Can’t let the Oscars slip past without some sort of mention, here on one of the Homes on the Web for Oscar Nominee Dashiell Hammett. . . .
Per my track record of recent years, I have not yet seen a single nominee for Best Picture on the big screen or even the little screen, and most of the list I’ll probably never catch. Out of the current pack, I guess Argo is the one that interests me most.
(It was only in recent weeks that I finally Netflixed both versions of True Grit, the one with The Duke because I happened to wander into Ridgway, Colorado on a trip last year, where the early scenes with the courthouse and hangings were shot — then the remake out of idle curiosity.
(The Jeff Bridges version had good moments, but if you weren’t familiar with the original film you wouldn’t know what the hell was supposed to be going on. And let’s face it, there was only one Strother Martin.
(Talk about an actor who deserved an Oscar, or at least a nomination, I’d put Strother at the top of the list. But then, I suppose his body of work puts him above Oscar and into Icon stature. Better to be an Icon than just an Oscar statistic.)
I’ll be watching the ceremony anyway, to see Jean Dejardin (one hopes abetted by Uggie, both pictured above after last year’s win) as a presenter, plus the tribute to James Bond is the sort of thing I enjoy (these days, I’d rather sit through a Bond documentary, such as the excellent Everything or Nothing, than go to the latest reboot — no Skyfall, thank you, no Quantum of Solace, though I’m pretty sure I’ve seen every other Bond movie in a theatre, and not to say that they were all good. . .).
Plus there’s always a chance of the great rogue moment, such as Mickey Rooney heckling Steve Martin from where they stuck him way up in a balconey. Mickey is as close to a one-man history of Hollywood as you can get anymore, so more power to him.
