Liveblogging: 2008 Golden Globes

6:48 CST Yep, I'm good for it. I don't have a cable box, and I am one of those people you read about that hasn't bought the converter thingy, so I'm not seeing a ton of visual detail. Everyone has a holographic twin of themselves standing a fraction of an inch away from them. The whole broadcast has been filmed through the beveled edge of a piece of dirty glass, in the middle of a little snow flurry. But I'm still watching it. And I can still tell when a Xanaxed Somebody With a Microphone has just made a fool of herself. "Congratulations, Sting, on your nomination!" Sting: not nominated. I hate almost all Hollywood reporters, but I do love the Globes.

Still 6:48 I love Marisa and her many, many accessories. When did she become such a fashionista? Maybe at the same time that she became such an incredibly natural actress. I didn't see either of these developments coming circa Vinny, but I'm completely happy about both.

6:52 Pierce Brosnan is making a movie about the first governor of South Africa and his love affair with Natascha McElhone. The Xanaxed Somebody With a Microphone thinks it "sounds fun." Oh, me, too. It'll be a blast.

6:57 Wait, seriously? The three zombies get to banter for several minutes? When asked who they want to win, they manage to all mumble indecipherably at exactly the same moment, but I think I heard the word "Winslet."

7:00 The time-honored arrivals montage scored to a crappy pop song. Penélope is going nude again. I mean the color of her dress, people. Always looks good on her. Drew Barrymore, as usual, looks twice as old as she is.

7:01 Jennifer Lopez looks orange, but is it just my TV? She's here to present...

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
I WANT: I suppose Penélope, but I don't feel strongly about it
I PREDICT: The "wild" and "exotic" Penélope should have no trouble. Surely it hurt J.Lo to have to call Penélope "wild" and "exotic"? We'll never know. Kate Winslet looks is ridiculously beautiful.

7:02 It's Kate! I think everyone in the entire room wants to make babies with her, or at least go to bed with her, or at least swap roles with her. You can tell that Kevin Bacon is sitting there thinking, "I would have been a great Hanna Schmitz."

7:05 Kate does all four things one MUST do, which is not surprising given that she is such a class act. What I mean: thanks her co-nominees, thanks the author of the original novel, acknowledges the people who died who deserve honoring, and is completely adorable. Yay for Kate.

7:06 BEST ORIGINAL SONG
I WANT: "The Wrestler," obviously, because it's gorgeous and perfectly apropos to the film and the character(s)
I PREDICT: "The Wrestler," because it's the only one that doesn't make me wish I were deaf. Well, the Beyoncé song isn't that bad, but it's tainted by its neighbors.

7:08 Sweet justice served! Turns out Mickey Rourke commissioned the song? And quite poetically? Every time Springsteen talks or tells a story, I feel bad that I never listen to his music or think about him as much as I should. I think it's probably a fantastic, fantastic thing that he's in the culture.

7:11 Commercial breaks are hilarious on the Globes because everyone leaps like pumas out of their seats and immediately start rubbing themselves against each other. Are they all trying to secure parts, or do they have star-crushes, or are they all just polymorphously perverse, like Jesse Helms always wanted us to believe? It's an entire room of star frottage; all those jewels surely get in the way. With the economy as it is, I'm expecting a lot of desperate friction tonight amongst the under-employed.

7:14 RUMER WILLIS is Miss Golden Globes? She of the astonishing jaw? Demi can't quite cede the on-camera moment to her own daughter. But then, if I were Demi, I wouldn't either.

TV THING (SUPPORTING ACTOR)
I WANT: Neil Patrick Harris, though I don't necessarily mean "...to win this award."
I PREDICT: I'm guessing Harris, on the Winslet thesis that everyone likes him. And does anyone still like Piven? He just emanates grossness.

7:15 Tom Wilkinson. Nice to see the perennial nominees getting a brief, tasty chance at the winner's mic. As though we don't know what Kate Winslet and Tom Wilkinson sound like, but it still feels like a rare and cosmically timed moment, like being at the zoo at exactly the right time: "I can't believe I was here right when the panda rolled over!" I love that Tom (drunk!) just thanked (drunkenly!) someone whose last name he admitted he couldn't (drunk!) remember.

7:17 Simon Baker seriously can't do anything: can't act, can't pull off a laugh-line at the mic, can't be quite as cute as it seems like he should be. And here's Laura Dern, who can do almost anything. Such as stretch her mouth out to eight times its apparent size. Laura Dern to Melissa George. It's Night of the David Lynch Ingénues.

7:18 TV THING (SUPPORTING ACTRESS)
I WANT: Dianne Wiest, even though I didn't see any of these, and even though she isn't here.
I PREDICT: Wiest, but it's Dern, which is fine. Guess I'll hafta rent Recount? I wonder if she'll thank Kevin Spacey, or if anyone will. He radiates even more Gross than Jeremy Piven does.

Dern gives the night's second shout-out to Sydney Pollack, and the second shout-out to a makeup team. And she should probably thank her personal makeup team tonight, too, because she looks absolutely lovely and elegant and soft. And she thanks Democratic voters everywhere! Remind me to send flowers tomorrow to Laura Dern.

7:20 More star-on-star rubbing. Must the commercials during the Golden Globes—surely the wet dream of capitalism, but fetishized everywhere by people with hourly wages and zero 401(k)s—must the commercials remind us that this is TurboTax season? I simply cannot. wait. to toss the federal government some money.

7:25 Seriously? The voiceover person is intro'ing Don Cheadle as "the star of Hotel for Dogs"? So much for Traffic and Hotel Rwanda. Cheadle makes a joke out of the obvious weirdness that he is intro'ing Burn After Reading even though he has never crossed the path of the Coens. Though he'd actually do pretty well in like a Raising Arizona or Big Lebowski situation, don't you think? I sure do love this movie, even though I think Frances McDormand is frequently lousy in it.

7:26 Latino band music plays for Eva Mendes as she walks out. I thought she was in rehab? I'm not making fun, it's just what I thought. If so, she got furloughed for one hell of a tailoring session, because she's rocking an asymmetrical, highly structured off-white dress that I'm totally into.

7:28 The president of the HFPA, if I heard correctly that that's who he is, is sparing us his speech???! Seriously?

TV THING (BEST ACTOR)
I WANT: Anyone who isn't the creepy Rhys Meyers
I PREDICT: Jon Hamm. When I saw Michael C. Hall, I thought for sure it was Ashton Kutcher. Winner is the absent Gabriel Byrne. Zac Efron and Hayden Panetierre can't quite agree on how to make clear that they are accepting for him. The struggles of the young.

7:29 New Star Trek guys, blatantly plugging themselves and their new roles. Not even an attempt to be funny. Just, "Hi, we are a living ad, but we're here to present..."

TV THING (BEST ACTRESS)
I WANT: Anyone who isn't Kyra Sedgwick
I PREDICT: Paquin, because it's the Globes. I miss her real hair color. If she speaks, will she make words, unlike Oscar '93?

7:31 It's Anna! She can't figure out how to get to the stage. Or maybe she's just looking for Brad Pitt. She thinks it's "awesome!" to win. Alan Ball beams at her. You know Kyra's like, "Whaaaa do Ah naaaaiiiver weeeiiin?" Anna Paquin thinks a lot of people are "awesome." One hesitates to blame the hai—you know what, I'm not even going to go there.

7:33 Heavily plugged movies that I can't wait to see: Last Chance Harvey and He's Just Not That Into You, even though they could both go so, so wrong. Or, more likely, I'll just not be that into them. But Aniston and Affleck both make me laugh in the ...Into You ads, and really, when has that ever happened?

7:34 Diane Keaton: a genius choice for L'Oréal spokeswoman. Sexy, shiny, and seemingly un-screwed-with by the mega-batallion of Hollywood cosmetic surgeons.

7:36 Ricky Gervais shushes the crowd, who are racing for their seats, post-rubbing. He takes public credit for Winslet's win for her Holocaust-themed role. Sneaks in a Ghost Town plug and complains about not being nominated: "That's the last time I have sex with 200 foreign-born journalists." Then drinks from a highball as big as a bowling ball. Then, apropos of nothing except his British-ness, he presents a clip from Happy-Go-Lucky.

7:38 I was trying to figure out how Rachel Griffiths was popping up in two different places at once, in different outfits. But that one in the black is actually Sally Hawkins.

7:39 The Jonas Brothers. Presenting. And bantering: an obvious and cold-blooded attempt on my life.

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
I WANT: Sit down before I tell you, but WALL•E
I PREDICT: Oh, it'll probably be Bolt, don't you think? Come on, you know I'm kidding. That bubble-wrap gag never gets old for me. But even better would be a deleted scene where WALL•E grabs the Jonas Brothers and pushes them into his adorable little ice-cooler tummy and just... compresses them. Done. Stack them on a trash tower.

7:42 BEST ACTRESS (MUSICAL/COMEDY)
I WANT: Sally Hawkins, who would appear to be weeping, or trying not to weep. And I want this even if it means no speech from Meryl or Emma, who would surely by now have won the Pulitzer Prize for Acceptance Speeches if that award had been invented yet.

It's Sally. The Globes do what needs to be done, even when it means giving awards to people who most of the people on screen don't recognize. Meryl visibly says something nice to Sally while she battering-rams her way to the stage. Yep, she's crying. She may also be halfway in outer space right now. She's more PJ Harvey than she ever was. Many of you who read this blog say that Sally is just a 1000% joy in "real life," so I'm even happier. Emma is deliciously stage-mothering her through her speech. She's making it funny that Sally is struggling, struggling through this moment. I won't quote. It's actually quite hard to watch. Poppy would give her an enormous, enormous hug. Immediately. And then she'd take her flamenco dancing in the morning.

7:47 (because Sally's moment was... pretty long) Against the heaviest competition of the night, I just saw the worst pharmaceutical drug I've ever seen, for Orencia. I didn't catch what it's supposed to help with, but I did hear this amazing passive-voice construction: "Some cancers have been reported." Also, "Be wary if you have any infections, including open sores."

7:49 Confessions of a Shopaholic ad. Normally, I'd be a flat "No." But, P.J. Hogan. And also, Kristin Scott Thomas. So... ?

7:51 Is everyone unusually drunk and disorderly tonight? The roar of talk in the background is crazily loud tonight, and the presenters keep having to be grouchy at everyone to get them to shut up. Jake Gyllenhaal is currently having this trouble before launching into an unnervingly robotic intro to the unnervingly robotic Benjamin Button. God, I hated this movie. "I was just thinking how nothing lasts, and what a shame that is." Funny: I was just thinking how some things last forever and ever and ever, and what a shame that is, and I think you know what I mean.

7:53 TV THING (MINISERIES OR MOVIE)
I WANT: To know why Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange are cracking themselves up. And to know what happened to Susan Sarandon's career. From one point of view, she got a lot out of a little for a long time. From another point of view, why can't she get almost anything together now?
I PREDICT: Oh, probably John Adams, although Cranford is a little bit Globesy, and they obviously liked Recount.

John Adams does in fact win, which in and of itself makes Jessica Lange laugh. But why?

7:55 NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! This means a Tom Hanks speech!! I usually need several weeks to prepare for one of these. He's just so positive that he charms everybody, and he just — well, okay, he got on and off quickly. Even Rita Wilson looks surprised that he shuts up so fast.

7:56 Demi Moore is TOO. MUCH. I'll say why during the next commercial break, because right now:

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
I WANT: Ledger, but Downey would be great, and Philip Seymour Hoffman (a no-show) and Ralph Fiennes were also quite good
I PREDICT: Ledger, and so do you. Demi is already pulling out the Solemn before she opens the envelope, because she knows it's smart to be prepared. And so it was. Heath wins. Christopher Nolan walks up to accept the award and—Demi forestalls him to show a clip of Heath's performance? Which everyone alive has already seen? Whaaaa?

Oh, good, Nolan still gets to say something. Heath's passing: "A hole ripped in the future of cinema." An eloquent remark; describes the performance as making it easier not to lament Ledger's absent future and instead to cherish what he accomplished during his life. Well played, Chris Nolan.

8:00 Okay, Demi Moore. A) I have never, ever seen the parent of a Miss Golden Globes steal The Thunder by also presenting during the broadcast. Which by default means that the Bearer of a Miss Golden Globes has never previously raced to upstage her daughter by making "comic" fun of her posture. And you know Demi was like, "Even though I have no acting career outside of my deathless celebrity, I demand to present the single award that everyone will be talking about in the morning!!" It's just astonishing. And then, she cuts in when Chris Nolan arrives. This gal is like a Newtonian Law. There is nothing you can do about her. She is implacable: she will wrest, squeeze, and claw every single nanosecond of attention that she possibly can away from whomever is foolish enough to want any attention when Demi is around.

8:04 Tom Brokaw is here?? Why? Screwing up a presidential debate isn't enough for one former news anchor to accomplish in three months' worth of TV? And is this man ever going to admit to the stroke he has so obviously had? Whatever. I don't care, just like I don't care about Frost/Nixon, though I can see where Tom Brokaw would. Ron Howard is doing one of those facial-hair things again. I think he just wants to look 30+ just once in his life before he dies.

8:06 Colin Farrell, looking dapper, which is a relief. We've seen him do otherwise. But there's no hair grease, et al., to speak of. And he's presenting...

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
I WANT: No strong preferences here, since I have only seen two and a half of them.
I PREDICT: Waltz with Bashir, I guess. And I guessed right! I saw Ari Folman at a Q&A and a party in London this fall (allow me the one starf**ker name-drop I will ever be allowed), and he was completely charming the whole evening. And the film is strong and ambitious, and he does a smart job of being allusive to the current warfare without being overbearing about it. So, good for him. And if my lip-reading is worth anything, I think Glenn Close agrees.

8:08 TV THING (ACTRESS IN A MOVIE OR MINISERIES)
I WANT: All of these actresses to be my friends. Catherine Keener and Laura Linney look amazing. Shirley MacLaine looks, unfortunately, like she's barely holding on.
I PREDICT: Shirley MacLaine? Nope! The Lovely Laura Linney. Takes no time for Shirley to start clapping happily for her, or maybe she's just applauding the gorgeous, honey-colored dress with the interesting but subtle structure and the fabulous, long, gorgeously styled hair. Susan Sarandon does not find it very easy to clap for her competitor. Laura leaps past the stiff competition of Kate Winslet, Laura Dern, and a handful of others and immediately claims the lead in the "Most Gracious Speech" contest. And she isn't even particularly self-conscious about it. She's just so obviously nice. Though I did already know that.

8:13 This liveblog, like the Globes broadcast, has been brought to you by Stella Artois. I am totally happy to push that product because Stella subsidizes the Landmark theater chain, the Chicago International Film Festival, and just about every thing that I, too, would make corporate donations to if I were a multinational conglomerate. I'm not even sure I'm crazy about their beer, but it's the one that I buy, for the reasons just enumerated. I hope this doesn't mean I'm supporting Prop 8 or Darfur or something, but I suspect I'm not.

8:15 That movie where Clive Owen and Naomi Watts are shooting bullets in the Guggenheim and being terrorized by a bank. I'm terrorized by my bank all the time, but I don't shoot anybody, and I don't make crappy-looking movies about it.

8:17 Gerard Butler intro'ing In Bruges, which I finally watched last night. Just didn't buy it, guys. Too self-consciously cheeky and flattered by itself for me to possibly take Colin Farrell's Catholic guilt at all seriously. And how many times did the movie get bogged down in shot/reverse, shot/reverse, shot/reverse? And the girl was a chore. But this liveblog isn't about In Bruges.

8:19 BEST SCREENPLAY
I WANT: I guess Doubt or The Reader, but they have serious liabilities as scripts. Just not as many as the other ones have.
I PREDICT: Slumdog, and inevitably, it wins. Freida Pinto, not surprisingly, is delighted. Simon Beaufoy, who showed such inspiration in swiping that completely implausible conceit out of a novel that nobody ever says anything nice about, and then added lots of tasteless parallel plots and a whole ark-load of clichés. I'm so pleased to see it win. (But at least Beaufoy seems like a nice fellow.)

8:21 TV THING (TV COMEDY ACTOR)
I WANT: A good speech, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Carell or Baldwin
I PREDICT: Baldwin. Who wins. Looks nice in his suit. At some point I'll have to see some of this show. "I remember when I used to bring Rumer Willis a juice box on the set of the movie!" He literally thanks Tina Fey four times, right up front, which is a totally fetch(ing) thing to do. Also thanks his daughter Ireland, which is sort of risky territory for him, but he soldiers on through.

8:24 Ads. This is the fourth time Kate Walsh has tried to sell me a Cadillac, and the fourth time she has tried to give a line reading about "smoldering for a long... long... time" as though she herself smolders. I beg to differ, but there are so, so many ways in which I am not the target audience for this ad.

8:26 S. Epatha Merkerson is in an ad selling Uniball pens, with the conceit that if you use a Uniball, identity theft is impossible. I honestly cannot tell if this is a joke or not. Possibly because Epatha has been such a hoot on so many awards shows that she inevitably makes me laugh, but also — seriously? Uniball "embeds its ink so far into the paper fibers that the thieves can't erase it"? That's the claim? What could this possibly mean?

8:28 GGAHHH!!!!!! NOBODY TOLD ME that Renée Zellweger would be here, and no one told me that she'd be wearing the mosquito net that Marilyn Manson packs when he boats up the Amazon. She's intro'ing The Reader, rather haltingly, though her first words refer to "The story of an older woman..." And this directs my attention to her bizarrely gray hair, and I just – do what I always do these days when Renée is at issue. I just sort of – deflate.

8:30 TV THING (ACTOR, MOVIE OR MINISERIES
I WANT: To believe that in 2009, we aren't still using "flamboyant" as a code word for GAY. For Chrissakes. From what I can tell, Tom Wilkinson and Ralph Fiennes read Cate Blanchett's black-market pamphlet and they have succeeded in being cast in everything.
I PREDICT: Paul Giamatti, I would think. I'm expecting a speech that means to be funny but somehow isn't. Let's see what happens.

8:32 Giamatti is drunk, and thanks "Dame Linney." I would like to think that I am a trained reader of Laura Linney's body language at this point, and I think she's not that into Paul Giamatti. Everyone at the John Adams table looks nervous that he's going to say something awful. But then he's off.

8:33 When Glenn Close presents, she always sort of Angela Bassetts it. She YELLS THE NOMINEES AT YOU!! And her outfit is almost always upsettingly drab, or it's got, like, the debris from the sales-floor at QVC all hot-glued and staple-gunned to it. And such is the case tonight.

TV THING (COMEDY SERIES)
I PREDICT: 30 Rock. Maybe if I didn't watch any movies whatsoever I'd be totally good at predicting the winners in those categories? Because I haven't seen any of these shows, but it all seems so clear to me. The guy who accepts (and those of you who watch 30 Rock probably know who he is) makes some funny jokes about post-racial America and takes a faux-potshot at Cate Blanchett. At about this time, it all starts to seem unbecomingly sozzled, but then he says the best thing that anyone has ever said at an awards show microphone: "I wanna thank the girl at the craft service, because when she make the tacos, she do 'em just right!" You know Robert Downey or Eileen Atkins would have said exactly the same thing if they had won.

8:40 Again with the Cadillac SUV's, though this time not care of Kate Walsh. Still, I'm glad it's hybrid and all, but how sympathetic am I supposed to be to the aspirational shopper who just has to haul eight people around in a huge roadfort and demands to get flawless gas mileage? Whatever. Oh, and here's the Orencia again. Remember, the open sores. And now Mira Sorvino, plugging her new TV movie directly to the camera: "I think everyone is sort of fascinated by that world of secrets spreading across continents." What... does she – ??

8:42 Pierce Brosnan introduces a clip of Mamma Mia!, and sort of finesses the fact that he sang so awfully in it. His face tells you that he knows he is a joke, but his teleprompter script sort of skates right past the issue. But we were there, and we all remember. Nathaniel thinks Best Picture could be within Mamma Mia!'s grasp, and you don't ever want to bet against Nathaniel. But: what if I die?

8:43 P.Diddy intro'd as the producer (but not as the star?) of A Raisin in the Sun. Kate Beckinsale is his co-presenter, of course, and she's hailed as the star of the "upcoming" movie Nothing But the Truth. So, has that movie opened or what?

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
I WANT: A nominee worth getting excited about.
I PREDICT: Benjamin Button, though it's bottom-drawer Desplat. But it could just as easily be Slumdog.

8:44 The Slumdog thing is so far out of control. The Globes producers cannot help but cut to Angelina Jolie. Rorschach: they see impoverished non-white kids and they immediately think "Angie!" But she has the grace to look completely not impressed with Slumdog Millionaire. I swear I am not just projecting.

8:46 TV THING (BEST ACTRESS)
I WANT: To know why Debra Messing keeps getting work. The people who wrote the teleprompter copy try to make a virtue out of the fact that all five of this year's nominees have been nominees before. Because it's so great when the same lineup just repeats ad nauseam.
I PREDICT: Tina Fey, and she wins, no doubt in a landslide. Everyone's hoping for some Sarah Palin action, but I'm sure they're not gonna get any. If I had the time to install a poll, this is what it would be: "Does everyone in the room at the Golden Globes most want to sleep with Kate Winslet or Tina Fey?" She uses her speech to take down three haters on the internet; she seriously calls them out by handle.

8:50 During this commercial break, it is occurring to me that we still have the Cecil B. DeMille Award to deal with, which always takes 68 minutes; and the recipient is Steven Spielberg; and we already know that Tom Hanks and Tom Cruise are both in the audience. So I might need to step out quickly to the Walgreens, or go a little further down the street and make good on that Stella Artois plug that I dropped higher up.

8:52 Is it because I'm getting older, or because of my bad TV reception, or because of some Body Snatchers-type situation that I cannot tell these people apart? There's a woman in the audience, wearing a dress in the magenta family, and I thought she was Amanda Seyfried, and then I realized that she was Michelle Pfeiffer, but it turns out that she's actually Cameron Diaz. Which is good, if you're Cameron. You want to be mistaken for Michelle Pfeiffer, and my confusion strongly implies that she isn't wearing one of those tragic, dirty, unpressed, good idea but badly executed gowns that always let you know that it's Cameron Diaz. But seriously, what's wrong with me?

8:54 HOW DID I KNOW THIS WAS NEXT? Spielberg Hour. He's sitting there with Chynna Phillips Kate Capshaw. Martin Scorsese's on stage: "When I think of Steven Spielberg, I think of history." This opening line lets us know that this tribute will begin with the creation of the Pyramids and catch us up, year by year, to the present moment.

8:56 The producers just did a sort of sonic cross-fade where Scorsese's remarks at the mic suddenly morphed into a solemn, pre-recorded meditation. No surprise that Schindler's List is the first movie that gets a shout-out within Marty's tribute, but who'd have guessed that Amistad would be second?

8:57 Here's a secret, never before divulged: I'd love to teach a Steven Spielberg class, because so many of his movies inspire such ambivalence in me, and all of them, even the great ones and the bad ones, make me curious to see them again and test my initial reactions. I'd love to see The Color Purple and Empire of the Sun and Jurassic Park again, and even stuff I couldn't deal with the first time around, like the last two thirds of War of the Worlds. One glaring exception to this overall rule is Catch Me If You Can. I'm not even remotely tempted. And a more obvious exception is The Terminal, which was an unqualified ordeal.

9:00 Kind of fun to re-think Spielberg's career in the added context of clips from movies that he produced or exec-produced, and TV shows that he directed or produced. Y'all thought I'd just be bringing the snark, right? But you've gotta hand it to Spielberg. Whatever else there is to say about him, he's accomplished an incredible lot, and he's pushed a lot of his own boundaries, and a lot of other people's boundaries. Everyone in the room has either worked with him or wants to.

9:03 Who knew that Spielberg felt so indebted to Cecil B. DeMille? And again, I'm being sincere: I love the idea that a little kid saw The Greatest Show on Earth, which it's so hard for me not to think of as just a totally crappy movie, and that he extrapolated an entire life's calling out of it. The audience is eating up this story, but Clint Eastwood especially is eating up this story. Little moment for the old dudes. Also eating it up: Drew Barrymore.

9:05 Fabulous idea to give a shout-out to the importance of professional mentoring. Though I wish his examples of glorious apprenticeship didn't all add up to A History of Straight White Guys Handing Each Other the Magic Keys.

9:07 Totally loving this part, paraphrased: "We can't bow to economic pressure to only make movies that appeal to huge audiences; we also have to make movies that appeal to individuals in our audiences." Way to go on that speech, Steven, especially since people might actually listen to you. Or, if Steven thinks this, it might reflect that other people in Hollywood already agree with him. Which would be great, in 9 out of 10 cases. (As long as Christmas 2010 doesn't somehow turn into Revolutionary Road 2: The New Neighbors! But you know, I'm not worried.)

9:10 Wynonna Judd and her big bag of hot mess are endorsing a new weight-loss drug. I love Wynonna, but I don't know if I — you know how some people are every two years on Oprah's couch, saying that this time, they've finally got their stuff together? Try not to take pharmaceutical recommendations from those people.

9:12 Dustin and Emma! Emma does the shushing. Seems like her needle is tipping a little on the Crazy side. I'm fine with that. I think that the Teleprompter is maybe melting or something. No one, all night — no one seems to know what's going on, or where to look, or what is happening. If Emma Thompson can't figure out what's happening, there is a prob. lem.

BEST DIRECTOR
I WANT: Again, "want" isn't the word, but Stephen Daldry.
I PREDICT: I said Fincher earlier today, but now, it's clearly Slumdog's night.

9:14 Danny Boyle, to the HFPA: "Your mad, pulsating affliction for our film is very much appreciated." Oops, he said "affection." Not sure how I made that mistake. Just can't figure it out. Isn't it funny, though, how the sentence still made sense? How delicious of him to thank the actors, whom he quite visibly had no facility with whatsoever, based on the evidence of the film.

Okay, whatever, I'll stop.

9:16 Sigourney, wearing one of those dresses that Michelle Obama sometimes rocks: "Yeah, I bought it off the rack, and it's cotton blend, and I look fab. Keep up with me, people." She's intro'ing Revolutionary Road, because she = The Ice Storm = Crisis in Connecticut.

9:18 BEST ACTOR (MUSICAL/COMEDY)
I WANT: Last Chance Harvey to be even better than it looks, or Pineapple Express to be way better than it looks. Franco not here.
I PREDICT: Farrell. Corrrrect. Is Farrell a weeper? It would seem so! Are we about to experience one of those I'm Actually a Sensitive Guy situations? (I am happy for you, T!) I didn't care for Farrell in the movie, but this is why I love speeches: he's obviously completely besotted with this script and feels overwhelmed to have won for a movie he's so proud of. He offers to give Brendan Gleeson one hemisphere from his Globe. He philosophizes that "curiosity is love." The speech is very sweet but reminds me just a wee bit of lectures I give where I sort of lose my own thread a little.

9:22 I think the producers are cutting to pre-taped footage here, but it sure looks like everyone is already hob-nobbing and rubbing while Colin is finishing his speech. And, tell me if I'm wrong, but I think Brad Pitt maybe just leaned forward and farted at his table, and cracked himself up? Anyone else catch that? If so, that's Coen Brad for you, who doesn't necessarily charm the socks off of me, but he's so much better than Benjamin Brad.

9:26 "Ladies and gentlemen, actress and producer, Salma Hayek!" It still sounds like all of Mumbai is celebrating the Slumdog wins in the back of the room. Why is everyone so loud? The Vicky Cristina Barcelona clip shows how funny Cruz is in the movie, but also how miserably edited and indifferently shot it is. Sigh

9:28 Sasha Baron Cohen tries three jokes, and they're all lame. Seriously. Plastic surgery jokes. Charlie Sheen sex jokes. And a deeply mean-spirited Madonna divorce joke, that the whole room loudly and appropriately boos. He really seems like such a —

BEST PICTURE (MUSICAL/COMEDY)
I WANT: Burn After Reading, which is a total hoot with great, sharp edges
I PREDICT: Happy-Go-Lucky, which is perfectly acceptable. (Meryl is still scowling at Sasha. Love her.)

WHOA! It's Vicky Cristina Barcelona! You gotta hand it to Nathaniel, who did predict this. And you gotta hand it to Woody. This is a pretty huge deal! And here's Woody's sister, who technically produced the movie. But Harvey Weinstein's hulking around, so it's hard to know how much of her own producing she was allowed to do. I'm pretty blown away by this win, and by hearing someone say "Patty Clarkson" at the microphone. Nice to see a comedy that isn't a musical, isn't a period piece, and isn't even a high-concept situation win the prize: obviously, people liked the movie and thought it was funny. Even if I don't share their enthusiasm, I like the spirit of this win.

9:32 You know the ceremony's almost over, because all of the semi-celebrities are racing to get their pictures taken on their camera phones with the actual celebrities. Though the tables are smashed too close together for any of the Slumdog kids to get close to the front-rowers, like Brad and Angie.

9:34 Visit The3Day.org and donate to the fight against breast cancer! Another ad I'm happy to reiterate. Stella Artois and breast cancer. My causes of the evening, but definitely not in that order.

9:36 Amy Adams thinks Freida Pinto is beautiful. For sure, Freida is working the heck out of a truly unusual color. Sort of Dijon Mustard After Dark.

9:37 BEST ACTRESS (DRAMA)
I WANT: Hathaway! I like all five actresses a lot, but hers is the only performance that doesn't seem much lesser than her own best work.
I PREDICT: Hathaway! Younger gal + big star + fashionista. As good a Globes recipe as any.

But no! Kate Winslet wins a second time, which apparently answers my earlier inquiry vis-à-vis her and Tina Fey. I can't quite work out why Sam Mendes looks so overgrown, and why he doesn't seem all that able to enjoy this moment, though he does give her quite the hug. Not my business. Kate = obviously overwhelmed, and also = a total doll. Again remembers to thank the writer of the original novel. Well played, and still happening...

9:41 A gorgeous tribute to Leo, followed by a lovely one to Sam. Those who don't keep up with the press will be forgiven for being confused about which one she's married to.

9:42 Kate obviously wins the award for All-Time Most Moved to Win an Award. Everything I said about Colin Farrell times at least seven.

Still 9:42 Indeed, why are Blake Lively and Rainn Wilson presenting — oh wait, it isn't what I thought. But it's not what Blake and Rainn thought, either. Why does no one know what's going on??

TV THING
I WANT: You know I completely don't care.
I PREDICT: Mad Men? Mad Men. Whatever. I missed my moment to say: Anne, Angelina, Meryl, Kristin, and Kate all looked extraordinarily beautiful. Perhaps the glammiest, loveliest category ever seen on a TV. (While typing this, I think I heard the producer or creator or whatever of Mad Men celebrate the fact that Jon Hamm won, but I thought that Jon Hamm didn't win? Are we experiencing a postmodern multiplication of competing and truthy narratives? Or did he just mess up? Or if he says Jon Hamm won, does he strategically feel that everyone will believe it to be true?)

9:48 An ad for an anti-depressant called Abilify, which seems like a horrible Orwellian monsterword, just cautioned people to call their doctors if they start to experience thoughts of suicide while taking the drug. In addition, it may induce a coma, or even death. Just like the middle hour of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I only put it that way because the first hour is a coma, and the last hour is like death.

9:49 BEST ACTOR (DRAMA)
I WANT: Mickey Rourke, but don't tell Sean.
I PREDICT: Sean, and you can tell Mickey, cuz I think he probably thinks the same thing.

Susan Sarandon says "The Curious Case of Benjamin Britten" which for any number of reasons, several of them related to Billy Budd and also to buggery, is a movie I'd strongly prefer to have seen.

9:50 MICKEY ROURKE!! Now, we're talking. Finally something to get really excited about. YAY!! I can't believe I'm so electrified and heart-full to see this straggly, sunglasses-wearing man accept a prize. And he right away thanks his new, young agent for "having the balls." I'm already into it.

9:52 Darren Aronofsky looks almost as proud of Mickey as he was of Rachel. Mickey calls him "a really special director" and thanks him for fighting to have him in the movie. He checks in to make sure he got Peter Rice's name right. He thanks Axl Rose for donating "Sweet Child o' Mine" for no money whatsoever. Mickey is so obviously telling all of it exactly how it happened.

And then he thanks all of his dogs, living as well as dead. That is right up there with thanking the taco girl. It's a little bit hard to blame the Globes producers for cutting in with the peppy music, but I really, really wanted to know what was coming after that. Lucky dogs! You've said that before, but now, it makes more sense than ever. Lucky dogs! Thanked on the Globes, even in memoriam. Congrats, Mickey!

9:55 The Williams sisters (think: tennis) vs. the Manning brothers (think: NFL) in a pretty freaking fantastic commercial for Double Stuff Oreos. I owe a lot of good memories to Double Stuff Oreos, and now I can include this commercial. Definitely my favorite of the night, although I feel that I should supply this disclaimer based on personal experiences: Double Stuff Oreos can also result in an abrupt coma. Seriously, if you buy some, you better watch out for that.

9:58 BEST PICTURE (DRAMA)
I WANT: The Reader, but how is that the best they could do?
I PREDICT: Slumdog Millionaire, though I've done nothing to deserve it. Will Tom dance if it wins? Will the audience? Will it rain inside the dining hall? Will there suddenly be a train, or a giant communal waterboarding in a vat of Veuve Clicquot?

Nope, just a gathering of all the talent. Whatever. Congratulations, guys.

Meanwhile, I hope you all enjoyed this! My hands hurt a little, and my head's a little light, but as I look around the room at the Globes, I'm guessing that I'm not alone. Check back tomorrow for the conclusion to my Top Ten List for 2008, and keep checking back through the rest of Oscar season!