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Forever Donna

Somehow, I never expected to live through one year where two of pop music's greatest singers died.

Donna Summer was the lifeline of my childhood, the Queen of Disco who made the world safe for teen age gay boys yet to come out. She was beautiful, insanely talented, and she put dance music on the top of the pop charts. 

Of course she was much, much more than that. She was a stage performer. She was a survivor, one of the brightest examples of a seventies cocaine casualty rising from the ashes. She survived the "death" of disco and rode the return of dance music wave of the late eighties and early nineties back to her rightful place in pop history. 

I am blessed, in my life, to have known one of her most ardent fans, my best friend. His love became my love; his joy in her music became mine. I am chocolate... but I don't like the heat.

She was the greatest of gay stars, a career created and supported by gay men, who managed to say "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve"... and still managed to make it right in the end. It helps that, you know, she wasn't necessarily a genius... but man, could she sing. So that's mostly what she did.

People will talk about Last Dance and MacArthur Park and Dim All The Lights - the longest sustained single note in a number one song by a singer - but my two favorites are earlier and simpler. No one has, or will ever improve on "I Love You" and "Heaven Knows."

I am a dancer. I love to dance, to feel the rhythm on the dance floor. I have been dancing to Donna Summer since I was 12, and almost consistently ever since. And we will dance again to her music. And it will all be all right.

 

 

On Hookers And Secret Services

Okay... so where were we?

I've been sort of chomping at the bit to comment on various stories - Ann Romney, George Zimmerman, you name it - but nothing is quite as captivating as the scandalous non-scandal of The Secret Service in Cartagena, now, is it? (And really... Cartagena? Other than Romancing The Stone... who's ever cared about Cartagena?)

My raction to the Secret Service story hasn't changed much since it broke: so... apparently after work the agents like to drink, carouse a bit, and maybe pick up a local resident for some R&R. And that's bad... why?

I'm not trying to excuse hooking, but in my own curiously twisted thinking on sex and sexuality, it's not people paying for sex that bothers me. What bothered me, say, about the Elliot Spitzer scandal, and made it scandalous, was both the outrageous prices he paid (which was simply foolish) and the fact that being Attorney General means enforcing the laws he was breaking at that time. That's hypocrisy, and that, it strikes me, is scandalous.

(Also, going to prostitutes while married strikes me as tacky and poor moral character, but that's a separate issue.)

So here's my thing: if the Secret Service agents were, say, using counterfeit money to pay hookers... then maybe we'd have a similar case; but  drinking in bars and bringing someone home for sex doesn't strike, entirely, as a firing offense. Again, tacky, perhaps; but not quite the federal crime it's being made out to be. Indeed, I'll be curious to see if some of these attempts to discipline Secret Service employees stand up as proper for a federal employer. Is off hour behavior really fair game for the government as an employer?

In any case, there's been a lot of huffing and puffing to try and dress up what is basically a salacious exercise in peeking behind other people's bedroom curtains as somehow a major breach of national security. You can almost see the visible relief of many media organizations reporting today's triumph "hooker may have been in President's hotel!" That's, you know, serious. It's almost like, you know, she was in the President's room. Except, you know, she wasn't.

All the heavy breathing doesn't amount to much, and can't really make the agent's behavior seem much more than what it is - tawdry, mostly, with a side order of tasteless. The idea that patronizing hookers might "lead to blackmail" is an old saw that was always meant to comment more on sexual behavior than any actual threat - it's the same nonsense that was trotted out about gays during the Red Scare years, and just as dopey. It's a suggestion that sex is dirty, embarrassing, and rather than be humiliated for a peccadillo, most people would, I don't know, pay thousands and reveal state secrets. Evidence of this actually happening isn't just mostly scarce... it's basically nonexistent. It's the stuff of movie plots and bad novels one buys in airports.

More to the point, these ideas of salacious blackmail seem especially absurd in this era where people's nude photos wind up on internet websites. Shocking? Embarrassing? Does anyone even know what these words mean anymore? The small number of people actually "shocked" to discover that Secret Service agents hire hookers lead especially sheltered lives and are, in general, awfully naive (almost as naive as the people who seem to think this only happened, once, in Cartagena). There's nothing especially shocking, or possibly even embarrassing about the President's guards getting randy after hours in a foreign country. The trope that this "could lead to national security breaches" is pretty much nonsense, and most sensible people, I suspect, get that, even if they hate to admit it. Because once you admit it... then we also have to admit that this story is getting way more play than it ever deserved.

I don't think, as Americans, we'll ever get over our nosiness, our voyeuristic tendencies, or our confused notions about sex generally. That's our culture, and that's how we define who we are - simultaneously wildly open and free, and puritanical and judge-y, all at once. By all means, go overseas and go wild with the foreigners. Just don't get caught. Or we'll really be mad. And if it helps us to pretend that somehow this is crucial to our "national interests", it's just a reminder of the lengths we go to when we need to justify our prejudices. Mostly, I suspect, the excessive interest in this story is about envy. And that's never pretty. And we're lousy at hiding it.

 

Articles We Never Finished Reading: Here, There... Somewhere

Deepika Bahri, a friend and an associate professor of English at Emory University in Atlanta, where Mr. Rushdie is a distinguished writer in residence, said that Mr. Rushdie was game for interacting online with any person or subject, highbrow or low. “I don’t think it really matters to him,” Ms. Bahri said, when asked how such behavior might affect public perception. “He does not fear or have concern about what people think or what it will do to his literary reputation.”

                 - Laura Holson, "From Exile To Everywhere," The NYT, Sunday Styles (emphasis mine)

"Everywhere," it seems, refers to Manhattan nightclubs and restaurants, not frequent flights to Atlanta, where Salman Rushdie is apparently "in residence."

This one isn't a "don't bother" because of the actual piece - like most Sunday/SunGay Styles articles, sure, it deals in trivialities, but it's not as bad as, say, building a makeup line off of the villains in The Hunger Games, or treating Kim Kardashian impersonators as art. No, what made me throw this one down was the subject of the article, Rushdie himself, who still, somehow, manages to garner this kind of coverage as if anything he's done literarily is remotely relevant or important. Even when The Satanic Verses was published, earning Mr. Rushdie death threats from fundamentlaist Islam (mostly Iran), Rushdie was more social butterfly than literary light; and time spent in hiding didn't particularly help ground him much better. But even the Times article notes that whole escapade ended after about ten years, and we're a good twenty years past that. And still, Rushdie is most notable for catting around with attractive women, frequenting nightclubs and bars, and vaguely talking about writing a new series for Showtime. And the difference between him and some other guy you run into on the Hotel Gansevoort rooftop? Not much, save that Rushdie is paid absurd sums to serve as things like "Distinguished Writer", no seriously... wait for it... "In residence" at Emory in Atlanta.  

Of course, Emory is welcome to throw its money away in any way it sees fit, but I just feel bad for the actual students at Emory, who deserve better than some Page Six Publicity Monster who can't even be bothered to take terms like "in residence" seriously.  And to be even fairer, this is hardly even one of the ten top reasons I'd never take Emory seriously, either (number one: Atlanta). None of which can be blamed on the Times, though it's hard to tell just how firmly Holson is relaying all of this seirously, or tongue in cheek. In either case, I couldn't be bothered to find out how this one turns out... because the thing really seems to write itself.

Are You Ready, Tell Me Are You Ready...

I've been sick for the past three days, hence no posting.

The Whitney thing keeps washing in and out of my head... one of my regulars at the coffee shop was at the funeral and called it devastating (he also went to see Aretha Franklin that night, where she paid tribute to Whitney. Also devastating).

In any case, while I gather some strength, here's one more, one I'd almost forgotten, probably her most flat-out jazz number, a big album cut on "Quiet Storm" and "Smooth Jazz" stations after Whitney came out. I loved this one.

 

 

Saturday Singalong: And It Hurts Me More Than You Know, So Much More Than It Shows...

Because today is her funeral, and because I am still not over it:

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday Field Trip: Stalking The Queen of Louisiana

Famous people go to restaurants and eat.

I know this may surprise you, but live long enough in New York City, and you will discover that this truth makes for occasionally great people watching and also events that, in the long run, are pretty mundane. When I saw Molly Ringwald at a birthday dinner for one of her friends, I was struck by how ordinary, how simply New York she seemed. It's who we are. It's what we do.

Similarly, when my friend Jennifer and I ate a late lunch one day at Fred's, the restaurant atop Barneys on madison Avenue, we were both surprised and yet unfazed to discover we were sharing the otherwise largely empty restaurant with Chris Rock, his wife and kids. Nice, fun to share... but mostly we were there for the food (although, while the food is good - and pricey - in the end, I keep going back to Fred's because you never know who you might see).

So Friday night I got to spend a little leisure time in Manhattan, with Michael, my other red headed pal. Michael have been friends for several years, and he remains my truest connection to gay life in Chelsea and Manhattan generally. Edward, his especially stylish, and youthful, boyfriend is also a big part of my keeping up with the absolute latest.

Anyway, the three of us share generally fancy food tastes, though Michael and I also share a common love of cheap Chinese (indeed, it's kind of a litmus test for friends that we share an appropriately cheap Chinese meal), Edward will have none of it. So instead of finding a fairly fancy Asian, we decided to go with Le Grainne, a charming French bistro at 21st and 9th, where we've dined before - mainly crepes and sandwiches along with some pasta, this is one of those "little places" that's more about being known to the locals than being one of the top spots. From 23rd down, you can really find tons of these (something similar up the East side, but I find the Upper West more about trendy and less about quality).

Anyway, it was a night of lovely food and our usual outrageous and funny conversation - we share similar dark and witty senses of humor - and wonderful all on its own... but then Edward looked over and spotted Evan Rachel Wood. Now, I know enough about movie stars to be able to identify Evan Rachel Wood by name, but not really by face. But Edward pulled up her pics on his iPhone and confirmed.

Apparently, Ms. Wood is best known these days for playing the Vampire Queen of Louisiana on True Blood. 

But really, it wan't like we were stalking her, and I made Edward come away from staring at her through the side window (but really, he was just checking out her date). But it was a genuine sighting.

And she's lovely. But mostly, I think we just appreciated her good taste, as well as our own. And anyway, Ethan Hawke lives just across the street, so that really doesn't count.

Friday Field Trip: Whole Foods And PF Chang's

I tend to leave Fridays to J and his lovely pictures. It gives me a chance, among other things, to go out and do things in the world.

Yesterday, I worked early, but not a full 8 hour shift, which was a relief. Still, by early evening, I was pretty much worn out, and Mom got home too late for any early show of Midnight in Paris, the new Woody Allen film (yes, I never miss Woody Allen. Sue me). Instead, we decided to take a little field trip.

Whole Foods has been slow to expand into Westchester, which strieks me as puzzling, since the high-end grocery chain feels like a perfect fit for Westchester's large number of pampered elites. It's fittingly ironic that their initial touchdown in the county, in White Plains, was the former site of Saks Fifth Avenue, which abandoned the space when The Westchester, an upscale mall prjoect, failed to connect the store to the mall as promised (Leaving them staring at Neiman Marcus and their first arrival in the area). Saks now has no Westchester location... which is also very odd.

Lots of people - including my Mom - might think I love Whole Foods; in truth, I find them exasperating. When I first met them, still living in my Manhattan apartment, I too was blown away by the luxe-ness of the goods, the absurd prices (I don't subscribe to the "Whole Paycheck" humor, but walking out with a small grocry bag with $60 in purchases was a first), and the crowds. (One famous memory is one blizzard-y day when the line in Columbus Circle stretched through prepared foods, past the meat department, around frozen foods and back to seafood.)

By the time I moved to Boston, I tended to use Whole Foods as an occasional backup to my main shopping in more traditional grocery stores. Boston, though, is lttered with Whole Foods - one by Symphony Hall on the edge of Fenway, one in cenrral Cambridge, one by Mass General at the edge of Beacon Hill, just for starters. And their promximity to much of my everyday life made visiting them too easy and addictive.

My Mom joked last night that she could envision a lifestyle where she had the money to only shop Whole Foods. Me... I don't see the appeal. Over time, in Boston I came to realize that what the store sells, really, is a kind of snob appeal: you're not just a grocery shopper, you're smarter, hipper, and probably healthier, the stores seem to say. Whole Foods doesn't bother popular, mass produced foodstuffs of ordinary stores - no, it's all artisanal this, and farm-raised that, organic and expensive and exclusive and hard to find. I always know that, if it comes to it, I will be able to find Creme Fraiche, Clotted Cream, and fancy infused olive oil at Whole Foods. Just not, say, Diet Pepsi. Or Wheaties. And not every department opf Whole Foods can claim absolute dominance - their coffee choices, I've come to realize, are haphazard and incomplete (in part, because they've no use for Starbucks, but they also overlook good small houses like Kicking Horse).

The truth is much of what Whole Foods brought to the grocery experience - the high-end items, the hot food cafes, the luxe presentations - have been adopted widely by competitors. Those with the square footage - like Shaw's in downtown Boston at the Pru, or Stop and Shop in many of its suburban locations - have similar sit down eating spaces, luxurious produce displays, and a lot of fancy olive oil. Even so... Whole Foods continue to have them beat for sheer over-the-top indulgence. As I walked past the refrigerated case devoted to nothing nut rare German and other artisanal beers, I realized  that so mcuh of what Whole Foods offers is class confirmation - come here, and you'll know you've made it. I like to think I don't need that kind of reassurance, and I can't be had for a slice of cheese (though a bottle of infused oltve oil and some fancy tortilla chips did follow me home, inexplicably).

Afterwards, Mom and I dined at PF Chang's, a similar experience in upscale mass appeal. Chang's is a fancy chain of Asian eateries, basically, a Chinese restaurant in a sleek dress. Try as they might to dress up the concept (and they're strying a lot less, these days), Chang's is every bit the aitport hotel chain store it seems to be, with a slight Asian twist. Since the economic downturn, Chang's has had to economize a bit,and they tend to feel dingier, and less epcial, if still a slight cut above, say, Applebee's. If it weren't for my endless devotion to Chinese food, I'd have completely given up long ago.

As it is, we endured one of those silly, pointless waits these chain restaurants seem determined to deliver - forced waits with handheld joy buzzer "pagers" and the promises of tables in 20-25 minutes (we wound up at ours in less than 10). It's an artifical kind of buzz creation, mostly leaving grumpy groups and annoyed dates standing around parking lots, and since the downturn began, it just feelssilly. The demand for this kind of dining has softened tremendously, but the urge to seem "special" can't be shaken.

Still, dinner was pleasant, the food reliably good, the air conditioning a nice respite from the beginnings of clingy summer heat. And overall, not that expensive. It's a weird world where luxury comes so cheap.

Of Charlie Sheen, Has Beens, And Never Weres

Back to Charlie Sheen for a minute - or, preferably, less.

Jezebel - a/k/a Anna Holmes - slips away from her own (amazing) home to pen an op-ed for the New York Times, making the valuable point that the less discussed aspect of the Charlie Seen story is actually his penchant for violence against his female partners; Sheen has been charged a number of times in a number of incidetns relating to pretty much all of his girlfriends and ex-wives (remember, both Brooke Mueller and Denise Richards have sworn out orders of protection against him at various points, Mueller's resulting in her sons being taken, last week, from Sheen's home, where he is now living with two other women).

Holmes goes on to link Sheen's behavior to our societal perceptions of women, especially women seen as prostitutes, pornstars, or sexually loose. Anyone familiar with discussions of Rape Culture will find this familiar, and in some ways it's great to see this brought forward in public consciousness. But along the way, Holmes makes an assertion that I think deserves some consideration and pushback:

The privilege afforded wealthy white men like Charlie Sheen may not be a particularly new point, but it’s an important one nonetheless. Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears are endlessly derided for their extracurricular meltdowns and lack of professionalism on set; the R&B star Chris Brown was made a veritable pariah after beating up his equally, if not more, famous girlfriend, the singer Rihanna. Their careers have all suffered, and understandably so.

This hasn’t been the case with Mr. Sheen, whose behavior has been repeatedly and affectionately dismissed as the antics of a “bad boy” (see: any news article in the past 20 years), a “rock star” (see: Piers Morgan, again) and a “rebel” (see: Andrea Canning’s “20/20” interview on Tuesday). He has in essence, achieved a sort of folk-hero status; on Wednesday, his just-created Twitter account hit a million followers, setting a Guinness World Record.

Holmes works hard to make Sheen seem especially successful and unbowed by previous scandals and problems, both in the above paragraphs and a previous one, where she points out that Sheen is the highest paid actor on television right now (I don't entirely buy it, but it is true that most other hit shows are ensemble efforts). This, she says, makes him different from Chris Brown as well as Lohan and Spears, because their careers suffered.

All of which made me wonder... just who took a close look at Charlie Sheen's career?

The King Without His Sword! The Land Without A King! A World Without Dior!

There's shocking news... and then there's just, well, genuine shock: no one, certainly no one in fashion could have imagined that today is the first day of a world without John Galliano at Christian Dior.

In the midst of fall fashion shows - especially with the Paris Pret a Porter shows for autumn starting yesterday - news this shocking just doesn't happen. Bad designers come and go. Houses go bankrupt. Collections don't work. But the King of all that is fashion does not just vanish in the middle of the night.

What has rapidly unfolded is basically this: John Galliano was arrested last week for an altercation at a bar in the Marais section of Paris, where he lives. He apparently got into an altercation with a couple, apparently tourists, and may have made an antisemitic remark to the woman (or, according to some reports, he insulted her handbag. I mean, it's not impossible). In any case, Galliano was then suspended from his role as head designer at Dior, throwing a great deal of chaos into Dior's upcoming fall show. But that seemed manageable.

Yesterday, video surfaced at a British tabloid (Galliano is English) of Galliano, in the same bar in the Marais where the altercation took place, making favorable comments about Hitler (Hitler!) and what happened during the Holocaust. It was pretty much a matter of hours before Dior announced that Galliano had been immediately fired, but not before Natalie Portman, who is the new face of perfume Miss Dior Cherie - and Jewish - denounced Galliano and said she would not be associated with him in any way.

"Mind boggling" doesn't begin to describe this turn of events. Galliano has, almost single handedly, been the guiding light for fashion's most dramatic, over the top possibilities. His Dior couture shows, season after season, have been almost instantly legendary. Even his ready to wear shows have been assured, stylish extravaganzas of styles and ideas that demand attention and set the tone for the season. He took the House of Dior - once considered sad and staid after the death of Monsieur Dior - and turned it into an enormously profitable and successful powerhouse (whether his couture line actually makes a profit is another issue altogether). Galliano is a visionary, but one who never lost sight that the real money in designer fashion is in the accessories that the masses can afford - the bags and fragrances and eyewear and makeup that account for most sales.

Whether Galliano is actually gone is still somewhat up in the air - he's apparently hired lawyers and will fight his dismissal, and French labor laws do protect workers from a lot more than American workers... but it's hard to see this working out with Galliano back at the helm of Dior; even if, as reported, he's now headed off to rehab. Indeed, along the lines of Charlie Sheen, one of the other interesting aspects of this story is that Galliano's been rumored to have a drug and alcohol problem for years, but as with Hollywood, the fashion world is loath to actually make such stories public (this, even after years and years of high profile meltdowns, most recently embodied in Donatella Versace and Marc Jacobs). There's a decided component of the creative world which insists on a separate, dangerous standard for the especially creative, ignoring destructive behavior and excusing addiction as some sort of necessary "mind expansion." It really is possible to be highly creative... and highly sober.

No one can, or should, try to defend Galliano; this is just a shocking, unexpected turn. I've been in the same room as Galliano, my friend Jennifer recently met him in Paris, and boht of us feel the shock of people who've known him for years - this just doesn't seem to fit the man we've seen, the man they know. And the idea of a World of Fashion that doesn't have Christian Dior, designed by John Galliano is just unimaginable. This is a seismic shift where one can say, breathlessly, that this does literally change everything. The land without a King! A world without Dior! Bring me a fainting couch!

The Oscars: My Super Bowl Sunday, Even When The Game Is Lousy

As I put on my sweatshirt and trackies this morning, I realized that this is my Super Bowl Sunday, making my trip to this year's party, you know, like going to a Super Bowl party.

That's why, this year... I'm bringing dip. :)

Football fans will tell you that the Super Bowl matters, even when the teams suck, or the game is lousy; that's how I feel this year. The films are bad, the nominations are weak... but regardless, here we are. And so... let the games begin.

This was not a banner year for feature films, receipts were modestly up, but mostly driven by the extra income from 3D (have you paid $15 a seat yet?), and there were few real breakout hits. And there was a distinct segmenting of the film calendar which really helped no film - except possibly Toy Story 3 - break free of expectations. Last winter was full of dogs, last summer full of "tent poles" and last fall was full of the films that are supposed to be "class" projects, helpfully informing us as to which ones deserved to be seen as the Oscar contenders.

Rather than pick winners in categories - so much of it this year is foregone conclusions - I'll just break down my thoughts on this year's Oscars by the sorriest category of all: the ten nominees for Best Picture (yes, I too believe that's five too many), which, I think, do tend to sum up just how horrifying this past year was in film.

By the way, I won't lie to you - I haven't bothered seeing all of the nominees. There's really only so much punishment I am willing to endure.

Black Swan - Is it an art house film? A big budget star picture? Can you be both at once? I've rarely heard about a more grim filmgoing experience that still got billed as so essential. Time will tell if the sense of Natalie Portman's impressiveness holds up... but I tend to think that even now, it's becoming clear that her talents may have been oversold. From the only sort of enthusiastic response to her shoo-in campaign to the lackluster response to much of her other output (and coming to the conlcusion that she's the worst thing in No Strings Attached, by far), I think Portman, like Gwyneth Paltrow (and arguably Hallie Berry) before her, will be lucky to have grabbed the trophy early on, before her work catches up to her (and then too... look how Country Strong fizzled despite endless flogging by Paltrow and others). No one expects Black Swan to pick up awards for anything but Portman, making it as much a "share the wealth" award as a "she's the best thing in it" response. Either way, not exactly a ringing endorsement of the film's excellence.

The Fighter - Nothing, perhaps, speaks as plainly to The Fighter's flaws as the failure of Mark Wahlberg to get any of the Oscar credit that's rained down on this film. Plainly, this is Wahlberg's Rocky, an attempt to jolt his peers into taking him seriously in a feel good role as a working class hero. Of course, the Academy already fell for that... with Rocky.  It's also gotten more than a little tiring to see a string of Boston-based talent - many named Wahlberg, more named Affleck - mine the obvious Dorchester/Charlestown/Southie gimmick (which Martin Scorsese used to gloss up his lackluster remake of Infernal Affairs, The Depahted) for easy plaudits. We get it - it's fun to slum around as a hard talking, hard drinking, scrappy ethnic. The Fighter too has no shot at winning, but will probably score Supporting awards for Melissa Leo and Christian Bale (both of whom are basically being rewarded for other, better work previously). And its success at the box office probably means the Southie film has yet to fully run its course. But let's hope that trend ends soon.

Inception - I've now watched enough Christopher Nolan films to see both why he gets the cred he does (especially with geeky fanboys) and why he is at the same time not quite getting recognition at awards time. Both of the Batman films, and now Inception, show a striking visual sense, but put story and character development second (having finally seen The Dark Knight, I have no idea what Heath Ledger was doing, but it was both disturbing and fascinating to watch - none of which made the film more coherent or less of a grim downer). I suspect Nolan's going to keep having a hard time closing the deal until he puts more focus on story and character insight. Then, too, I think part of the puzzling sense that Inception wasn't quite all it could be is the continued, baffling lauding of the perfectly ordinary presence of Leonardo DiCaprio, who has come nowhere near the potential he showed as a young man, partly because he seems intent on throwing himself into these vast, bloated efforts (Titanic, The Departed...they're big, yet he's still small). DiCaprio too would be well served getting out of the bloated high class film business, and try a small film with a director who would push him to really act.

The Kids Are Alright - I'm all for gay parenting; I'm less in favor of feel good efforts meant to pat liberals on the back for being open minded and PC. Too pleased with itself, celebrated by audiences also a little too pleased with themselves, The Kids Are Alright takes a fairly bland premise - test tube kids discovering who their anonymous donor father was - and really doesn't take it much farther than that, to reconfirm familar tropes about families and bonding that we all already knew. I think that makes for a fine afternoon at the multiplex... I don't think it makes it brave, daring, riasky, or the kind of work that needs an Academy Award. Nevertheless, it will be wonderful if, for once, the Academy would recognize Annette Bening as the incredible actress she is, before it's too late (on the other hand, Bening is one of those actresses for whom I'm sure it will never be too late).

The King's Speech - In a lackluster year, it's no surprise that a tony British import rules the field. From the minute the trailer for this film started running, "Oscar nominations" was a foregone conclusion. And, more or less, everything has gone according to plan, which is why The King's Speech sits with a good chance of taking home Best Picture. It also stands a near perfect chance for Colin Firth getting Best Actor, but his win will also reflect his losing last year for A Single Man, which was arguably more of a stretch. I don't begrudge Firth - he's due, overdue really, and a very likable talent - but The King's Speech is much like The Queen (it is, after all, about her parents), in being a fairly respectful, almost kissy suck-up to the Monarchy and British royalism... not necessarily things we want to laud too heavily. The difference, really, is that The Queen faced much healthier competition. The King's Speech stands tall in especially weak field.

127 Hours - Nothing defines "peaked too soon" this year like this intense turnoff; had it shown up in limited release on Christmas Day and gradually expanded last month, I suspect we'd be having a much more robust conversation about whether James Franco could upset Colin Firth's royal progress. As it is, too many people figured out too fast that a film about a man who cuts off his own arm is both horrific and a downer, however well realized and visually stimulating. I'm not one for the "cult of Franco" these days (though I am dying to see Howl), but I think he's on track to be a contender for future Best Actor nods. But the fact that this film slipped into the Best Picture nominees even after interest in it waned is a good example of why ten nominees is really doing nothing to improve the qualitative expectations at Awards time.

The Social Network - Probably the best example of a film this year that didn't really manage to live up to its prerelease "class project" hype; the film seems to be entertaining enough and the performers are engaging... but billing itself as the definitive and full examination of the online social networking craze was probably a mistake. Aaron Sorkin is really no one's example of a tech savvy writer, and his script more or less does what Sorkin scripts do - witty, fairly urbane talky verbiage that seem to make smart points, but afterwards seem little more than frothy examples of semi seriousness (really, go back and watch A Few Good Men. It's great... and about as deep as a puddle). At best, this film served to explain to older folks a lot of what they wanted to hear about the hotshots of Silicon Valley - that they're young, too rich too soon, and kind of shallow. And those qualities certainly would be well represented by the likes of Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake (who, one could note, seems to have disappeared the minute his own performance started getting overlooked at awards shows). I'm not a big fan of David Fincher's chilly visual style, so I don't see him winning (and he could really use some lessons in finding likable characters to populate his stories), but if not now... when? His chances don't get better against superior competitors.

Toy Story 3 - The other story of the "ten nominee" decision is that it has allowed the Academy, finally, to throw a sop to the animated film community, despite a lingering impression - and that's since Snow White that it's lingered - that animated films aren't serious contenders. Toy Story stands no more chance of winning than other previous nominees, nor should it, necessarily (I said it was a lingering impression; I didn't say they were wrong about it). Nor is Toy Story 3 necessarily even the best aniimated film this year, having seen The Illusionist and having been thoroughly charmed. And I'm not sure that when an animated film does win Best Picture - and I'll admit that one day they will - that Pixar will be the studio producing it.There, I said it.

True Grit - It's equally indicative of how lackluster this year is that this remake of John Wayne's Oscar winning performance both managed to limp into contention and be almost immediately dismissed. Sure, nearly everyone attached to it has already won an Oscar, but in a better year, either other films would have crowded it out or forced everyone attached it to work harder to have it get noticed. As it is, the nominations for it seem rote - even, and especially, Hailee Steinfeld's - and it could quite possibly walk away with nothing. Thank goodness we can nominate ten Best Pictures!

Winter's Bone - An also-ran in almost any year, Winter's Bone is also a good indication of how the small art house film has also been corrupted by the current way Oscar mania plays out. This fairly small, good for what it is film can't possibly bear the weight of expectation attached to its nominations and outsized attention. It's indicative that this, alone, amounts to the only film about people in poverty anywhere near contention this year. But the story is fairly slight, the resolution inventive but a little obvious, and things are tied a little too neatly in a bow at the end. Jennifer Lawrence - much like Melissa Leo - has laid the groundwork for future consideration, though I'm hard pressed to exactly describe a memorable moment she creates. Like several films on this list, Winter's Bone would look better and start more of a conversation if what's around it seemed better or more interesting. As it is, the film is somewhat better executed (for a film of its size) than much of its competition... and that's about it.

Other notes: I'm mystified by the nominations for Biutiful and even more so Javier Bardem. I think Blue Valentine was vastly overhyped, and I'm surprised that a number of other so-so projects (most notably Tilda Swinton and I am Love), didn't get more of an Academy embrace. But mostly, right now, I think too much of the whole Awards season process is too rote and tooo foreordained. And that won't change until Academy voters stop acting like sheep, or a surprise film breaks through. And neither scenario seems liekly to happen soon.