Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
The snubs and surprises of the Golden Globes
Guild Award for her role as Gloria Gaines in Lee Daniels’ The Butler on Wednesday, she was left off the Globes list. In fact The Butler was completely excluded, including Forest Whitaker in the title role. The true-life injustice tale was numbing and received a large amount of praise and buzz. However, the indie film may be a bit of a distant memory for the HFPA, since it was released. Plus there are no big stars here, sans Octavia Spenser’s appearance. But a complete out is quite a burn.
A Disney movie about a Disney lowing on SoundCloud to a fourtime Grammy nominee with commercial success and plenty of critical raves.
Royals, which has sold close to 4 million tracks, was at the top spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart for nine weeks, and Rolling Stone named the song as the second best single of the year.
Lorde was named Spotify’s most viral new artist, and NPR (National Public Radio) recently compared her to Nirvana – a pretty heady comparison for someone who’s still in high school.
But Lorde is miles apart from the typical teen artist – or pop star.
Her debut, Pure Heroine, touches on what she describes as teen life: relationship drama, school, movie would seem like the perfect Hollywood wet kiss in the comedy or music section. And with Emma Thompson, who is nominated for best actress for her role as Mary Poppins author PL Travers, and Tom Hanks as Walt Disney, it’s a wonder this one was overlooked. Despite his prestige, Martin Scorsese was overlooked as best director, while Jonah Hill failed to nab a supporting actor nomination. But the picture was nominated in the best comedy or musical category. party life and suburban living. But it hardly comes off that way.
With the help of her collaborator, Joel Little, Lorde fashioned a moody, lyrically rich album told in a far more mature way than most teens would ever describe.
“When you consider how little life experience anyone who is 16 could possibly have, and then you listen to these lyrics, you go, ‘Wow, how do you know?’. She wrote these songs when she was 15,” said Jason Flom, head of Lava Records, which signed her to a major label. “She’s a once-in-a-lifetime type of artist.”
Royals has been nominated for best pop solo performance and Pure Heroine is up for best pop vocal album at the Grammys. No nod for Ben Stiller or mention of the film. The usual funny-man’s impressive dramatic turn as a long-time Life magazine photo editor failed to capture the HFPA. Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto were nominated in acting categories, but the critically acclaimed film was rebuffed by the foreign press. Mark Wahlberg, a favourite Hollywood everyman, stars in the Navy SEAL film about a botched mission in Afghanistan. But the actor and the wartime pic were unaccounted for. Julie Delpy scored an actress nomination for the raw romantic comedy, but the acting abilities of co-star Ethan Hawke were overlooked, as was the film itself. Julia-Louis Dreyfus, the leading lady of the film, cleaned up on Globe nominations, receiving bids in both film and television categories. But no posthumous nod was given to the revered late Sopranos star James Gandolfini.
Lorde, who says she started writing music when she was 12, downplays the hype.
She was quoted as calling DJ/producer David Guetta “gross”, has made disparaging comments about Selena Gomez and Miley Cyrus, and complained that Taylor Swift seemed “too perfect” (though the pair were recently spotted hanging out together).
Lorde was uncharacteristically mum and declined to clarify those comments in this interview.
She blamed others for trying to label her as the “anti-other things that are happening right now”.
“My kind of interest in making music was born out of this desire to hear something that I hadn’t yet heard,” she said. – Sapa-AP Neither show, both of which developed a cult-like fan base, made the cut.
Maybe HBO should rethink its approach to killing off some of our favourite characters. While Zooey Deschanel was nominated for her performance in the series, the popular comedy about a set of roommates living in downtown Los Angeles did not make the bill. The show, which premiered in 2011, was completely absent from this year’s list. Instead new shows like Netflix’s House of Cards and Showtime’s Masters of Sex freshened up the drama series and acting categories. Though it has been wellreceived, it seemed like it might get lost in the shuffle. But the HFPA, which ranked it in the best picture category, loves Judi Dench. Even Ron Howard was shocked at this best picture nomination. “It’s really more than I expected by a long shot,” he said on Thursday morning. The film didn’t fare well at the box office, but it was a unique – and big budget – take on the Formula One subculture. The Fox comedy, still in its first season, garnered two nominations. The show’s star, Andy Samberg, is nominated in the comedic actor category and the show itself is in the running for best comedy series. – Sapa-AP