Oskie Boy

I avoided the Oscars tonight as much as possible, only watching the last four awards, which were all completely unsurprising. I don't really care, so I can't get but so worked up, but Carey Mulligan and Meryl Streep were both better in their respective movies than Sandra Bullock was in hers. If we're giving out Oscars for performances relative to their careers, then John Travolta deserves one every year because of Battlefield Earth.

I spent the Oscars watching Gonzaga beat Loyola Marymount in the WCC semifinals and Oral Roberts outlast North Dakota State in overtime in the Summit League quarterfinals (I had to watch that one online). I also saw Northern Iowa today for the first time this year. They are legit. They defend, they have size, they shoot very well from long distance, they go ten deep. If you don't count New Mexico as a mid-major, then there are three excellent mid-major teams this year with Gonzaga, Northern Iowa, and Butler. All three are very capable of going Sweet 16.

What Time Is It? Game Time!

The best sports week of the year has arrived as Championship Week began in earnest today. Cornell had previously qualified for the NCAA tournament because the Ivy League does not have a conference tournament, but three bids were up for grabs. Even though I was out all day, I taped all three of the games and watched significant portions of them tonight. I love Championship Week. Here's who made it in today:

Big South: Winthrop

• What they do well: This isn't the very good Winthrop team of 2007 that advanced a game as an 11-seed. They play solid defense and they have two relatively good point guards. Otherwise, they never seem to get to the gym too late for a game, which is admirable.
• Cinderella Watch (out of 10): 0. Too good to make the play-in game (also they're not an HBCU so they're ineligible), but likely to be a 16-seed. See ya.

Atlantic Sun: East Tennessee State

• What they do well: Score. They run and attack the rim.
• Cinderella Watch (out of 10): 0. As the 5-seed in their conference tourney, they have an outside shot of getting into the play-in game. Their 20-14 record may be too good for that, though. They'll be a 16-seed either way.

Ohio Valley Conference: Murray State

• What they do well: They play tight defense, have some big men down low, and they spread their scoring around. They have five players that average between 10.2 and 10.6 points per game and another that averages 9.5. They also win, with a 30-4 record, 17-1 in conference (the only loss came at Morehead State, who they beat fairly easily tonight, in the second to last game of the regular season).
• Cinderella Watch (out of 10): 2. They will be a 13- or 14-seed and with a relatively weak field this year, there's a chance for some big upsets. Early in the season, they only lost by 5 at California, the Pac-10 regular season champ. Am I telling you to pick Murray State next Sunday? Hell, no. But if they're matched up against an up-and-down team like Tennessee (who Joe Lunardi has them playing) in the first round and the opponent has an off-night?

Coming up tomorrow, it's mid-major time. Two of the best mid-majors in the country hit the court as Northern Iowa plays in the Missouri Valley Conference championship game (the only such game of the day) and Gonzaga plays in the West Coast Conference semifinals. The Colonial Athletic Conference also holds its semifinals, as Cinderella sleeper William & Mary (lost at UConn by 9, won at Wake by 10, won at Maryland by 6) probably needs to win its tournament to get in and regular season champ Old Dominion (won at Georgetown by 4, lost to Missouri by 5, lost at Richmond by 7, lost at Dayton by 8) is in action.

Worst of the Worst: #50, Dirty Love

In the last season of 30 Rock, there was a series of episodes where Jon Hamm guest-starred as Liz's love interest. She eventually broke up with him when she realized that he was incredibly stupid, but got away with it because of his looks. No matter what he did, people just said he was right or smart or talented. This must be the story of Jenny McCarthy's life.

McCarthy wrote and starred in Dirty Love, the #50 movie on Rotten Tomatoes' list of the worst movies of the last decade. She became famous in Playboy, but got her mainstream start as the co-host of MTV's Singled Out. She left to get her own not-so-good sketch comedy show on MTV, replaced by Carmen Electra who co-starred in this movie (it should be noted that Electra stars in every single last entry of the ____ Movie franchise). Hmm, what else? I remember her being not particularly funny in Baseketball. Anyways, she parlayed a lot of entertainment execs nodding agreement to her contracts while not exactly staring into her eyes into the opportunity to get a movie made of her script. Now, I can't find anywhere how much it cost to make this movie and my impression is that it didn't cost much. But "not much" by movie standards is still potentially quite a bit. Great low, low, low-budget movies Swingers and Halloween cost $200,000 and $300,000 to make, respectively. Dirty Love opened on forty-four screens (because the advance word-of-mouth was so bad) and made $23,281 in its opening weekend. It stayed open (on only two of those screens) for one more weekend. When it made $822. No, I didn't miss a comma there.

McCarthy's script is bad. I don't just mean in the way that there are no laughs -- not one -- in the entire movie. I mean in the way that there are glaring errors in verb tense and pronoun use. It's not slang; the grammar is noticeably wrong. Besides that, it's racist (Electra's prolific acting chops are put to use in a white character that inexplicably acts as stereotypically black as possible to the point that it comes off as a minstrel show) and anti-Semitic (two movie execs with big noses, glasses, and New York accents, are compared to Woody Allen). It's a gross-out movie that includes graphic scenes of vomit, sex, and a menstruation "joke" that a thirteen-year-old wouldn't find funny. Thanks to the over-the-top script, even a talented comic actor like Guillermo Diaz is forced to play over-the-top and comes out looking the worse for it. The attention to detail is so poor that at one point a sign on a studio audition room reads "Quite Please". I shit you not. I only wish I could find a picture of it.

Much like with my review of The New Guy, where I lamented Zooey Deschanel's inclusion in the movie, I lament here Eddie Kaye Thomas as the guy who is in love with McCarthy's character but she won't see it. Thomas was very good in American Pie and he and David Krumholtz together were great in Harold and Kumar. Of the people in this movie, he's the only one who looks like he's trying (or capable) at all. He also doesn't fit because he plays a peer to McCarthy but he's actually eight years younger than she is. And, look, she's very pretty, but it's obvious. Aside from him (and he couldn't do anything with that script), the acting is exactly what you would expect when you let a bunch of Playmates star in a movie. When porn stars have bit parts in mainstream movies like He Got Game, it is barely acceptable because of how bad they are. Build a movie around them? You can see how that goes.

Male gross-out comedies are huge. The Hangover was one of the biggest movies of last year, following in the footsteps of Old School, Anchorman, and even as far back as Animal House. I think we generally believe that the female counterpart to that type of movie is a romantic comedy, movies which mostly have little to no edge. I don't blame someone for trying to make a female gross-out comedy. Perhaps there's a market out there for that. Perhaps someone like Sarah Silverman could pull one off. If we're going to be blazing new trails, though, let's leave it to someone whose talent extends to above their shoulders.

Random Pop Culture

Thanks to Steve for hitting Idol. I got home tonight and tore through the girls quickly, fast-forwarding through almost everyone. Just not feeling it besides Crystal. I don't think she can win because she's not the type who wins this thing, but I think she is the most talented. I hate that people are singing songs by Marvin Gaye or Sam Cooke or Aretha Franklin. Sure, it may sound okay for Idol, but these kids can't hold a candle to the original and I can't get the original out of my head. I'm fine with who got voted out tonight because none of them had any chance to win and two of them were downright annoying. I'm not fine with them singing that insipid Black Eyed Peas song using auto-tune. I. Am. Not. Fine. With. That.

Great Survivor, great blindside. It's not just that I dislike the Heroes tribe, it's that I specifically dislike Amanda and James. So Amanda being dumb enough to believe Tom and Cirie's subsequent dressing-down of Amanda were right up my alley. Add to that the look of overconfidence on Candice's face in Tribal followed by her look of misery and Rupert's realization that he had made a horrible mistake by hitching himself to Amanda and James followed by him tearing at his hair and shaking his head. Love it. Plus, the continuing leadership of Rob and some great Coach stuff. Russell has great sound bites, but nobody tops Coach. New favorite quote of the year: "Am I going to change? No. Am I going to be the Dragonslayer and slay everyone? Yes."

The more I thought about last week's Lost, "The Lighthouse", the more I liked it. This week's was also very good. I don't know that I'm okay with Sayid being evil, but I'm not sure that he actually is. He's under Locke's spell, but I wouldn't be surprised one bit if he ended up sacrificing himself once he realizes that he's made the wrong choice. I like Kate being embedded in Locke's crew (and Locke maybe knowing it). I like the setup of Jack, Hurley, and Ben versus this group of bad guys with Sawyer (he seemed more indifferent than outright evil) and
Kate as the wild cards. I get the sense that this was the end of the setup for what's to come. One question: Do you think that the "Flash Sideways" has something to do with what Locke said to Sayid about making his dreams come true? Like it's a timeline that Locke has made happen or put into play? I guess the big argument against that is that it's the real Locke, one would guess, that is in that timeline. Either way, good stuff.

The fact that Maryland is going to be everyone's Final Four dark horse makes me think that they are going to go out quickly. They could. They played very poorly early in the year. However, they are also very talented and have a makeup that can beat anybody on a given night, with the exception of a couple of teams. But I'll save that for the next week or two as we get into my favorite sports time of the year. The conference tournaments have begun. Championship Week is two days away.

Misunderestimating the Ladies

I have to admit that I didn't like any of the women last week and was disappointed that Ashley Rodriguez was booted out. This week, a few stepped up their game to give at least respectable peformances. One or two of them would actually get my vote (that is, if I actually voted).

• Crystal Bowersox came back from the dead to sing CCR's "As Long As I See the Light". She's got a decent voice and will probably last deep into the competition but I can't see her winning. The judges just fawn over her. I don't get it.
• Haeley Vaughn - She's quite bubbly but her version of Miley Cyrus' "The Climb" was not very good. She's in trouble.
• Lacey Brown - Her "Kiss Me" by Six Pence was painful to listen to. I think I heard Bailey howl from 30 miles away. It sounded like a drunk girl at a fraternity party stealing the DJ's microphone and singing Karaoke. Pack your bags, you Finito Santiago.
• Katie Stevens - The cutest gal in the pack. She has talent but was definitely in the wrong key for Corrinne Bailey Rae's "Put Your Records On". Did I mention that she is really, really cute. Wait a minute, she's only 17 years old? Nevermind. I will withhold any further comments.
• Didi Benami performed "Lean On Me". She kinda reminds me of Kristie Lee Cook. She is probably better off sticing to country music. To this point, I thought she had the best vocals of the night. The judges didn't like the song choice.
• Michelle Delamor - I loved her "With Arms Wide Open" by Creed. On a side note, I have noticed that Ellen repeats everything that Randy says. Let's see how far this streak continues.
• Lili Scott - Sang Sam Cooke's A Change is Gonna Come". She was really good. I think it is funny when Randy calls the ladies "Dude".
• Katelyn Epperly sang Coldplay's "The Scientist". You know what this season is missing? A really hot girl with marginal talent. The easiest on the eye is Katelyn but that is not saying much. I can see Katelyn following the Katherine McPhee trend of removing more and more clothing as each week goes by.
• Paige Miles - If I closed my eyes, I wouldn't know whether it was Paige singing or Kelly Clarkson singing. She lost a bit of energy toward the end but I liked it overall.
• Siobhan Magnus - When I heard she was singing Aretha Franklin's "Think", I screamed at the television "Nooooooo. Don't do it". Only really large people can sing this song properly. I have to admit that I was completely wrong. She was flat out awesome. She would get my vote for best of the night (if I voted).

The two people going home should be Lacey Brown and Haeley Vaughn. Then again, I seem to be wrong every time.

Forwarded Email of the Day: "Following Monday and Tuesday on the Calendar is W.T.F.". Makes you think...

American Idol Stunt Doubles

While Josh is in the land of No Left Turns, I'll handle tonight's Idol recap. It seems like all of the male contestants are just poor man's versions of prior Idol contestants. Of the 10 guys remaining, only one or two have a legitimate shot of being an actual star. The rest can only aspire to be a one-hit wonder at best.
One thing that I can't stand this year is how the judges seem to give contradictory advice. For example, they told a few singers to make the song their own, to not sing it just like the original performed sang it. Then, they tell a performer like Todrick Hall, who sings a fresh version of a song, to just hit the notes and don't worry about being different. I wish they would be consistent here.
Here's the rundown

• Michael Lynche - Season 9's Rueben Studdard - Ryan Seacrest plays him up, calling him Big Mike. I'd have to think that this gives him some extra credibility. He has that teddy bear appearance that will get him plenty of votes. Tonight, he sang "This is a Man's World" by James Brown. I thought it was really good. He is one of my favorites among the men.
• John Park - Season 9's John Stevens - He is a crooner, nothing more. He would be good on Broadway but I don't know if he is cut out for this competition. He sang John Mayer's "Gravity". He was better than last week but that's not saying much. He might be in trouble.
• Casey James - Season 9's Ace Young (but with talent) - He is the most polished overall performer. Tonight he sang Gavin DeGraw's "I Don't Wanna Be". The judges were a bit hard on him but he will be safe. Whether he wins this competition or not, he will certainly have a successful album once the season is done.
• Alex Lambert - Season 9's Kevin Covais - Sang John Legend's "Everybody Knows". There is no doubt this kid got beat up in high school. He has a decent voice but it is not good enough to hang around very long.
• Todrick Hall - Season 9's Corey Clark - The judges seem to have it in for him. He sang Tina Turner's "What's Love Got To Do With It". I thought it was pretty solid. The judges all saw it differently. He doesn't have the best singing voice amongst the men, but he has much better onstage presence than most, if not all, of the men.
• Jermaine Sellers -Season 9's Nikko Smith - Seems more into fashion than singing. What's with the ugly bow tie? He sang "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye. What is going on is that he is in trouble this week.
• Andrew Garcia - Season 9's Danny Gokey - Andrew seems to be taking a step backward each week. His version of "You Give Me Something" by James Morrisson was just disappointing.
• Aaron Kelly - Season 9's David Archuleta (with less talent) - Sang The Temptation's "My Girl". He just looks scared to be on the stage. I wasn't impressed.
• Tim Urban - Season 9's Kris Allen (with much, much less talent) - Sang "Come On, Get High" by Matt Nathanson. I don't know how many ways I can come up with to he say that he sucks. Unfortunately, this is an easy candidate for the Vote for the Worst crowd. As Tony Kornheiser would say, he Gots to Go.
• Lee Dewyze - Season 9's Michael Johns - Sang Hinder's "Lips of an Angel". I could go either way on him. He seems like the contestant that will have a good week followed by a bad week but move on based on his reputation. He's safe this week.

If I had to pick two to go home this week, I'd like to see Tim and Jermaine go home. That being said, it wouldn't shock me to see John, Alex, Todrick, Andrew or Aaron go home. Only Michael, Casey and Lee are safe.

I'm Going To Vote Die

• Random Pop Culture:
• I'm happy at how the hockey game ended up yesterday. It lived up to its massive hype. It was exciting from start to finish and incredibly so at the end. As much as anything, I'm happy that Canada won. They care more about it than we do and it was in their country. They deserved it and I was glad to see the crowd go home happy.
• As exciting as the hockey game was, 24 is about the opposite. After a strong episode last week, this week's was nearly unwatchable. So bad that I almost gave up the show for good about ten minutes in. It treats its viewers like idiots and I don't buy the big technological thing regarding the bomb and the remote detonator.
• The first fifteen minutes of How I Met Your Mother were as funny as that show gets. The whole idea of people having people of the other sex "on the hook" was dead on and Barney's history of hot women jobs was great. But right about the middle, it just fizzled and headed straight downhill. Probably because the plot actually came into it. By the end, no laughs. Weird.
• Speaking of no laughs, I watched the first two episodes of Funny or Die Presents, which should be called Excruciatingly Disappointing or Die Presents or perhaps Slightly Amusing Every So Often But Mostly Awful or Die Presents. It just doesn't work. So far, there have been three legitimately funny skits, all very short, all involving children. "Playground Politics" uses kids on a playground to explain how the USA exploits North Korea and Africa. The funniest was "Space Baby", which I can't find for embedding and isn't all that funny anyway.
• A Break:
• Headed to northern New Jersey for work for the next couple of days. Probably going to watch Lost and Idol when I get back on Thursday. Maybe I'll post if something fun happens, but seriously...