from IFC
Hooray! Today's the Oscars! But yesterday was the Independent Spirit Awards, honoring those films that were made for less than a paltry $20 million, and damned if you're not just Oscar-crazy enough to read about 'em. Actually they were pretty good - star-studded, free-spirited, and hosted by the irrepressible and ridiculously tasteless Sarah Silverman. Silverman, whose new sitcom on Comedy Central has gone rather through the roof. There are those who cannot abide Silverman and find her unfunny and vulgar, and point out that she frequently uses variations on the same jokes. It's true, much of the material rang familiar — and yes, there were the obligatory vagina jokes — but still, she we couldn't help but laugh at a lot of it. She has a knack for knowing how to take an old joke to a new place (cf. her channeling of Georgia O'Keefe). After a start-up video where she mocked the nominated movies as a group — she is nothing if not fair — she bounded onstage in a baby-doll outfit, which would have seemed like a Little Miss Sunshine joke had she not worn almost the identical outfit to "The View."
Silverman started off with a list of differences between the Independent Spirit Awards and the Porn Awards, including observations like "it turns out, the award for best DP does not go to Director of Photography." Though she scored points with pretending to confuse Britney Spears with Djimon Honsou, the crowd laughed a little more weakly at this one: "The Lives of Others was directed by German-born Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck — which in English roughly translates to "I never laid a finger on Anne Frank." Yikes. (Her more prurient follow-up joke — and there was one — is after the jump, because that's where it belongs. Actually, so is the rest of this post. Go!)
A Robert Downey Jr. rehab joke fell a bit flat — it's a bit played out, that one — but couldn't help laughing at her prohibition on political statements ("I'll be honest, I'm kinda sick of the Susan Saradons, and the Tim Sarandons"). Also, Sarah Silverman hearts Babybel cheese. In that special way, like Alexander Portnoy loved liver. People who weren't sure if they should laugh: Zach Braff, Laura Dern, Robin Wright Penn, Daniel Craig.
Also, there were awards: Best Feature was Little Miss Sunshine, which also won Best Director (a tie for married team Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris), Best Supporting Actor for Alan Arkin and Best First Screenplay for Michael Arndt. Half Nelson won top acting awards for both Ryan Gosling (Oscar dark horse!) and Shareeka Epps and Frances McDormand took the supporting actress award for Friends With Money (a film which featured an entirely realistic plotline involving Jennifer Aniston). The harrowing Road to Guantanamo won Best Documentary (NB: first clipped on HuffPo); Sweet Land won for Best First Feature; Thank You For Smoking won for Best Screenplay; and Pan's Labyrinth won Best Cinematography, and also Best Weird-Looking Goat-Man Thing. Attractive people ogled: Matt Dillon, Ryan Phillipe, Josh Hartnett, Christina Ricci, Lucy Liu, a slightly wired-looking Winona Ryder, Marisa Tomei, Marcia Gay Harden, , a punk Neve Campbell, an opthamologically-challenged Sharon Stone, Peter Sarsgaard and wife Maggie Gyllenhaal (who seemed to be smiling at everything), America Ferrera, Aaron Eckhart, Anjelica Huston, Catherine O'Hara, and others. Nikki Finke has the full live-blog experience (plus all manner of Oscar coverage, straight through the weekend); for those of you who are all business, here's the AP. Sorry we put it right here at the end, after we made you read all that.*
*Warning: Prurient joke about that German director below
"The Lives of Others" was directed by German-born Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck - which in English roughly translates to "I never laid a finger on Anne Frank...I'm kidding, I'm kidding. It actually stands for 'Anne Frank has a curly bush.'" See above: Tactful, she's not. Or tasteful.
Tied for just as bad: Taylor Dayne.
