Genie Awards!

For those expecting some sort of Valentine’s Day posting, you’ll be collectively disappointed. Much like last year, I’m opting to not do much more than casually acknowledge this “holiday.” Instead, I want to talk a little bit about the Genie Awards, held last night in Toronto. The Genie Awards are essentially the Canadian version of the Academy Awards, but unlike their cousins to the South, are barely even noticed by the general viewing public in Canada.

Anyway, I was looking at the list of winners and something rather obvious jumped out at me: almost ALL the winners come from Quebec! Now I’m not sure if the Quebecois just produce more films per year than English Canada, thus leading to a larger talent pool from which to draw, but it does strike me as odd that the awards were so lopsided. It would be nice to see a bit of competition in both languages one of these years.

In terms of the winners, it seems that the Rocket suffered from a Prince of Tides sort of effect. For those that don’t remember, the Prince of Tides was once nominated for something like 7 Oscars (including Best Picture), but the films director, Barbara Streisand, wasn’t even nominated. Alright, so it’s not the same situation at all. The Rocket was nominated in every major category and won in virtually everything (Best Actor, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, etc) but yet lost out on Best Picture to Bon Cop, Bad Cop.

For a nice change of pace, I’ve actually seen both of the main contenders for Best Film, and for my money I would vote for Bon Cop, Bad Cop. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed both films, but I just felt that The Rocket dropped the ball. It felt too… clichéd… to me. My views on Bon Cop, Bad Cop are pretty well known, so I won’t waste too much space on this, but I will say that once you really get the joke, it becomes that much better of a film.
So congratulations to all the nominees and winners! Til next time…