Entertainment: Golden Globes 2019 Recap

January 08, 2019

This past Sunday NBC aired the 76th Annual Golden Globes with hosts Andy Samberg (Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Hot Rod) and Sandra Oh (Grey's Anatomy, Killing Eve) and while the night wasn't exactly a win for my top picks, it was surprisingly inoffensive and inoffensively surprising.

To start, Samberg and Oh had a nice chemistry together as the hosts who no doubt had been instructed to keep things as apolitical as possible given the strongly Liberal bleeding-heart nature of Hollywood events in the Trump era which has lead to ratings for programs like the Emmy Awards, Academy Awards, and The Golden Globes absolutely tanking in recent years. Oh, a daughter born to Korean immigrants, waxed political only briefly while she delved into the concept of “representation matters” which has come into the forefront of big budget film-making within the past year thanks to multi-racial and cultural hits like WB's CRAZY RICH ASIANS and Disney's BLACK PANTHER.

To Sandra Oh, I could sympathize. Asians make-up for an overwhelming majority of film audiences and China has literally become the “Second Hollywood” in today's Box Office landscape...so it makes sense that they should have more on-screen presence as actual people instead of being relegated to neon-haired sidekicks.But I digress. The two hosts were fine, if bland and safe, which is honestly what this program needed right now.

Top honors of the night included Carol Burnett who was recognized with an Award in her name, The Carol Burnett Award for Outstanding Achievement in Television. Burnett was given a charming highlight reel of her variety shows and appearances over the past 50 years in entertainment. Dick Van Dyke quipped, when he appeared on stage with MARY POPPINS RETURNS co-star Emily Blunt, that he saw Carol Burnett and said “Finally, someone I know!”

The legendary Jeff Bridges was also honored and presented the Cecil B. DeMille Award for his 60 years in the business, sharing the honor with past recipients like Audrey Hepburn, Steven Spielberg, and Denzel Washington. Bridges, one of my favorite actors, got a sizzle reel showing his screen presence from birth (literally) until now. It was moving and uplifting, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I teared up.

The big shocker though? The winners. I knew that the steaming pile of derivative cinematic equivalent to horse-droppings that is Disney's BLACK PANTHER wouldn't win anything, despite Heir Mickey and the Mouse Regime's best attempts at throwing money around...what I didn't expect to win either was BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY, the bio-drama about the legendary rock band Queen and it's singer Freddie Mercury. The film had an extremely rough production with director Bryan Singer being targeted for sexual misconduct claims and leaving the project in the last few weeks of filming, and the film itself even received some detractors who felt it's portrait of Queen as a whole was skewered towards painting Mercury in a bad light. Regardless though, BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY received Best Picture (Drama) and Best Actor (Rami Malek) beating out a category many predicted A STAR IS BORN would take. The latter though, my favorite film of the year and an incredible piece of cinema as a whole, did take Best Original Song with “Shallow”.

Another big shocker, and a crushing blow to Disney, was Sony's SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE taking home the Best Animated Picture Award ending The Mouse's 4 year domination of the category at both the Globes and Oscars. For context, Disney had TWO features in contention this year (The Incredibles, Ralphs Breaks the Internet) and i'm sure they slid a lot of money to critics in hopes one of those would win...especially up against Sony, who still owns Spider-Man.

Another big winner for the night was the film GREEN BOOK starring Mahershala Ali and Viggo Mortensen. Spike Lee's BLACKKKLANSMAN, starring John David Washington (Denzel Washington's son) and Adam Driver, went home empty as well on a ll fronts which is very bizarre and it was easily one of the best films of the year with two great performances from each lead. Christian Bale took home another Globe, this time for Best Actor (Musical or Comedy) for his portrayal of Dick Cheney in VICE. Glenn Close shockingly stole the award for Best Actress from Lady Gaga, but I haven't seen her film THE WIFE so I can't comment on her performance.

I was, however, very excited to see Olivia Colman's win for THE FAVOURITE where she portrayed Queen Anne. Colman will be playing another famous queen this year when THE CROWN returns with her as Queen Elizabeth.

Moving forward though, let's look at The Oscars. Already shrouded in controversy thanks to the Kevin Hart scandal, The Oscars will likely look very different than the Golden Globes we got tonight. The Oscars take place Sunday, February 24, and announcements are expected by the end of this month. I'm hoping A STAR IS BORN swoops in with the awards it deserves, but I won't be shocked if BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY has somehow just become "the hot thing."