i HATE the grammys and fear the Oscars will turn into it

"Grammy asshole weekend in LA. Yuck... The Grammys = the old guard / old media propping up their puppets trying to convince the outside world (and each other) they're relevant."

those words are trent reznor as said on his twitter account and i totally completely agree.

the grammys by their very nature are a giant disappointment. the goal of the grammys is to showcase and award the best of music in the american market. this is of course the most cutting edge, innovative, and daring sonic interlays on radio airwaves today. or they will just give a bunch of statues to black eye peas, who dont so much write songs as they do put loud thumping noises together with a single phrase and taylor swift, who actually might be carrie underwood? um....the second one?

of course the grammys are a total joke. the fact that a major award went to kings of leon which everyone who knows music feel haven't been really good since a-ha heartbreak (or whatever it was called). the grammys are basically the same award ceremony as the people's choice awards, american music awards, billboard music awards, just to name a few. its another excuse for the same crop of mediocre music that sells a lot of copies to get on TV.

one only needs to look at the incredibly condescending, 'best alternative album' category to truly appreciate the ridiculousness of the farce. phoenix won. good. they were up against a death cab for cutie EP, the new depeche mode album, yeah yeah yeahs, and david byrne/brian eno. right. bryne/eno -- who talked about this album? they are legends but it did not make waves. yeah yeah yeahs its blitz was definitely a great album and deserved the spot in a year that didn't include breakthrough albums, commercially and critically by animal collective and grizzly bear. depeche mode's new album was pretty much shrugged off with a giant 'meh' (i love depeche mode but this album was not very good and playing the angel was a way better album by far). also, this wasn't a 'alternative' album but closer to electronic or even dance. in fact, neither was the byrne/eno album. finally, death cab for cutie's open door EP was really good. in fact, i liked it more than the tepid narrow stairs album (which was nominated for a grammy, their first) but i refuse to accept that there were no other full albums that could fill the bill.

i complain about this every year but every time someone says that the oscars needs to be like the grammys, and that people are sick of movies that didnt make a billion dollars winning best picture-i want to bite their face.

what is best isn't always what is most popular. in fact, it usually never is.

the grammys maybe at one point was relevant but now, its just an excuse to be a more family friendly MTV music awards which is way more about the show than the actual awards.

the oscars i feel will eventually go down this road and we will see quality all around brilliant films like the hurt locker getting nudged out for GI Part 4: The Quest for Unbridled Merchandising. i think if avatar wins best picture this journey will be accelerated.

avatar is not the kind of movie that wins best picture. it is the kind of movie that wins every technical award but nothing that involves rewarding story structure. a film like the hurt locker excels in every single area of celluloid. it is thought provoking, well acted, directed, and is destined to be included in lists of important films from a critical standpoint.

avatar is like the matrix. its a game changer and the kind of movie that changes the way popular films are made. popular? yes. good? yeah. oscar worthy? no. Anyone out there who thinks the Matrix should have won Best Picture should stop reading or send me hate mail.

just listen to grizzly bear's two weeks and get lost in the subtle sweeps of the beautiful harmonies and chorus. experience the well crafted technical musicianship and the unique and subtle lyrics. then listen to the black eye peas boom boom pow. what does that even mean? what is it trying to say? one is made for people who love hearing something cutting edge yet accessible and beautiful. the other is made for folks to dance to. nothing wrong with that but not deserving of the highest musical honor america has to offer.

• Boom Boom Pow by Black Eyed Peas

More Black Eyed Peas music on iLike

LETS GET AVATAR-DED!

AVATAR! 3D! AWESOME! WOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

now that i got that out of system, i would like to welcome people back to mise en meh. ive been a little quiet since my ten megawatt list that took most of my christmas break from me. during that time i was writing i was watching A LOT of movies. i will resume the recent watching feature soon but for now i want to talk about avatar.

i saw it last week in a HUGE IMAX. as far as IMAXs go, this was a big one and of course it was in 3D.

i winced quite a bit during the movie. in fact, during each of the stupid navi dancing sequences, my wife and i were downright LOLing at the ridiculousness of it.

'silly navi. its going to take more than that to save ripley!'

before i start talking about what i liked in this awesome awful film, ill talk about the badness. going into avatar, i had heard a lot of things on this movie.

@secretcristina said it was about 'blue cats living in an internet tree'

@radmike likened to ferngully as did hitler

this is my favorite hitler video btw...but that is for another blogspot.

yes avatar was incredibly stupid. the plot was nothing new and downright silly with predictable turns, clear good and evil, and a lot of cinematic pilfering (the final battle between jake sully and the evil military guy reminded me a lot of the final battle scene in iron man). frankly, hitler is right and sam worthington is awful. REALLY awful. his acting is laughably mad and is frequently outacted by anything remotely on screen. in fact, signourey weaver really phones it in too and you have to wonder if any of the flesh actors were too distracted by the awesomeness of pandora to actually concentrate on acting.

but again, this movie is not about humans.

the world of pandora was the most amazing thing ive ever seen. floating mountains!? YEAH! crazy dog things!? WHOA! FERNGULLY RE-IMAGINED! FUCK YES!! i never wanted to leave the magical land of pandora and every moment in this world was so frickin' cool.

this is a game changer. much like the matrix did with action sequences, avatar made 3D movies with motion capture characters look silly. if you compare the navi with any of the characters in the zemekis trilogy of mediocre to attrocious IMAX films (polar express, beowolf, christmas carol), the navi reign and everything else looks silly.

a coworker of mine was comparing the 3D in avatar to beowolf. in the latter, characters would take out a weapon and seem to say something, 'look at my sword in 3D! it is totally in 3D! is this not blowing your mind!' or 'im going to swing a stein of ale and bits of red shit is going to come FLYING out at you because its 3D! ISNT THIS AWESOME!' with avatar, 'here are some floating mountains. it is impossible to picture these in 2D because this is a real place and these are really some floating mountains.'

avatar should NOT have won the golden globe for best drama. that should have went to hurt locker which should win the oscar as well. avatar was an outstanding cool film that will change the course of action films from now on. it is NOT a best picture. the story and the acting were passable to downright abysmal. cameron should get a best picture nod of course and possibly win but this film should not take away best picture honors from hurt locker, a brilliant, impressive, smart, understated, and all around excellent film. the hurt locker doesnt have weak points and will change the way hollywood will make movies about contemporary war.

next up for avatar is a sequel and maybe jimmy cameron should borrow the wachowskis to put in some cool bullet effects. that would be SWEET. seriously jim, i cant wait ten years to go back to pandora. i want to see some of those faraway lands referenced and maybe see the internet tree again.