Nothing else to say
I’m tired
Tired of playing the game
Ain’t it a crying shame
I’m so tired
In Blazing Saddles (1974), Lili Von Sctup (the late Madaline Kahn) was tired of all the romancing (among other things), I am tired of this Award season.
It is no secret: in a world of ups and downs, 2025 had many more of the latter than the former.
Yet I will try to stay more optimistic, as I remember a moment from the 75th Academy Awards, when film legend Olivia De Havilland took the stage. As she was presenting the Past Oscar Winner reunion, she stated the following (and I am paraphrasing a bit):
“Much has changed in our world…but what hasn’t changed is our love for the movies, and their ability to inspire us and to help us through troubled times.”
Over two decades later, those words have not lost their meaning in the slightest.
For those unfamiliar, there is a story in the book of Genesis (specifically in chapter 19) that talks about a man named Lot.
He is told by an angel of the Lord to take his family and leave Sodom and Gomorrah before they are destroyed, and not look back. As they are leaving, Lot’s (unnamed) wife looks back, and turns into a pillar of salt.
Looking back, I realize it is a plus that I became aware of the Oscars around the age of 10, because, at that age, I did not think of the Academy Awards as being something political.
While I can clearly see the political aspects nowadays, there is still a little bit of that naivety I have held on to that translates into this being the best night of the year for movies, even if the “best” never really comes out on top.
That said, I’ve been doing my predictions since I was 13, so I have no intention of stopping now.
Before I could finalize this list, it was rather fitting that the last movie I caught up with was Hundreds of Beavers.
While it did not make the list (despite being hilarious), it summed up the 2024 movie year with one word: Ambition.
My good friend Kenneth is a worthy cinephile, but since the release of Megalopolis, we have been fervently discussing our differences over the film: I was genuinely disappointed (yet still eager to try it again), and he (like many) truly hated it.
Yes, the film does not work, but I could at least see (somewhat) the idea Coppola was going for as he went for a big swing (in a year full of big swings in the cinema). If he is reading this, Kenneth should know I did see more than ten films worse than Megalopolis…and not one of them are Hot Frosty. (I did thankfully dodge a bullet by not seeing films I have heard are trash such as Borderlands, Harold and the Purple Crayon, The Crow, and Kraven the Hunter).
That said, here are the 10 worst films of 2024 that are totally worse than Megalopolis (not including that one movie I saw for free on Twitter by someone I refuse to say makes movies: Kenneth knows who I am talking about).
It is clear that we are feeling the true effects of last year’s strikes.
I supported the strikes, but as a cinephile it came at a cost: This year’s movies would not be strong. As of this writing, I’ve seen just under thirty movies that were released this year (I have yet to see certain titles such as Challengers and Kinds of Kindness), and none of them were five stars (though some were close).
Still, I have hope, as the second half will give us the likes of Deadpool & Wolverine, Twisters, Sing Sing, Longlegs, Alien: Romulus, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, and plenty more (I don’t care what the reactions were at Cannes; I am still stoked for Megalopolis.)
I am really coming in to the 11th hour.
With the only a few days left until the Academy Awards, my predictions are finally done, but at the cost of a few things, namely, that I don’t have all the photos I would normally have with this post.
(On the plus side, I did have time to see all the shorts).
Read more: Predictions for the 96th Academy AwardsMuch of that has to do with the same old story of me overthinking certain categories and not knowing what to pick. That is not to say that there are not certain categories that are easy to predict. the real question of Oscar night will be how many awards will Oppenheimer sweep and how many will the rest get?
Here are my predictions
There are a lot of positives and negatives to look back on in 2023 when it comes to cinema, both industry wise and personally.
Of course, Hollywood had a big dent in the year with two strikes (which I did support, for what it is worth), While they have thankfully ended, we will probably feel the fall out of them in this upcoming year (and possibly into 2025). Looking back at the amount of films I have seen (just shy of 80, which is more than I have done in previous years), I saw nearly 90 percent of them (whether in theater or streaming) by myself. It would really be nice to have my friends and family have a better schedule for me, but such is life.
In the past month, I found myself doing something I never imagined I would do in my time on this planet:
I started watching Hallmark movies.
My first was Holiday Road, followed by titles such as Christmas with a Kiss, On the 12th date of Christmas, A Biltmore Christmas, Norwegian Holiday, and Christmas on Cherry Lane. Much of this was “pressure” from my insistent (and wonderfully amazing) cousin Monroe.
Nothing else to say