“…and the Oscar goes to…”

Well my tiara is polished, my favorite gown is steamed, and I am ready for the Academy Awards. Not that I’ve been nominated, or even invited, but you never know, a girl has to be ready. If my 98-year-old grandmother can score an invitation (like she did three years ago) not only to the Awards, but to the Vanity Fair after-party, I have to hold out hope that it can happen for me. I can promise you that I will not be so worn out from the flight that I will sleep through the entire experience, as she did. Anyway, I’ve spent the better part of the last month seeing all the nominated movies so I know what I’m talking about when I bash a performance or cry out at the injustice of it all when the wrong movie wins, whether I’m sitting in the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, or in front of my own television. Meanwhile, in the coming days and weeks all the movie critics will be chiming in with their predictions for this year’s Oscars, so in the friendly spirit of competition, I would like to offer my own predictions and comments for some special categories that may not be mentioned in the broadcast.

Let’s start with the obvious, “Best Looking Guy in a Leading Role.” You might be surprised that I am not going with my true love, Leonardo DeCaprio, whose stunning good looks and winning personality I can honestly vouch for because I have actually had a conversation with him in person (don’t be jealous…well, okay, actually you should be) and let me tell you the man is BEAUTIFUL, but honest to god his movie “Inception” was painful to watch; and I admit that Ryan Gosling is extremely cute in “Blue Valentine,” but my award goes to James Franco in “127 Hours.” My friend Rusty put it best when she said, “I love his teeth,” and I haven’t seen anyone else look quite so good while chopping off a part of their body.

Next we move on to, “Best Body for a Woman in a Leading or Supporting Role.” Clearly the only competition here is between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis in “Black Swan.” And as I don’t know too much about Mila, I’m going with Natalie because she had to lose 20 pounds for the role, and now she’s pregnant and that body is gone FOREVER.

While we are on the topic of “Black Swan” we might as well jump ahead to my next category, “Best Lesbian Scene” and the winner here is clearly Mila and Natalie, although Natalie gave Mila a run for her money in the masturbation scene. Hats off to Mila for not being shy with the rug munching. I just hope the girls were using their dental dams. You might be thinking, “D. Parker, why not give this one to Annette Benning and Julianne Moore in “The Kids Are Alright?” Sure, a movie about lesbians should warrant the prize for “Best Lesbian Scene,” but I’m still bothered by the fact that the ladies were getting it on while they were watching man-on-man porn, and no matter how many real-life lesbians I ask to explain that to me, none of them can.

While we are on the topic of porn, let’s move along to my next category, “Movie Most Likely to Almost Be Porn.” Here I’d like to just offer a comment on the sex that is in the movies lately: not much is left to the imagination, and the rated R of today must be the NR of yesterday. Ryan Gosling and Michele Williams have great on-screen chemistry in my opinion, and man, the sex scenes were pretty graphic. Plus, I heard they had to edit out quite a bit to get that R rating. I can only imagine. Yikes. Oscar goes to “Blue Valentine.”

My next category is new for this year, “Best Part of the Body to Be Amputated in a Feature Film.” Obviously the Forearm gets the Oscar for this, as it’s lost to a snakebite on a 14-year-old girl in “True Grit” and to a boulder in “127 Hours.” A shout-out to the Coen brothers for not making us watch the amputation, Danny Boyle gave us quite the eyeful, thank you very much.

In the interest of equal time I feel it’s only fair to recognize the movie with the most physically unattractive characters, since I’ve awarded the movies with the most attractive characters. So my Oscar for the “Movie with the Ugliest Actors” goes to “The Fighter.” Certainly not in reference to Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale or Amy Adams, although I give Amy a lot of credit for looking so “natural” and Christian for looking like a real dirt bag. My Oscar goes to the pack of homely ladies who played the sisters. Come on!! They were the ugliest bunch I haven’t seen since I graduated high school! And I’m not giving all the credit to the wardrobe department or the hair and makeup people, stellar jobs they all did, no doubt: the giant pouf hair with bad roots, the mom jeans….brilliant, really brilliant. But those were some homely ladies and I’m pretty sure one of them was a flat out midget, unless she also had her forearms amputated. I don’t know if Marky Mark intended for those sisters to be laugh-out-loud funny, but I thought they were and god bless them if they are actual actors, I can’t imagine them ever getting signed for another serious job. What will be very interesting is seeing them all on the Red Carpet and what kind of job their stylists and makeup artists can put out for that occasion. Maybe I’ll eat my words. I hope so, for their sake. Poor things.

And now my last Oscar for “Worst Movie That I Wanted to Love” goes to Golden Globe nominee, “The Tourist.” So so sad. Johnny, Angelina, Venice, Paris….how could it all go so horribly wrong?? Oh, but it do. First of all, Johnny looks all puffy like he’s retaining water. Second of all, they have about as much chemistry together as two pieces of dead wood. And lastly the stupid scenes are put together so poorly that the viewer finds herself hung up on things like, “Why is Angelina still wearing the same sweater she had on the day before?” “Why is it suddenly daytime?” “Why do the backdrops look so fake?” and “Why did I waste $8.50 on this piece of crap movie?”

If you haven’t seen anything good since “The Social Network,” you still have time. And if you can get to a matinee before noon on a weekday, it’s like only six bucks. Get out there and see some movies, and I’ll see you all on the Red Carpet.