• Nikki Finke chats with Relativity Media honcho Ryan Kavanaugh. [Deadline]
• Gregory Ellwood thinks Melissa Leo flushed her chances at an Oscar down the drain. [Awards Campaign]
• Melena Ryzik catches up with “Waste Land” director Lucy Walker. (Oscar Guide on documentary features coming tomorrow.) [The Carpetbagger]
I didn’t see the Grammys this weekend. In fact, I tend to avoid them like the plague. But it was nevertheless an impressive slate of winners, so that’s a unique start.
In any case, it’s worth pointing out that Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett’s “The Weary Kind” wrapped up a long awards march by taking the award for Best Song Written for Motion Picture, Television, or Other Visual Media. So add that to a list of accolades that includes an Oscar, a Golden Globe, a Critic’s Choice Movie Award, and the Americana Music Association “Song of the Year” honor. A great ride indeed.
“It’s incredible,” Bingham said to press backstage at the Grammys. “It’s been a hell of a ride. All this stuff flies by so fast and happens so quick. Afterward you look back on it, let it soak in, and see what it’s all about.”
As the music world celebrated the general awesomeness that is Taylor Swift last night, Oscar-minded Hollywood couldn’t resist infringing on the proceedings slightly. When Jeff Bridges even crops up at the Grammy Awards (to introduce a Les Paul tribute), you just know that he’s this year’s chosen one.
Bridges at least acquitted himself with dignity, something that sadly couldn’t be said for another Oscar hopeful, Quentin Tarantino, who came dressed (to steal blatantly from Joe Reid) as “Retired in Miami Elvis” and pimped his movie in a hopped-up intro to a Lil’ Wayne performance. To be fair, however, he was present as a nominee, though “Inglourious Basterds” lost the Best Compilation Soundtrack award to “Slumdog Millionaire.”
Yes, last year’s Oscar champ isn’t done winning awards yet, as “Jai Ho” also beat Bruce Springsteen and Karen O to the Best Film/TV Song award.
I’m always interested to see what cinematic musical achievements the Grammy Awards single out for recognition each year, largely because their pop sensibilities are so different (and their eligibility criteria so much looser) from those of the Oscars that they may as well exist on different planets.
Last year, for example, they selected “The Dark Knight” as the year’s best score, though it didn’t manage a nomination from the Academy. A similar shaming shows up this year, as the Grammys show the respect for Bruce Springsteen’s “The Wrestler” theme that the Academy’s music branch did not.
An earlier cut-off date means a few late-2008 titles show up here, including “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “Milk,” “Slumdog Millionaire” and “Cadillac Records” — a song from the latter counting for one of Beyonce’s field-leading 10 nominations, incidentally. (I won’t even say anything about the non film-related categories.)
The Academy’s petty disqualification of Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard’s score for “The Dark Knight” from Oscar contention has already caused much gnashing of teeth on these pages, so here’s something to compound the embarrassment.
It seems the Grammy voters are rather less fussy. Zimmer and Howard’s work was nominated yesterday in the category of (deep breath now) Best Score Soundtrack Album For Motion Picture, Television Or Other Visual Media. (Still with me? Good.)
And hey, look who joins them on the list: none other than Jonny Greenwood for “There Will Be Blood,” who of course won last year’s Oscar because the work was simply too groundbreaking to be ignored. Oh right, except he didn’t, because he was disqualified. Sensing a pattern here?
We shouldn’t be surprised by now that a voting body unrelated to the field of film should exhibit more common sense than AMPAS’ music blue-hairs, but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating.
Joining Greenwood, Zimmer and Howard on the list are three more 2008 contenders, Thomas Newman for “WALL-E,” Ramin Djawadi (surprise!) for “Iron Man” and John Williams (yawn) for “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.”