Not necessarily the Oscars.

So the nominations for the Razzies were announced this morning. Talk about an upset. Transformers hardly got a fucking thing! (And, no, I don't count the 'Worst Supporting Actor' nod for Jon Voight, who is also credited for September Dawn, National Treasure: Book of Secrets and - the most likely reason for the nod - Bratz.) The leading nominated films, in addition to Bratz, are I Know Who Killed Me, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry and Norbit.

One of the nominations for INPYC&L (one can only type out that long-ass title so many times) was for 'Worst Screenplay'. The credited writers are Barry Fanaro (Kingpin) and Alexander Payne & Jim Taylor (Oscar winners for Sideways). I would love to read the Payne/Taylor draft to see what remained before the script was Sandlerized. The resulting film wasn't quite the worst I saw last year (check the third sentence in the first paragraph), but it was rather lazy in its jokes (The guys are showering and someone dropped the soap! Larry's son is engaging in unmasculine activities like musical theater!). If one is going to set out to make a film about gay tolerance, this is the kind of easy humor that any self-respecting filmmaker would do well to avoid. That said, Steve Buscemi and Blake Clark were funny and Kevin James gave a sincere performance.

I never got around to seeing I Know Who Killed Me (though it seems time to re-assess the order of the universe if Lindsay Lohan is playing a stripper in a movie that no one sees), so I'll just talk about Norbit. Not even close to great Eddie Murphy, but I liked it more than INPYC&L. It seems hypocritical to decry a film about easy gay humor and defend one with easy fat humor, but what can you do? The main story is pure cartoon (and not really in a good way), but it's the side bits that make the film. Every moment with Mr. Wong, for good or ill, cracked me up, Eddie Griffin and Katt Williams made for a great team and Terry Crews was, as always, hilarious; the spin he puts on the line "If you hurt my sister, I'm gonna come at you with razor blades and lemon juice!" was, for me, one of the film's highlights.

Getting back to Transformers, I can only wonder if there were flecks of spooge on the screen when the nominating committee was done watching it. I'm just saying. That film would've, could've and should've been a lock.

Personally, if and when I make a movie, I wouldn't mind winning a Razzie. If people can have a strong-enough reaction to something I've done (good or bad), that's enough for me.