Maybe the World IS Coming to an End

 

 (sally field in "lincoln")

Whoa! A couple of surprises today in the movie awards season.  First, The New York Film Critics Circle upped their awards announcement by a few days, beating The National Board of Review to be the first of the major critics' groups to name their year's best films and actors.






But it wasn't the fact that the New York critics jumped the gun, it was what they did with that fire-arm that shocked Hollywood today.  They took that gun and committed the film industry equivalent of showing up at a 7-11 store, brandishing that gun and then proceeding to shoot up the place and everyone in it.  They named, now brace yourself, Matthew McConaughey as the Best Supporting Actor for "Magic Mike".  I know, I know.  Feel free to reach for the smelling salts.

(matthew mcconaughey in "magic mike")

(tom hiddleston and rachel weisz in "the deep blue sea")

The other winners were Daniel Day-Lewis as Best Actor for "Lincoln", Rachel Weisz as Best Actress for "The Deep Blue Sea" and Sally Field as Best Supporting Actress for "Lincoln".  Other winners include "Zero Dark Thirty" for Best Picture and its director, Kathryn Bigelow, as Best Director.


But make no mistake about it, all anyone's going to be talking about today is the win by McConaughey.  And this instantly starts the mind-numbing speculation that the blonde, normally shirtless actor could actually win an Oscar nomination.  We haven't seen "Magic Mike", but we have seen "Bernie", the other film for which the New York critics bestowed this prize on McConaughey, and trust us, he was awful in it.  In fact, over the years, we've seen several McConaughey movies, and we've never seen him do anything which could be even distantly related to that artistic ability the world knows as "acting", and we seriously doubt if he suddenly acquired that skill in mid-life.


Who knows, maybe McConaughey will ride this buzz all the way to an Oscar nom, and maybe even an Oscar win, but all we can say to the Oscar voters is, "Slow down, take a deep breath and think hard about what you're doing.  You did this once before with the infamous Marisa Tomei Oscar win, and you're still paying for that one.  So proceed with caution!"