The Golden Globe nominations have been announced, and some silliness ensued. That’s all per usual with this high-profile awards show with the meshuggeneh format (an award for Best Drama and another for Best Musical or Comedy is good for nothing, except Burlesque) administered by the meshuggeneh foreign critics, a collective body that really loves movie stars. In fairness, some not-silliness ensued as well. The nominees for Best Drama — Black Swan, The Fighter, Inception, The King’s Speech, The Social Network — reflected the coalescing common wisdom about the Oscar front-runners (which isn’t good news for 127 Hours, The Kids Are All Right, and especially True Grit, which got completely snubbed). Less by the book? The Tourist: Best Comedy or Musical nominee. And many other such absurdities.
1. The Tourist Gets a Best Picture Nomination. So Does Red. So Does Burlesque
While the nominees in the Best Picture (Drama) category will likely all be nominated for the Academy Awards, not so much in the Best Picture (Comedy or Musical) category. No, in that perennially frivolous category, things got crazy. The Kids Are All Right is the lone serious film in a group that consists of Alice in Wonderland, Burlesque, Red, and The Tourist. Look, we love Helen Mirren as much as the next person, but Toy Story 3, where are you?! And the other films that didn’t get nominated — How Do You Know, Love and Other Drugs, Cyrus — aren’t exactly Oscar contenders, but compared to The Tourist, they’re Fellini.
2. Johnny Depp vs. Johnny Depp
Almost as hilarious as the Best Picture (Comedy or Musical) category is the Best Actor (Comedy or Musical) category. Johnny Depp was nominated twice, once for Alice in Wonderland and once for wearing what looked like a dead beaver on his head in The Tourist. Joining him are Jake Gyllenhaal, Kevin Spacey, and Paul Giamatti (though not John C. Reilly, Paul Rudd, or Robert Downey Jr.). At least Tom Cruise didn’t get nominated for Knight & Day. We guess word didn’t get out that he’s still a movie star until too late.
3. Harvey Weinstein Is Happy
Not only did the Weinstein Company’s The King’s Speech earn the most nominations of any film (seven), the newly R-rated Blue Valentine finally made an awards splash, with Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams both receiving acting nods. Seriously, The Social Network, watch your back.
4. Halle Berry Enters the Awards Race, for Real
Because both Annette Bening and Julianne Moore were nominated in the Best Actress (Comedy) category (along with Emma Stone. Yay!), the Best Actress (Drama) category had some more wiggle room than it will come Oscar time. And what did the Hollywood Foreign Press decide to fill it with? Halle Berry, whose nomination for her part as a multiple-personalitied stripper in the panned Frankie and Alice should jump-start an Oscar campaign that was otherwise DOA. Berry’s inclusion in the category, along with front-runner Natalie Portman, Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Lawrence, and the aforementioned Michelle Williams, means Another Year’s Lesley Manville, True Grit’s Hailee Steinfield, and I Am Love’s Tilda Swinton got the shaft.
5. Michael Douglas Saves Us From Justin Timberlake
The Best Actor (Drama) category overlooked older gentleman like Jeff Bridges and Robert Duvall (and, also, Leonardo DiCaprio) in favor of strapping gents Jesse Eisenberg, Colin Firth, James Franco, Ryan Gosling, and Mark Wahlberg. Not so in the Best Supporting Actor (Drama) category, which saw Michael Douglas getting what looks like a sympathy nod for Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps alongside Christian Bale, Andrew Garfield, Jeremy Renner, and Geoffrey Rush. Matt Damon (True Grit), Sam Rockwell (Conviction), or Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right) might have been more deserving, but at least we won’t have to deal with Justin Timberlake’s smart glasses on the campaign trail.
6. Mila Kunis, Piper Perabo, Jennifer Love Hewitt: Golden Globe Nominees
These nominations may be wacky, but some are also great. Big hooray for Black Swan’s Kunis getting nominated with The Fighter’s Amy Adams and Melissa Leo, The King’s Speech’s Helena Bonham Carter, and Animal Kingdom’s Jacki Weaver in the Best Supporting Actress (Drama) category. A smaller hooray/giggle for Jennifer Love Hewitt, who scored a Best Actress in a TV Movie or Mini-series for her turn as a working girl in the campy The Client List. And an eyebrow scrunch for Piper Perabo, the star of USA’s spy show Covert Affairs (and Coyote Ugly), who was nominated alongside Julianna Margulies, Kyra Sedgwick, Elisabeth Moss, and Katey Sagal as Best Actress in a TV Drama. Sorry Connie Britton, Anna Paquin, Mariska Hargitay — thanks for playing.
7.The Golden Globes Loves Zombies, Too
AMC’s The Walking Dead got nominated for Best TV Drama, alongside
Mad Men, Dexter, Boardwalk Empire, and The Good Wife, possibly at the expense of AMC’s Breaking Bad, but maybe just at the expense of HBO’s True Blood. We wonder if zombies would be any better or worse at awards-show speeches than drunk actors.