Ballots for different palates
http://www.montrealmirror.com/2006/030906/aaa.html>> Readers choose their favourites in our 10th annual Alternative Academy Awards
Welcome to the 10th annual Mirror Alternative Academy Awards. In this parallel universe, Tom Cruise can’t hide behind studio spin doctors, Quebec talent is acknowledged, and well-endowed women named Jessica get the props they so desperately deserve. Here’s the rundown of how Mirror readers voted...
Movie Most Overlooked by the Academy
No big surprise here. Shutting out Jean-Marc Vallée’s masterpiece was a f***-you to Canada that outraged moviegoers nationwide. And the Academy should know: Giving Ontario-native Paul Haggis an undeserved Oscar for best film in no way makes up for this injustice.
47% C.R.A.Z.Y.
21% Sin City
12% Kung Fu Hustle
12% Mysterious Skin
8% The Aristocrats
Most Overlooked Performance
Jeff Daniels may be tops here. But if he wants to impress the real Academy, he’s gonna have to play a legend, preferably a dead one with leftist leanings and/or with multiple addictions. Good luck.
36% Jeff Daniels, The Squid and the Whale
24% Vince Vaughn/Owen Wilson, Wedding Crashers
18% Emily Mortimer, Match Point
16% Paul Kaye, It’s All Gone Pete Tong
6% Harry Reems, Inside Deep Throat
Best Soundtrack
Britpop, crunk, Ibiza rave and southern-fried rock can’t hold a candle to outlaw country. But we already knew this.
58% Walk the Line
24% Hustle & Flow
12% It’s All Gone Pete Tong
4% 9 Songs
2% The Dukes of Hazzard
Best Male Bod
Nothing says sexy like using a big Santa hat as a loincloth. This could explain why Pitt’s pecks, Chiklis’s biceps, Usher’s abs and Brosnan’s gunt all came up short against Jake’s snake.
55% Jake Gyllenhaal, Jarhead
25% Brad Pitt, Mr. & Mrs. Smith
9% Pierce Brosnan, The Matador
8% Michael Chiklis, Fantastic Four
3% Usher, In the Mix
Best Female Body
Our polling results prove what the scientific community has been saying for years now: Women named “Jessica” are inherently sexy. Anyone here remember that scorching-hot scene in Cocoon where Tandi strips down to a one-piece? We rest our case.
44% Jessica Alba, Into the Blue
23% Jessica Lange, Broken Flowers
14% Elisha Cuthbert, House of Wax
11% Jessica Simpson, The Dukes of Hazzard
8% Jessica Biel, Stealth
Worst Performance
Apparently, pretending to stomach Tomcat’s nauseating shenanigans wasn’t Katie Holmes’s only unconvincing performance of 2005.
31% Katie Holmes, Batman Begins
22% Orlando Bloom, Elizabethtown
22% Dakota Fanning, War of the Worlds, Hide and Seek and Dreamer
16% Jim Carrey, Fun With Dick and Jane
9% Heath Ledger, Casanova
Most Overhyped/Overrated Movie
These results may have less to do with the War of the Worlds as a movie and more to do with its star. See above.
29% War of the Worlds
26% Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
17% King Kong
17% Brokeback Mountain
11% Batman Begins
Movie That Never Should Have Happened
Considering Monster-in-Law is the first film that Jane Fonda has made in almost 15 years, this category could also be renamed the worst comeback for a once-respected actress. Not even the sight of Jennifer Garner roller-blading around in red pleather horrified our readers as much as J.Lo and J.Fo’s two-hour cat scrap.
35% Monster-in-Law
25% Elektra
17% The Pacifier
16% Be Cool
7% Memoirs of a Geisha
Best/Most Gratuitous Violence
This is a bit of an upset. Oldboy comes in at a disappointing third place, this despite a scene in which its star Min-sik Choi slowly and graphically cuts off his own tongue. There’s just no accounting for taste.
47% Sin City
34% Saw II
11% Oldboy
5% The Devil’s Rejects
3% Land of the Dead
Best Choreographed Sex Scenes
The competition was stiff here: an NC-17-rated threesome, some lesbian love scenes, spurting cocks and a little Toronto softcore. Still you can’t deny that Maria Bello more than earned this top honour. According to the History of Violence star, all that crashing and banging around on the stairwell with co-star Viggo Mortensen left her badly bruised.
51% A History of Violence
14% My Summer of Love
12% Where the Truth Lies
12% 9 Songs
11% Lie With Me
Most Annoying Non-Human
Poor Mr. Binks. You can’t say you didn’t see that one coming.
34% Jar Jar Binks, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
27% Herbie, Herbie: Fully Loaded
22% The Fog, The Fog
9% Foxy Loxy, Chicken Little
8% Fender, Robots
Worst Performance by a Pop Star
Even with all eyes on her Daisy Dukes, Simpson couldn’t detract attention away from her abominable attempt at acting.
43% Jessica Simpson, The Dukes of Hazzard
19% 50 Cent, Get Rich or Die Tryin’
15% Lindsay Lohan, Herbie: Fully Loaded
15% Hilary Duff, The Perfect Man
8% Usher, In the Mix
And now for the real Oscars...
Not surprisingly, only one Mirror reader earned a perfect score in our Oscar contest this year. Olivier D’Amour correctly predicted the winners in the following six categories: best actor, best actress, best supporting actress, best supporting actor, best director and best film (how he guessed that one without hacking the Price Waterhouse database, we’ll never know). For his efforts, D’Amour wins first prize, 12 Ex-Centris/Parc movie passes. Nice work Olivier!
For second place, dozens of people guessed five out of six categories. However, only one contestant can walk away with the coveted runner-up prize, eight Ex-Centris/Parc movie passes. So the Mirror tabulation department drew a name from a hat of the people who guessed five of six. And the winner is.... Samantha Young. Congratulations!
Ballots compiled by Chloé Roubert, pithy commentary provided by Sarah Rowland