(The author occasionally attends hoity toity film festivals and has submitted some thoughts on few lesser-known Oscar nominees; Related: The author lives in the Arizona desert yet is rarely seen in shorts himself)
There are five films nominated in the category of animated short film, but there is only one that could and should win: PIPER. In this story, a mother bird tries to teach a baby bird how to find food, and the result is adorable. Having watched all of the nominated films in the category, the only way that PIPER will not win would be if excellence might not be the goal (or, if the voters have something against Disney/Pixar).
DOCUMENTARY (SHORT SUBJECT)
Three films in this category are outstanding, and all three deal with different facets of the Syrian war and the refugee problems in Europe. I would declare a three-way tie.
4.1 MILESpresents a coast guard boat captain in Greece who must deal with the wave of immigrants trying to make the crossing from Turkey across treacherous waters. The story is palpable and personal, and it presents the magnitude of the refugee problem from the perspective of one seaport. After viewing this short movie, you will see the refugees as human beings, and not statistics.
THE WHITE HELMETSallows us to witness the rescue workers at the Syrian Civil Defense who risk their own lives to save people trapped in the rubble after bombs are dropped. This movie is not about being political, it is about being a hero.
WATANI: MY HOMELAND is the intimate portrayal of a family who is forced to deal with the Syrian War. You watch the children grow up on the screen, as they escape the violence and try to create a new life.
SHORT FILM (LIVE ACTION)
The choice in this category is just splitting hairs because all five of the nominated films are inspirationally excellent.
TIMECODE was my personal favorite in this group, but it was by no means better than the other four films. It tells the unique story of flirtation and romance on security cameras.
SINGgives us a heartwarming tale about children finding justice while singing in a choir.
SILENT NIGHTS is a love story between a refugee and a social worker that rips you apart and puts you back together by the end.
LE FEMME ET LE TGV is about an elderly woman finding her true self, all over again, by waving at the fast-moving train that travels by her house.
ENNEMIS INTERIEURS is an interrogation movie that explores loyalty to country and loyalty to friends.
*The judges will also accept “Escape From Moo York” and “He Cud Go All The Way”, “Jamaica Run For It”
“Runaway cow, never going back/Not about to be product for Shake Shack,
Runaway cow, get away quick/Take Northern Blvd. to the on-ramp at Van Wyck”
Am I weird that the Runaway Cow story made me sad yesterday? Hey, I had a burger at J.G. Melon last Friday night, so that makes me something of a hypocrite (it’s difficult to be an idealist when burgers taste so good). This was a terrified animal running for its life with no real chance in an age of militarized police and overhead news copters. Also, we’re an increasingly scaredy-cat society that puts “keeping people safe” against real and more importantly, imagined dangers, above all else. I was rooting for you, Runaway Cow. And I’ll always admire your attempt: all any living creature really wants is to live free.
2. Charade
“Where’s the Kenyan manger where Obama was born?”
A dude whose entire grassroots movement was built on falsely accusing the first African-American president of being born in Africa suddenly cares about black people (and, as a two-fer, because who wants to walk all the way over to the Holocaust Museum, it’s so far? It’s next door? Oh, good to know….)? Ni**er, please.
Donald Trump, reading from a carefully worded script, never used the words “slavery” or “Holocaust.” He also had a big rally in Melbourne, Florida, on Saturday where he could have paid lip service to these same issues and took a hard pass.
Sorry. Not even close to buying it. You know what WAS real yesterday? This. Watch from 9:00 on. Chris Matthews kicks Ned Ryun’s ass here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGEfX-DJ3CQ
And this…
What’s going on? You’re so sick of your parents making you eat your vegetables and do your homework, so you go live with that fun-ass neighbor. Except after moving there you realize he doesn’t do laundry, doesn’t buy toilet paper, doesn’t buy milk or eggs and, well, it’s a heroin den. You assumed he’d be fun AND take care of the simple things you took for granted. Wrong.
3. Ball Four-gone Conclusion
Major League Baseball wants games to not eclipse 3 hours any more so as a stop gap measure (like saving a few hundred jobs at Carrier while ignoring the larger issues) it’s eliminating the intentional walk. Instead, a signal from the dugout will allow umps to direct the batter to first base.
Now, the IW isn’t my most hallowed baseball item, but I don’t like the spirit of this edict: In order to make baseball more palatable to the Snapchat generation, we’re going to eliminate things that make it baseball-y.
I’m kinda hoping pitchers defy this ruling by either pitching around hitters or plunking them in the side butt. Wanna make games shorter? First thing, allow no more than one tric to the mound in any game by a pitching coach or manager. And one more trip by a catcher. Two total. Any more and the batter takes his base. That’s number one….
4. Unalaska IS Alaska
There is no town of 500 or more people in the United States located farther west than Unalaska, Alaska. It’s more than halfway out on the chain of the Aleutian Islands, an 800-mile flight southwest of Anchorage. It’s also home to the state champion 2A basketball team. My story in Newsweekis here.
Let me take space here to thank school principal Jim Wilson, coach Kent Russell, deputy chief Jennifer Shockley, native Sharon Svarny-Livingston and a few others who helped with this piece. Unalaska is quite a noteworthy place. It’s the last piece of U.S. territory that was ever attacked by a foreign military power and it has been home to the Unangan, or Aleutian people, since the Stone Age.
4,500 people live on an island that is twice the size of Oahu
As isolated as this place is, the town and team are a model for what the United States should be. The starting five features two Filipinos, one Samoan, one half-Unangan, and one Caucasian. The top two reserves are Vietnamese. I hope you give the story a read.
5. Good Buss? Magic Buss
Jeannie! Major Bellows is going to be furious!
*The judges will also accept, “I Scream of Jeannie” or “It’s not personal, it’s Showtime” and “Does This Buss Stop In Last Place?”
As my friend Chris Corbellini noted,
Jeanie Buss settled all family business. She may have sent Jim fishing in Tahoe for all we know: https://t.co/uvdibEYXxm
The fans will note that GM Mitch Kupchak (if you’re of a certain age, you instantly go to the movie Caddyshack when hearing that name) and designated Fredo (“I’m smart!”) Jim Buss are gone, but if you’re an old scribe you find it hard to believe they got rid of PR chieftain John Black, who’d been with the Lakers since the Showtime era. John Black (no, that’s not his spy name; that’s his real name) was as much a part of L.A. as the Hollywood sign. And the Hollyweed sign.
Writers loved dealing with John Black. Now our only old friend in LA media is Tim Tessalone.
Hey, the Lakers have been awful for awhile and it’s going to take some time. Luke Walton is a good hire and while I really don’ t believe much in this current young nucleus (hell, the Suns probably have a better Under-25 nucleus), Jeannie had to do something. But haven’t we seen enough of Magic Johnson, on variety shows, as a studio analyst, as a coach, to know that there are two things he does well and neither of them involve being peripherally involved with basketball?
Music 101
Lost In Love
Eleven out of 10 people consider themselves too cool for Air Supply. I get it, but I love this song and have never hidden my unfettered love for Aussie schmaltz pop (hello, Little River Band). Go ahead and mock this flaccid rock group who met while performing in a production of Jesus Christ Superstar, but this 1980 hit is soft-rock perfection (unless you consider that an oxymoron, which, okay, I understand).
Remote Patrol
Sports
Duke at Syracuse
Louisville at North Carolina
7 & 9 p.m. ESPN
Non-Sports
Roman Holiday
8 p.m. TCM
Trump’s First 100 Days
10 p.m. MSNBC
That two-day desert of horrid TV choices ends (so bad I almost found myself watching TV or worse, calling old friends). The last item on this list will feature a two-hour round table on The First Month of Trump featuring the MSNBC primetime hosts, and IMHO Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell and Brian Williams have been better than anyone not named Jake Tapper since the election.
Critics are praising Donald Trump’s selection of three-star general H.R. McMaster as the latest National Security Adviser because he has a degree from West Point, was a decorated field commander in Iraq and Afghanistan, and has a Ph.D. in military history from the University of North Carolina.
Personally, I think Donald chose him because he looks like a guy who would play a general in an action movie and because of his last name. Also, because if he (or a minion) Googled McMaster he’d see that his wife is named Kathleen Trotter and maybe Trump mistook her for Canadian fitness guru Kathleen Trotter. Maybe?
Not the general’s wife. Not even his McMistress
Oh, that doctoral thesis was turned into a book, Dereliction of Duty, in which McMaster wrote, “The war in Vietnam was not lost in the field, nor was it lost on the front pages of the New York Times or the college campuses. It was lost in Washington, D.C.”
Clip and save.
2. A.D. and Boogie
At the time of the trade, DeMarcus Cousins, 6’11”, was fourth in the NBA in scoring (27.8 ppg). Anthony Davis, 6’10”, was fifth in the league in scoring (27.7 ppg). It’s rare enough to have two teammates finish in the Top 5 in scoring, but rarer still—in fact, as far as MH’s crack research staff of kindly Twitter followers who did the work for us can tell, it has NEVER HAPPENED—for two teammates 6’10” or taller to do so.
So let’s see if this pair of Kentucky products can maintain those levels of production. It’s intriguing in this age of bombs-away from beyond the arc to watch a team literally double down on low-post scoring (even though both are decent outside shooters). The Pelicans are taking the ’75 Corvette out for a spin. At least it’ll be fun to watch.
There was no cooler American-made car in the Seventies, though as the decades pass, the GTO and Challenger get more love
By the way, the Pelicans also have THREE seven-footers in their lineup. Wouldn’t you love to see coach Alvin Gentry put those three, plus Boogie and point guard AD on the floor just once?
3. The Curious Case of the Russian Diplomat Who Was Found Dead on Election Day
Who killed Sergei Krivov, who was found dead at 7 a.m. inside the Russian consulate on East 90th Street in New York City? Or did he die of natural causes? Where is his body? And why has the NYPD closed the case while the medical examiner’s office, which no longer has the corpse, still has it open? An intriguing read from Buzzfeed, although I’m not sure where they got the fact that there was “blunt force trauma” to his head.
Not directly related, but such a good line from last night:
Stephen Colbert: “90% of Swedish crime takes place in ‘The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.'”
Just once, can’t we meet a panda named “Frank” or “Larry?”
This is Bao Bao, who is being deported from the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., to “CHI-na.” Or maybe I’m just panda’ing to my constituency, and it’s an open exchange between the two countries. Frankly, I think the D.C. Zoo is getting fleeced in the deal and it doesn’t help that zoo director Vlade Divac admitted they had a better deal from the Prague Zoo two days earlier but turned it down.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfy5mRFz3IU
5. CPAC Disinvites Milo
Dude, we’re all for hate speech, but you gotta tone down that whole sodomizing boys is okay thing, Okay?
In this very space yesterday I defended Milo Yiannopoulos as someone whose political thoughts I almost universally disagreed with but as someone who was at least funny and smart. Also, as someone later pointed out on CNN, he’s very good at “identity politics,” claiming you can’t call him a bigot because after all he’s gay and has a black boyfriend.*
*Oh, but see, that’s the thing about sexuality; it makes hypocrites of us all. Ask Thomas Jefferson.
Anyway, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) loved Milo way more than I do, inviting him to be a speaker as their way to show libtards, cucks and snowflakes how horny they are about the First Amendment (because it allows them to say bigoted, misogynistic, homophobic and anti-Semitic things and if you cucks don’t like it, then you are hyporcrites). But then came word that Milo had laughed off and condoned pedophilia by Catholic priests, and apparently we discovered the new line in the sand not to be crossed in the CPAC sandbos.
So Milo was disinvited—and he also lost a book deal. Of course, all of this will only increase his popularity with the alt-right-delete crowd. Of course, CPAC, which runs from February 22-25, has not rescinded the speaker invitation of Donald “Grab ’em by the pu**y” Trump for its conference. Or Mike “conversion therapy” Pence. Good times.
Reserves
This as the cover would have generated more heat and pub
Casa Bianca
I was fortunate enough to work at Sports Illustrated throughout the 1990s, in the last years when the SISwimsuit Issue was still a buzz-worthy phenomenon. Then Maxim and other lad mags as well as the internet came along and watered down its influence.
Anyway, one man’s opinion, but I thought the mag might have drawn more attention last week by putting a relative unknown on the cover as opposed to Kate “Check Out These Milk Cannisters” Upton. Four more inspired choices? Bailey Clauson, Nina Agdal, Samantha Hoopes, Anne De Paula and/or rookie Bianca Balti, of Italy, above. Now you are in a Baltic state of mind.
Music 101
Drain You
Yesterday Kurt Cobain would have turned 50. Time marches on. On December 29, 1991, I sat onstage (thanks, Lorraine) in Tempe, Arizona, as Nirvana played a 12-song set, sandwiched between Pearl Jam and Red Hot Chili Peppers. This was the song they led off with that night in the desert.
This is a wonderful interview of Cobain late in his life. He’s really such a down-to-earth guy. He was never the overly affected rocker you might have supposed him to be.
Remote Patrol
The Detour
TBS 10 p.m.
The Parker family moves to New York City for Season 2. Jason Jones (who created this series with his wife, Samantha Bee, perhaps you’ve heard of her) and Natalie Zea star and if you missed the rookie season, try to catch the re-runs. It’s twisted, kind of a Flirting With Disaster meets Little Miss Sunshine meets We’re The Millers, but funnier.
A couple days ago Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band were playing in Brisbane, Australia, and this happened. Stick around ’til the end because the lad, Nathan Teston, lands a souvenir.
Just because it’s Another Day of Trump doesn’t mean we always have to begin with a downer….
Uncontested
At least Curry was honest about it….
I went to a basketball game and the Pro Bowl broke out.
2017 NBA All-Star Game: West 192, East 182
(I got out my calculator out, and that’s 374 points).*
*All-Star Game Record
A few plays later, Curry went up for a defensive rebound, and Giannis happened…
In case you were curious:
2014: East 163, West 155; 318 points. A record.
2015: West 163, East 158; 321 points. A new record.
2016: West 196, East 173; 369 points. A new record.
The last time I saw a market rise this irrationally, Michael Burry shorted it and became a kabillionaire. ESPN wants to talk about the Durant-Westbrook Alley Oop Armistice, but I think Marv Albert was making a more salient point: Sure, we like to see offense, but can we keep the dunk contest on Saturday and actually play a little bit of defense?
Not sure what carrot we need to dangle. Maybe the losing team has to get into a ship with Kyrie “Panned Planethood” Irving and sail off the edge of the Earth?
3. Artificial Sweden-er
Grandiosity
Among the many dubious things Donald Trump said at Saturday’s “Rally To Massage My Fragile Ego,” he brought up Europe and terrorism: “We’ve got to keep our country safe. You look at what’s happening in Germany, you look at what’s happening last night in Sweden — Sweden, who would believe this?”
To which Sweden asked, “What?!?” (Or however you say that in Swedish).
This is from Carl Bildt, former Prime Minister of Sweden:
Last year there were app 50% more murders only in Orlando/Orange in Florida, where Trump spoke the other day, than in all of Sweden. Bad.
Trump was citing a Fox News interview he must’ve seen on Friday evening, but what’s funny is that even a few Fox News anchors have decided to no longer carry the president’s water. We featured a clip from Shepherd Smith last week, but here’s Chris Wallace (son of Mike) informing Reince Priebus that after only one month, the Trump White House has whined more about the media and said far more inflammatory things than Trump’s predecessor ever did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5RRUZynq80
Priebus kept talking about needing to get “sources on the record.” Like Deep Throat, Reince?
Meanwhile, how can we pass up a chance to replay “Let’s Look For Swedes…”
4. Boogie Down*
Is this the scariest man in the NBA?
*The judges will grudgingly accept Sacramento King Cake and somewhat more enthusiastically accept “Buddy, Can You Spare a Dime?”
Sacramento King DeMarcus “Boogie” Cousins only played two minutes in last night’s All-Star Game and as I was mostly watching The Saviors vs. The Kingdom vs. Alexandria vs. the newest gang, The Heap-sters (love that name), I just assumed he’d been ejected. Turns out the talented but tumultuous big man was about to be traded.
Pelicans get: Cousins and forward Omri Casspi.
Kings get: Noted nut-puncher of Cousins, Buddy Hield; Tyreke Evans; Langston Galloway; a 2017 1st round, a 2017 second round.
As MH reader Okerland tweeted: “See what happens when you punch Boogie in the nuts?”
From heel to Hield in Sac-Town….
Cousins, who is 4th in the NBA in scoring and 11th in rebounding, is supremely gifted and still only 26. But he’s a little bit moody. Just a touch. If he and fellow former Kentucky big man Anthony Davis, who is 5th in the NBA in scoring and put up the easiest 52 points you’ve ever seen last night (an NBA All-Star Game record, but there was no defense, and these were mostly dunks, so….), then maybe the Pelicans can be something. They’ll still need a guard.
This trade isn’t about to bring Sac-Town to greatness, but they simply just got tired of Boogie being Boogie and knew when he became a FA this summer that he’d be leaving. As good as the surly 6’11’ Boogie is, this is his seventh NBA season and he still has yet to appear in a playoff game.
5. Milo: Hateful Ideas, But Charming and Smart
Kudos to Bill Maher for inviting every college student’s favorite alt-right target of hate, Milo Yiannopoulus, onto Real Time last Friday. I thought I’d be getting a younger version of Steve Bannon, a better-looking version of Stephen Miller, a just-as-punchable version of Richard Spencer, but you know what?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRAiJAlXeZE
He’s a lot more like Bill Maher than any of those guys—just prettier. Milo is a world-class provocateur (during “Overtime” he got two of three panelists to tell him to “F**k yourself” or some variation) and he’s also funny and self-aware. Yes, some of what he spews is garbage, but he also has a lot more charm than anyone on the Trump staff or even in the alt-right universe. And he’s not stupid. Misguided in some of his opinions, but not stupid. Take a look.
Also, Bill Maher’s “Gall Pass” rant was right on (and by “right” I mean correct, not a political leaning). Watch it:
If the topic is black female singers, you should be as familiar with Marilyn McCoo as you are with Whitney Houston or—do I dare?—Queen Bey. As the lead singer of The Fifth Dimension, it is the lovely McCoo’s lovely voice that you hear on “Wedding Bell Blues,” “Up, Up and Away” and this, the ultimate insomniac anthem. It climbed to No. 8 on the charts in spring of 1972.
Remote Patrol
Braveheart
11 p.m. Spike
Does George R.R. Martin write Game of Thrones if this hadn’t come out?
Maybe you’re the one person who is holding out and hasn’t seen this film. Maybe you thought you wouldn’t enjoy scenery of the Scottish Highlands, or men in kilts doing battle. Maybe you don’t have to be up early Tuesday morning. What Evs. On Oscar Week, let’s remember this ’95 film, a worthy Best Picture winner.
This photo isn’t too impressive until you notice the two men in the sink hole
California Streaming
Water, water, everywhere! California, land of the perpetual drought, is now its own disaster film. Five people died in various storm-related incidents (electrocution, submerged vehicle, pedestrian swept away) as presumably Albert “It Never Rains In Southern California” Hammond scrubbed a nostalgia gig.
Was it only two years ago, this same time of year, that SoCal was drenched with rain and Ellen DeGeneres kicked off the Oscars assuring the world that Hollywood was fine? At least the gods/God were kind enough to bring this storm a full week earlier this year.
2. Hangar Stake
In dire need of some emotional stroking after four weeks on the job, Donald Trump fled to Florida (again) and held a rally in front of 9,000 acolytes at an airport hangar in Melbourne. Donald played many of his heats (“Win, win, win”, “I inherited a mess”, “Get rid of the gang members,” “radical Islam”) but retired “Lock Her Up” and “What The Hell Is Going On In Chicago?”). Then he headed down to Mar-A-Lago.
Trump, the president of all 50 states, has visited Florida three times since being inaugurated, South Carolina once (on Friday), and Maryland briefly (to do a “My bad” in front of the parents of a slain Navy SEAL). That’s it.
There are doofuses who wrongly assume that because Trump stays at his own resort, he’s saving taxpayers money. WRONG. Here’s a Washington Poststory detailing just how costly the president’s lifestyle already has been (the Secret Service is working at three dedicated locations–White House, Trump Tower, Mar-A-Lago, while also footing the bill when Donny, Jr., and Eric traveled to the UAE this weekend to conduct private Trump business; American taxpayers are basically underwriting the cost of Trump, Int. doing business; but then again, maybe we’ve already been doing that for decades).
Trump’s three Florida excursions have already cost taxpayers $10 million. When his predecessor took a four-day trip to Chicago and Florida that cost us $3.6 million, Republicans in Congress called for the Government Accountability Office (GAO) review Obama’s costs. When those same Republicans were asked if they’d do the same for Trump, they actually pointed to the Japanese prime minister’s visit as proof that Trump trips were all business.
3. The Mason-Jackson Line
Miss Jackson if you’re nasty
You need guards in the NCAA tournament, and Kansas has two of the nation’s best. Senior Frank Mason III is under six feet but he reminds you of Kemba Walker (who led UConn to a national title in 2011). Superfrosh Josh Jackson is a 6’8″ string bean who plays like a young Kobe Bryant.
Mason making plays
Yesterday in Waco, No. 3 Kansas overcame a four-point deficit late to host No. 4 Baylor to win 67-65. Mason had 23 and Jackson 16. The defense got turnovers at key moments. The front court is not elite, but the Jayhawks (24-3) are going to be an awfully tough out in March and most likely the first weekend of April.
4. The People’s McCourt
You may have heard about Charlotte McCourt by now. A sixth grader and Girl Scout from South Orange, N.J, she hatched a devious plan to sell Girl Scout cookies: honesty. McCourt wrote a letter to her dad’s wealthy friend, Dirty Jobs host Mike Rowe, in which she bluntly reviewed her inventory (“Toffee Tastic is a bleak, gluten-free wasteland”), and then Rowe posted the letter on Facebook and talked about it, and the next thing you know McCourt had sold a Girl Scout-record 26,000-plus boxes of Girl Scout cookies.
Did Sally Draper ever sell Girl Scout cookies?
This is the most candid moment in advertising since Don Draper confessed to Hershey brass that he grew up in a whorehouse. Of course, the results of his brutal honesty did not go so well.
5. The Devil and Daniel Webster*
*The judges know: Too Easy
If you went to a Division III basketball game in Nashua, N.H., this weekend and a felony broke out, you were at the Daniel Webster-Southen Vermont College contest. Daniel Webster player Marquise Cardill, 22, was charged with assaulting an opponent and is being held on $50,000 bail. Teammate Antwaun Boyd, 23, was charged with disorderly conduct after allegedly inciting the crowd to hurt an officer who had stepped in to stop Cardill.
The game was forfeited and Southern Vermont won, 2-0. If you took Daniel Webster and laid the points, I don’t know what happens here.
Was it only two years ago, this same time of year, that SoCal was drenched with rain and Ellen DeGeneres kicked off the Oscars assuring the world that Hollywood was fine? At least the gods/God were kind enough to bring this storm a full week earlier this year.
