danfrank wrote:I’m not watching but just curious: is everyone showing up for this like they did every year except last year, i.e., is all forgiven and the Globes have seemingly fully recovered?
A little hard to tell, because they didn't show nominees in the crowd as their nominations were being read, nor did they have them all on screen as the envelope was being opened. All winners but Blanchett were there (two TV winners were also absent), but I can't say if that reflected overall attendance, or if longer-shot nominees skipped the festivities in greater numbers than pre-COVID/scandal.
The winners were interesting enough, with the late-distributed two best film prizes being among the most difficult to be sure of. I was delighted by Banshees beating out Everything Everywhere... -- I just think McDonagh's movie is better, and I've been annoyed by the "inevitable" tone many have been adopting about the latter's best picture prospects. The Fabelmans I'm not especially high on, but anything, as long it wasn't Maverick, was acceptable by comparison.
The lead actors were pretty much expected (with Brendan Fraser not only having a less-nominated film, but having made it clear he wasn't attending). The Bassett win was the sole difficult choice in a performance category; I'm not sure if this moves her closer to an Oscar win (it could be good old HFPA star-fucking), but it might move her closer to a nomination.
Quan's speech was absolutely terrific, got the night off to a zippy start. Farrell, Yeoh, McDonagh and Spielberg also gave quite nice speeches.
I thought Carmichael made a pretty dreadful host. I'm not familiar with his work; maybe it comes off better in isolation. But his tone was so low-key, it failed to bring any energy to the proceedings, and a couple of his riskier jokes -- Scientology, Whitney Houston -- seemed to fall flat because of this. I wonder if Rickey Gervais' in-your-face style might have made them work better.
I watched this all through a Nyquil haze (not COVID; just a standard winter cold), so that's pretty much my full reaction.