The Golden Globes don’t matter much to the Oscar race. That’s, mostly, fact. And yet, here I am writing about them because it seems as though film writers are still in a phase pretending that they do matter.
I was tuning in and out of last night’s ceremony, but did catch host Jo Koy bombing his monologue. I felt bad for the guy, he was clearly not the top choice to host the ceremony, but there he was, a second-tier comedian, trying to strenuously make people laugh.
“I’ve just got one complaint,” Koy said about “Oppenheimer,” the triumphant winner of the night. “Needed another hour. Could’ve used some more backstory.” Was that even a joke intended to make people laugh? We’ll never know.
“Yo, I got the gig 10 days ago, you want a perfect monologue? Shut up,” Koy said, multiple times. A friend texted, “where is Will Smith when you need someone to slap the host?”
Okay, fine, I’ll cut Koy some slack. The minute Jo Koy’s name was announced as host, and I searched his shtick on YouTube, I knew this was a disaster in the making. He should have never been put in this position in the first place.
Meanwhile, Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” was the big winner of the night — Globes or not, it was already positioned as the Best Picture frontrunner for the Oscars. The film won five Globes, including Best Motion Picture, Best Actor in Drama (Cillian Murphy), Best Supporting Actor in Drama (Robert Downey Jr.) and Best Director (Nolan). In his speech, Nolan mentioned Heath Ledger, pure class.
This truly feels like it’s Nolan’s year, where he’s going to win his first Oscar for directing. I can’t see anybody else beating him, especially not Martin Scorsese, whose “Killers of the Flower Moon” hasn’t shown that it has the legs to beat it — ‘Killers’ actress Lily Gladstone did, however, win Best Actress in a Dramatic Film.
Save for Jo Koy, “Barbie” was the big loser of the evening, losing Best Picture (Musical or Comedy) to “Poor Things”. Beaten in all major categories, in fact, as Margot Robbie lost to “Poor Things” actress Emma Stone. “Barbie” even lost the Screenplay prize, to everyone's surprise, which instead went to Justine Triet for “Anatomy of a Fall”, which also won Best Foreign Film. Well deserved.
The Oscar for Best Actress seems to be between Stone and Gladstone, which is the tightest and most interesting race of awards season.
Paul Giamatti’s Best Actor win — even in musical or comedy — inches him closer, at #2 — behind Cillian Murphy, in the Oscar race. Social media users had a laugh at Bradley Cooper’s reaction when Giamatti’s name was called — the hatred for the guy is starting to feel forced and mean — he’s now #3 in Oscar rankings for his performance in “Maestro.”
Here are the winners in all the film categories.