in a few guitars before N & N, satisfied entirely with their discovery of the concert, up and leave before the first song, god forbid they actually enjoy the music they blabber on about to each other. “Where’s Fluffy” is the macguffin-like, shallow embodiment of “good music taste” in the movie, that certain hip quality the writers wanted Nick & Norah to have that would identify them with the obnoxious hipster crowd. It is not a movie about two people who find each other through music, it is a movie about two teenagers who pretend to be music enthusiasts who use “good music taste” to socially profile the rest of the stereotyped cast and to serve as a hollow excuse for their affection. Sollet would have done well to watch a few music-centered romantic comedies before he got started on this bile-evoking byproduct of adolescent pretense.

Nick & Norah's Indefinite Pronoun

While not a recent release, I’ve been thinking about this movie a lot since I’ve seen it at K. I felt strongly enough about my opinions and the complexity of my arguments to write about it, and so I figured, what the hey, I’ll do so. Here’s my review of Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist.

“Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist” is a romantic teen-comedy directed by Peter Sollet, based on a book of the same title by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan. It’s meant to be about a sweet, charming romance between two people who find each other through the eclectic melodies of the modern urban music scene, their near-identical music taste bringing them together in the chaos of high school and downtown New York. Undoubtedly, this is the impetus for many relationships in this day and age, and “Nick & Norah” seeks to present a unique yet quintessential story of two people who fall into this kind of romance. However, this “Infinite” playlist comes up aggravatingly short. For all the hype the movie gave itself about sporting an indie playlist featuring names like Vampire Weekend and Modest Mouse, “Nick & Norah” is really not a movie about good music whatsoever. Take a movie like High Fidelity. Those guys knew their stuff, and the movie used its encyclopedic knowledge of great music to explain the inexplicable complexities of life and relationships. You’d think that a movie about two people’s infinite playlist would imply that the film would focus on using good music to effectively accompany some important adolescent-romantic moments, or that they would at least talk about a song or two, of which it does neither. Other than their brief tour of Electric Lady studios and a timid Cure reference, “Nick & Norah” either leaves the music on this infinite playlist as an indefinite pronoun (Nick & Norah’s indefinite pronoun, rather) or stays so cozily in the comfort zone of mainstream music that it comes off as utterly phony. “Nick & Norah” even goes so far as to botch both the selection and implementation of songs by the good New-York-area bands it chose. It feels painfully like a movie about two people who find each other through great music written by people hopelessly out of touch with the music scene they’re trying to capture. In a nutshell, the mysterious location of a concert by legendary fictional band “Where’s Fluffy,” a major theme of the movie, is indicative of what the movie is really about and what this “infinite playlist” contains. Protagonists in the movie love “Where’s Fluffy.” Antagonists utter things along the lines of “oh yeah, I love Whose Fluffy,” to which our cool protagonists sigh and roll their eyes. Throughout the movie, our protagonists search for this mystery concert. After all their searching, all we see or hear of this illustrious band is a few enigmatic slow-motion clips of them waltzing onto a stage in ripped jeans and dingy converses to plug in a few guitars before our protagonists, satisfied entirely with their discovery of the concert, up and leave before the first song, an act that screams poser music enthusiast. “Where’s Fluffy” is the macguffin-like, shallow embodiment of “good music taste” in the movie, that certain hip quality the writers wanted Nick & Norah to have that would ingratiate them with the obnoxious hipster crowd. Sollet would have done well to watch a few music-centered romantic comedies before he got started on his.