David Pierdomenico
In recent years, the Golden Globes have struggled to find there place amidst award season. Between inviting Ricky Gervais back several times to host/roast the guests, as well as accusations of corruption among voters simply wanting to nominate celebrities they like, the event has had its issues. However, it seems that they’ve found just the right balance of humor, respect, and poignancy starting with this year. So let’s take a look at the winners and losers of the 76th Golden Globe Awards:
Winner – Comic Book Films
To be fair, no one actually expected Black Panther to win Best Picture – Drama, but it was still a pretty big deal that it was nominated. The genre has come a long way from being relegated to the “stuff of children”. And while it’s currently dominating at the box office, award show recognition has usually eluded such films…until now. With the nomination of Black Panther, as well as the well-deserved Best Animated Feature win for Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse, the genre has taken two more steps in the right direction towards prestige!
Loser – Sharp, Witty Humor
Not every single comedy necessarily needs to be subversive or satirical in its approach, but it goes a long way. While Christian Bale won for his complete immersion into playing Dick Cheyney (and even thanked Satan for inspiration!), Vice itself failed to win any of the other five categories for which it was nominated, including Best Picture, Director, and Screenplay. The Hollywood Foreign Press saw fit to award the much more wholesome and friendly Green Book, over the sharp political and social satire of Vice. And as much as Michael Douglas is a brilliant actor, it was very surprising to see him win Best Actor in a TV Comedy over Sacha Baron Cohen in Who Is America? Cohen accomplished the amazing of feat of staying in character while improvising with unsuspecting people who didn’t even realize he was acting. If that’s not enough to win the award, what is?!
Winner – True Story Music Drama
Rami Malek’s performance as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody is nothing short of amazing. Actors are always put under more scrutiny when playing a real person; especially one as beloved as Mercury, and Malek gets it just right. He nails the accent, the mannerisms, and even the iconic singing voice. However, it’s debatable whether the film itself deserved Best Picture – Drama. It has a spectacular performance by Malek but plot-wise it just feels like a montage of Queen’s greatest hits and highlights rather than a real in depth look at the life of Freddie Mercury. This doesn’t make it a bad film by any means, but perhaps it means that others deserved the coveted prize more.
Loser – Fictional Music Drama
As Bohemian Rhapsody was honored with multiple important awards, A Star is Born had to settle for just Best Original Song. And the sad fact is, from a filmmaking standpoint, it’s a much better film. It takes its audience on an emotional ride, experiencing joy, humor, inspiration, tension, and tragedy, all in one film. But when going up against another music based film, dealing with one of the most famous bands in history, it’s no surprise why this film was overlooked. Perhaps it was taken less seriously by the Hollywood Foreign Press voters precisely because it’s a fictional story. Either way, A Star is Born deserved more!
Winner – The Hosts
What started as a semi awkward opening monologue turned into a decently funny hosting job by Andy Samberg and Sandra Oh. They had good chemistry and found ways to make the audience laugh without resorting to straight up roasting them with cringe-worthy jokes like Ricky Gervais had done before. Not that there’s anything wrong with his style of comedy, but it seems like a mean spirited sense of humor no longer blends with Hollywood award shows, for better or worse. The pair took a more quirky approach, trolling the audience by introducing a montage of inspiring Golden Globes clips, only to show footage of them winning in the past. Plus, Sandra Oh had the distinct honor of hosting and winning an award herself; which is sort of like having one’s cake and eating it too.
Loser – The Music Cues
Ever since the award shows were televised, the networks airing them have been pressured to keep the runtime down. And for many, the most effective strategy is using instrumental music to signal to winners to wrap up their acceptance speeches. On this night however, many winners kept talking right through and music and it would often go silent, thus allowing them to continue their speech. It was a great triumph for artists over corporate control!
Winner – Netflix
Once again Netflix is proving their legitimacy in an ever changing arena of entertainment. There was a time that many considered their original programming to not be as valid, due it to it not “airing” on a TV network. The same was said about their films, which usually only saw a brief limited release, just to be put on streaming immediately after. But with Netflix’s Roma winning best Director and Best Foreign Language Film, it’s a huge step for their original films. That, along with the internet losing its mind over Bird Box demonstrates that Netflix may become a big player in film as well as television. In addition their series The Kominksy Method scored wins for Best TV Comedy and Best TV Actor Comedy (Michael Douglas)!
Loser – NBC and other Networks
As streaming and premium channels rise, the networks of old must fall. Years ago ABC, CBS, and NBC dominated the landscape of Golden Globe nominations and wins. And now the only claim to fame they have is the fact that NBC’s The Good Place was nominated for Best TV Comedy and it didn’t even win. We may very well be on the verge of a precipice in which the networks cease to exist and everyone consumes their TV via internet streaming or online subscriptions to premium channels.
Winner – Diversity
The biggest winner of the night however was diversity itself, in more ways than one. We saw diversity of genre with comic book films being nominated and winning. We saw wins from performers of African American, Latino, and Asian heritage. The most remarkable thing we saw however was a pledge made by Regina King after winning Best Supporting Actress for If Beale Street Could Talk. King vowed that for any future project that she produces, she will ensure that half of the crew and staff is made up of women, thus reflecting the true diversity and demographics of the population. Hopefully this pledge inspires others to do the same, and prevents the rampant abuse of power that made it necessary for the entire Time’s Up and Me Too movements.
What was your favorite moment of the show? Who do you think deserved to win but didn’t? Who you do you think didn’t deserve to win but did? Tell us in the comments below!
