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Pique N Your Interest

The Dangerfields
andrewbyline

A few weeks ago the nominations for the 2006 Academy Awards were announced and I was not the least bit surprised to find that, once again, I’ve only seen a fraction of the films. I guess I’m just not that interested in cinema, although I do like movies.

There is a difference. Brokeback Mountain is cinema, while Grandma’s Boy is a movie. I happen to own Grandma’s Boy .

This year I’ve seen exactly one of the movies up for Best Picture, Little Miss Sunshine , which is one more than I’ve seen in any of the past two years. For the record, I also waited until it came out on DVD.

It’s not that I’m immune to great films. I just don’t have endless amounts of free time to spend at the theatre or on the couch, and with the time I do have I’d rather be entertained than provoked, upset, or shocked into deep thought by whatever I’m watching. In that vein, I’ll freely admit that Schindler’s List was a great and important film, but I will never watch it a second time and I definitely would never own it.

A friend once told me that the true test of movie greatness lies in one simple question: now that you’ve seen it once, would you ever own it?

I would never own Crash or Munich or Brokeback Mountain or Capote or Good Night, and Good Luck , all five nominated for Best Picture in 2005. I do however own Zoolander , Strange Brew and Ghostbusters (autographed by Dan Akroyd himself — thanks Brew!), among others. I own mostly comedies, but then I read too many factual newspaper stories every day to ever find depressing fictional movies appealing.

I don’t think that I’m alone in thinking that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is maybe a little too ivory tower in its annual selection of nominees, preferring films that are far too melancholy for the average person that is just looking for some simple entertainment. With the exception of Little Miss Sunshine , comedies very rarely get noticed by the Academy, while tragedies like the miserable Million Dollar Baby , or any of the countless movies released where the lead character dies in the end, are considered art.

That’s hardly fair. Shakespeare wrote comedy as well as drama, and nobody considers him a lesser playwright for it. Even the Greek Tragedies were offset by the Greek Comedies, which is why theatre has always been symbolized by two masks — one laughing and one crying.

I have no idea what the Academy has against happy endings, but it has gotten to the point for me that an Academy Award nomination is a good reason to avoid watching a film because I know by experience that it’s probably going to be overly long and make me feel like crap at the end.

It just seems so out of touch with what people want. The top grossing movies of last year were Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, X-Men: The Last Stand, The Da Vinci Code, Night at the Museum, Talladega Nights , and Superman Returns . Together they grossed well over a billion dollars in theatres and hundreds of millions more on DVD — bright spots in an otherwise dismal year for the motion picture industry. Yet none of these movies are nominated for any of the important awards like Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, or Best Actress.

How does the Academy decide who gets nominated? Is Ryan Gosling really a better actor in Half Nelson than Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Carribean ?

Maybe it’s time that the Academy created a separate set of awards to recognize movies that were made purely to entertain us, simply and joyfully, like the original Star Wars trilogy or Slap Shot . (Both classics I hope to add to my collection soon.)

It’s time to recognize the best comedy, the best action movie, the best sci-fi, fantasy or superhero movie, the best sequel, the best stunt, the best fight scene, the top grosser in theatres, the top grosser on DVD, best date movie, and so on. Of course the Golden Globes and MTV Movie awards do recognize these things to some degree, although the Globes are getting too serious and MTV tailors their awards to teens.

I would name these awards the Dangerfields after Caddyshack and Easy Money star Rodney Dangerfield, if only to finally give the man some respect.

And if we can add the Dangerfields to supplement the Oscars, then why not create the Pettys to supplement the Grammys? I can’t remember the last time I’ve knowingly purchased a CD that won a Grammy. I’m not saying they never nominate good music, but the stuff I like never seems to win Best Album, Best Record (apparently there’s a difference), or Best New Artist.

February and March are the awards show season. But I think I’ll rewatch Grandma’s Boy instead.