Monday, February 23, 2015

Bathroom Monologues Movie Awards 2014

It's almost March 2015, so of course we're all talking about the best movies of 2014. Naturally I disagree with some of the Oscar winners. More naturally, I don't understand what some of the categories mean. But nothing shall dissuade me from telling a sizable democratic body of people who devote swaths of their lives to film that their mass conclusions were wrong. So here we go.


The Too Little/Too Late Award
Going to the movie I missed by several years,
but have now seen and wish I'd been on the bandwagon for at the time 
 
Memories (title short film in the 1995 collection, Memories)

The Raddest Scene Award
Going to the raddest scene in a motion picture
The end of Whiplash
honorable mentions: Happy New Year in Snowpiercer,
Xavier-on-Xavier in X-Men: Days of Future Past



 The Best Soundtrack Award
John's already used the "going to the obvious thing-award" joke,
so this is embarrassing
 
Whiplash
honorable mention: Interstellar

The Dark Horse Award
Going to the movie that was way better than you all led me to believe it would be
 
As Above, So Below

The Frank/Nixon Memorial Award
Going to all actors who performed as well or better
than Frank Langella did in Frost/Nixon
For the seventh year in a row, No One

You're Actually All Great At This
Going to the best ensemble in a motion picture,
since a great cast is way more impressive than a single great performance
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
honorable mention: Selma, The Raid 2: Berandal


The "There's No Such Thing As The Best Movie of the Year" Award
Seeing as there is no such thing as a best movie amidst a field of
comedies, dramas, musicals, period pieces, speculative fiction, animation,
blockbusters and an international film market we're both not watching enough of as it is,
the award that simply goes to whatever movie brought me
the closest to both crying and laughing last year  
The Wind Rises
which didn't reach my little town until March
honorable mentions: 
X-Men: Days of Future Past
Whiplash


10 comments:

  1. No one has been as good as Langella.
    I want to see Whiplash. Anything with music has my attention.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Whiplash has fantastic music, and is also a morbid study of slavish devotion to one's art. It's a troubling film, and good for it.

      Delete
  2. I put Whiplash on my to-watch list. Looks excellent. As above so below was okay, but I guess I wanted something more.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Really? Because it was so much more than I expected it to be. There's the claustrophobic dimension, and environmental peril, but the way the lower levels operated became a fascinating meta-game to track.

      Delete
  3. The Wind Rises: pure brilliance.
    I haven't seen Whiplash yet, but I will.
    I loved Birdman - and I TOTALLY agree that "There's No Such Thing As The Best Movie of the Year".

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Birdman is an outstanding movie! The only one I've seen in years where I never thought about anything other than the movie in front of me, not even for one minute. This was the first year where my No Best Movie category gave me trouble, because sadness is not something Birdman ever elicited from me, but it's so notable that it's the sort of thing one wants on a Best list.

      Delete
  4. This is a great list and now I totally have to go and look back on your other years. I really want to see As Above So Below. The New Year's scene in Snow Piercer was pretty awesome. If only the end of that movie would have been stronger.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, Snowpiercer's ending felt inevitable, both in the tone and the climax it had to deliver. I would have preferred something zanier, but I still enjoyed the movie a great deal. Bong Joon-ho does such unusual movies. I Saw the Devil still freaks me out.

      Delete
  5. Your awards are more interesting than the Oscars. =)

    ReplyDelete
  6. I would love to see an actual award for best ensemble. They should do best duo or partnership, too, for when there are two fantastic actors in a movie, but only one gets chosen to be up for an award. Plus, it's messed up when actors from the same movie are up against each other.

    ReplyDelete

Counter est. March 2, 2008