Unlike other major papers, which mostly went with a cover shot of a resplendently emotional Marion Cotillard, the ever-classy New York Post puts “former stripper” Diablo Cody on the cover of their Oscar morning-after edition, letting her outdated job description stand in for her name. And with THAT, the rags-to-riches transformation from strip club Cinderella to Oscar winner, as well as the little indie-choo-choo-that-could fiction that made it happen, (the Post story actually uses the phrase “the little indie that could”, and refers to the win itself, which was the second-biggest lock of the night behind Javier Bardem, as a “shocker”) is complete.
Oh, and did we mention that the Post, like Fox Searchlight, the teeny-tiny independent company that made and released Juno, is owned by Rupert Murdoch? Vertically integrated corporate strategy is a beautiful thing.
Via Tim Shey.
UPDATE: I apologize for suggesting that Cody only wore one earring to the Oscars. I was clearly wrong.
Forget about betting on the NFL playoffs. Forget about betting on the Oscar nominations. In fact, forget about betting on whether the Oscars will even happen. The only thing you gamblers should be betting on right now is whether Cloverfield is going to be a box office hit or a box office bomb. Because right now, it’s any body’s game. If the monster movie ends up being the former, it will most likely only be only a modest hit. But if it’s the latter, it will be legendary. Actually, some people think the movie is going to be this year’s Snakes on a Plane. I have a feeling it has more appeal on its own than did Snakes, mainly because people are curious about the monster. There was nothing in the marketing of Snakes on a Plane that made us wonder, nothing that wet our appetites for surprises. Now, if we had already seen a visual of Cloverfield’s monster it would be a different story. And after the opening weekend, after somebody posts a photo of the monster on the web (instead of simply a rendering), moviegoers may no longer be as interested in going to see it. So, the real bet is that Cloverfield will make a decent amount of money in its opening, but like most Hollywood product will suffer a huge drop in ticket sales afterward.
I think that a lot of people are really hoping for Cloverfield to crash and burn, though. On Sunday, the New York Post featured an article detailing why Cloverfield will bomb. Of course, the Post is owned by the same people who want you to believe Cloverfield exploits 9/11. The article was also written before the first press screening, which is apparently tonight (I won’t be there, unfortunately). So far, though, some people have managed to see the movie, including Harry Knowles, that other hilariously nutty AICN dude, Jeffrey Wells and E!, and everyone seems to love it. So, I’m putting all in for Cloverfield to win at the box office this weekend. We’ll see on Sunday if I’ve gone for broke or won the pot.
Check out this creeptastic quote from Lou Lumenick, lamenting Juno‘s failure to win the New York Film Critics Circle’s vote for Best Screenplay:
I do regret that erstwhile stripper Diablo Cody will not be joining us for the awards on January 6. She sure had my vote.
Gross, right? If the guy really thinks Juno was the best screenplay of the year, he’s entitled to that (wrong) opinion, but then what does it matter that Cody is an “erstwhile stripper”? As it stands, it reads like Cody got Lumenick’s vote not because she wrote the best screenplay, but because she’s more likely than the Coen Brothers to do something sexy at the awards ceremony (and/or, Lumenick is more likely to enjoy fantasizing about it). At best, it’s a stab at Friar’s Club-caliber comedy that does nothing to dispel the notion that these critics circles are too old, white and male for their own good.
As if it wasn’t gross enough to think that Juno’s critical success could be the product of a bunch of journalists wanting to hang out with a sometime stripper, and all the “once a sex worker, permanently a whore ie: maybe she’ll get naked during our interview” bullshit that entails, it’s almost worse to think that these dudes are, like, patting themselves on the back for spreading the urban legend about The Stripper Who Actually Had a Brain. And this is, remember, all in service of a movie that was essentially made for young girls. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of vomiting to do before the HFPA takes this line of thinking to its inevitable conclusion.
