Oscar Nominations: A Quick, Cranky Early-Morning Reaction

I'm not going to do this all press-release style, because 1) I've barely had any coffee yet and 2) you can read that kind of inverted-pyramid roundup about this morning's Academy Award nominations in about a billion other publications.

Also, 3) bulleted lists are easier to read but 4) I don't know how to type a bullet in WordPress so 5) I'm just going to stick to numbering my random thoughts as I looked over the Academy's chosen. Here goes:

1) SIGH. No Best Picture love for The Dark Knight or WALL*E. Seriously, guys? You think the fucking Reader and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button are more remarkable, moving, stand-up-and-cheer achievements in film?

WALL*E was the best movie of 2008, period — fellow Animated Feature contenders Bolt and Kung Fu Panda don't deserve to lick its robot treads. And if people even remember The Reader five years from now, I'll be astonished. The Dark Knight wasn't a perfect film, but it was an indelible one. Best Editing my ass.

2) Bravo for recognizing Robert Downey Jr. for Tropic Thunder. Too bad it's Heath Ledger's year.

3) Brad Pitt was not one of 2008's Best Actors. Best Mannequin, maybe. All his Benjamin Button had to do was wear makeup, drawl 'n' smile, and get digitized. Pass.

4) Same goes for Kate Winslet in The Reader, except replace her actorly requirements with showing nipple, affecting a German accent, and banging a 15-year-old. Her turn in Revolutionary Road was much more accomplished.

5.) Fuck, I need to be somewhere.

6.) To be continued, along with an in memoriam about Ledger on the first anniversary of his death.