ReasonForOurHope

Sunday, January 13, 2019

Sunday Best: Thoughts on Golden Globes 2019

The thing that I found most shocking about the Golden Globes this year was that a number of the winners were from movies that I had actually seen.  Like the Oscars, the Golden Globes had been reaching out and lifting up films that were obscure to most of the general audience.

I was very surprised that crowd-pleasers like Bohemian Rhapsody and The Green Book won so big on this night.  Bohemian Rhapsody is a bona-fide international hit.  And even though The Green Book has a much more modest box office return, it sits with a very high A+ Cinemascore.

What does this mean for the Oscars.


As I've written in years past the Golden Globes are less and less of a predictor of Oscars than they used to be.

YEARGOLDEN GLOBE
BEST DRAMA
GOLDEN GLOBE BEST COMEDYOSCAR BEST PICTURE
2001A Beautiful MindMoulin Rouge!A Beautiful Mind
2002The HoursChicagoChicago
2003The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the KingLost in TranslationThe Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
2004The AviatorSidewaysMillion Dollar Baby
2005Brokeback MountainWalk the LineCrash
2006BabelDreamgirlsThe Departed
2007AtonementSweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet StreetNo Country for Old Men
2008Slumdog MillionaireVicky Cristina BarcelonaSlumdog Millionaire
2009AvatarThe HangoverThe Hurt Locker
2010The Social NetworkThe Kids Are All RightThe King's Speech
2011The DescendantsThe ArtistThe Artist
2012ArgoLes MiserablesArgo
201312 Years a SlaveAmerican Hustle12 Years a Slave
2014BoyhoodThe Grand Budapest HotelBirdman
2015The RevenantThe MartianSpotlight
2016MoonlightLa La LandMoonlight
2017Three Billboards...Lady BirdThe Shape of Water
2018Bohemian RhapsodyThe Green Book

2015 saw The Revenant and The Martian take home the Globes while Spotlight won the Oscar.  for 2016,  Moonlight ended up taking the Oscar and the Golden Globe, but we saw a return to the trend with The Shape of Water taking the Oscar but no Globes.

Last year there were very few things to root for.

The top 10 highest grossing movies of 2017 were:

Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi
Beauty and Beast
Wonder Woman
Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2
Spider-Man: Homecoming
IT
Thor: Ragnarock
Despicable Me 3
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
Justice League

NOT ONE OF THE TOP TEN FILMS received a nomination.

In 2018, the Best Picture Globe winners have a combined box office of $60 million, which is almost 1/4 of the Justice League.

This year was a bit different.  The top 10 highest grossing movies this year were

Black Panther
Avengers: Infinity War
Incredibles 2
Jurassic Word: Fallen Kingdom
Deadpool 2
Aquaman
The Grinch:
Mission: Impossible - Fallout
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Solo: A Star Wars Story

As you can see, the highest grossing film of the year received a nomination.  Not only that, but Bohemian Rhapsody is the 13th highest grossing film of the year at around $200 million.  And with an Oscar campaign, it could crack into that top 10 as well.  The combined grosses from this year's winners is 4x the combined grosses of last year's winners.


Other nominees like A Star is Born ($203 million) and Crazy Rich Asians ($174 million) have been seen by a good number of people.  And while most of the nominee slots were filled with low-grossing films, there has been a little improvement toward popular tastes.

And while TV ratings are harder to gauge because of streaming services, I would venture to say that most of the highest rated shows are left out of the nominations.  I think there could be an argument that some highly-rated shows and big box office hits are appealing to the lowest common demonenator and for that reason can be a bit flat artistically.  While I am open to that argument and think that it has merit, the larger problem for these awards is the fact that they tend toward the more obscure and irrelevant.  It would be different if by placing the spotlight on an obscure film that it would then become a big hit.  This would be wonderful in the case of The Green Book.  But many of the past obscure winners receive their moment in the spotlight and then fade into irrelevance.





ASSORTED MUSINGS:

-I'm glad to see my that my pick for Best Actor of the Year, Rami Malek, was honored with the Golden Globe

-Olivia Coleman is a wonderful dramatic and comedic actress.  Her work on Broadchurch alone is proof of her skill.  But The Favorite looks like a truly atrocious film.

-Even though I know it is a joke, not a fan of Christian Bale thanking Satan in his acceptance speech.

-I was very happy for the makers of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse they has some serious competition this year.  But not only is this movie a real crowd-pleaser, but it is also a truly creative artistic endeavor.

-While I wasn't a fan of the movie, I'm glad that "Shallows" won best song, just like my Catholic Skywalker Awards.

-I did not see any of the TV shows that won any awards this year.

-This year's hosts were fine, but bland.  I enjoy watching Ricky Gervais if for no other reason that I have no idea what he is going to say next.

-Seeing Dick Van Dyke made me very happy

-Oscar Nominations are January 22.  We will see how much the Globes prognosticates these nominees.







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