2013-02-22

Best Picture Nominees in 60 Seconds

Crap! The Oscars are in a couple of days and you still haven't seen many of the films yet, have you? Don't worry - I've broken all of the Best Picture contenders down into short scripts just as I did for the Best Pictures last year. BE WARNED that they all contain SPOILERS and SARCASM. In other words, if you want to see a film untarnished in the future, maybe skip reading that one.


Argo
Embassy Employees: Ack! Political unrest has led Iranians to threaten the lives of Americans in their country. We must hide.
U.S. Government: Ack! We need someone who can sneak our embassy employees out of Iran.
Ben Affleck: You’re going to need a suave hero, someone who doesn’t play by the rules, but still gets the impossible done… I know: I’ll cast myself.
U.S. Government: Okay, here are list of ideas we have…
Ben Affleck: Those ideas are trash! We’re going to pretend to be a Canadian film crew that wants to film a fake movie in Iran.
Hollywood Execs: And we’ll help because a story like this will be good material for real movies, too!
Embassy Employees: This plan will never work! We’ll be caught for sure.
Ben Affleck: It sure will work. I, Ben Affleck, have never ever failed at anything. And if you want to look less conspicuous, you could all take off your ridiculous oversized eyeglasses.  
Audience: Isn’t this supposed to be a true story? I heard they got the embassy employees got on the plane with no problem, but the movie just had them encounter like ten implausible problems in a row where they almost get caught.
Ben Affleck: “Based on a true” story means I can change it all I want. It’s a director’s discretion. Just like my decision to throw in a gratuitous shirtless scene. 
Audience: Ah, so it’s less historical, and more just your run of the mill suspense film. Why is it getting so many awards then?
Hollywood Execs: Because we love any movie that celebrates Hollywood and portrays us as heroes. 
Audience: It might have been more interesting if you turned the fake movie into a real one and just actually created the cheesy science fiction movie from the screenplay you gave to Iran.
Ben Affleck: Ooh, I’ll direct that! But my character has to be awesome and we’re going to need to write in a nude scene for me. 

Silver Linings Playbook
Bradley Cooper: I have bipolar disorder, I’m obsessed with my estranged wife who has a restraining order against me, I freak out when books don’t have a happy ending, and I destroy things in a blind rage when I hear the song “My Cherie Amour”… but I’m not crazy.
Jennifer Lawrence: My husband recently died and I was so distraught that I had sex with all eleven of my coworkers before I was fired… that’s not even a plausible backstory, but I’m sticking too it…  and I’m also not crazy.
Family Members: Actually, you are both crazy, and that’s why we’re trying to fix you up… the same as we would if you were both fat or black or disabled.
Bradley Cooper: But we have nothing in common!
Jennifer Lawrence: [lists the many medications she’s taking]
Bradley Cooper: Fine, we have something in common, I guess we can be friends. But I’m going to use you to try to reconnect with my wife.
Jennifer Lawrence: And I’m going to lie to you about what she’s saying and force you to enter a dance competition with me.
Robert De Niro: Son, you’re spending way too much time dancing with that girl when you know my superstitions dictate that I need you doing and wearing certain things when my favorite sports teams are playing. You’re responsible for my tens of thousands in recent gambling losses!
Jennifer Lawrence: Now would be a good time to point out that your superstitions make you even crazier than us two, but since an unhealthy obsession with sports and gross mismanagement of money is considered pretty commonplace in America, I’ll instead argue that your team has done better when your son spends time with me.
Robert De Niro: Oh, you’re right! My superstitions live on. I’ll go double or nothing by betting on your dance competition.
Jennifer Lawrence: Don’t do that, we’re amateurs entering a professional competition and we suck.
Robert De Niro: Nonsense, I don’t take advice from crazy people!
[ridiculous dance competition sequence]
Bradley Cooper: Remember how I said I only like happy endings? Well watch us force one now: we just got the bare minimum score to win back my dad’s money and despite showing no interest previously: Jennifer Lawrence, I love you.
Jennifer Lawrence: And I love how we tried to turn this movie into a romantic comedy in the final thirty seconds. [make out]

Zero Dark Thirty
CIA Agent: Give us information! [tortures terrorists]
Maya: I’m watching you do this, expressionless. Just like the movie, I swear I am staying neutral on the subject of torture.
CIA Agent: You gotta teach people not to be violent dicks by being a violent dick, Maya. You’re in the CIA, toughen up.
Maya: I am tough! Now watch me use psychological tricks instead of physical ones to get information from this guy.
Terrorist: I’ll tell you everything!
CIA Lady: Hi, Maya, I’m the CIA’s other tough bitch. But I’ll let my guard down and we can be friends.
Maya: Thanks I’d like that.
CIA Lady: Oops, but now I also let my guard down when interacting with a terrorist. [explodes, dies]
Maya: [cries] Let me wipe my tears up with this old file that’s of no use… oh, hey, this brief we’ve had forever has all of the secrets! I found Osama.
CIA Heads: Really, Maya? You make a compelling case and tend to be on point, but we’re still skeptical, mainly because of mild misogyny.
Maya: Fuck! Shit! I’m swearing in front of you to prove I’m tough and competent.
CIA Heads: We’re convinced. Let’s send some soldiers to Osama’s home.
Soldiers: [kill some people including Osama]
Maya: Yay? [cries for America

Django Unchained
Christoph Waltz: I hate slavery! But I’d like to buy a black man to work for me and make me money. Hmm, that kind of still sounds like slavery when I say it aloud…
Django: All right, Mr. Bounty Hunter, I helped you out. Free me now?
Christoph Waltz: That, or you could be my assistant, and you could use the money we earn on bounties to buy the freedom of your slave wife.
Django: Sure. [kills a LOT of white people] Cha-ching! Now let’s go get my dearest Broomhilda.
Leonardo DiCaprio: Welcome to my plantation. I make niggers fight each other to the death. And I have a pretty nigger named Broomhilda who you can have your way with, if you’d like. Let me say "nigger" a few more times to make the audience even more uncomfortable and so you don't somehow miss that I’m a racist asshole. Nigger, nigger, nigger.
Samuel L. Jackson: I don't like this Django nigger! I'm a slave who says "nigger"because I'm a new twist on an Uncle Tom character. Say, Master Leo, I think Django and Christoph are really paying us a visit to take back Broomhilda. 
Django: Uh oh, the jig is up. [shoots nearly 100 white men] You're dead! You're dead! You're dead! You're dead!...
[somehow more white men with guns arrive]
Django: [shoots them all] You're dead! You're dead! You're dead! You're dead! You're dead! And Samuel L. Jackson, now you're dead, too!
Broomhilda: Oh, Django, you've killed almost the entire Southern population... my hero!
Django: Let's ride off into the sunset as this awesome soundtrack plays.


Les Miserables
Hugh Jackman: [singing] For twenty years I’ve been a prisoner for committing a petty crime/But now I vow to be a better man after completing my time
Russell Crowe: [singing] Your supposed self-improvement will never last/I will ruin your future, just as I have your past
Anne Hathaway: [singing] I lost my job and now my kid and I are destitute/I sold my teeth and hair and now I’m a prostitute
Audience: [not singing] Wow, Anne, you’re giving an amazing performance, you’re easily the best part of this film.
Anne Hathaway: [singing] Too bad I’m already dying and things will fall flat/There’s still two hours left, so good luck with that! [dies]
Hugh Jackman: [singing] I promise to take care of your child and love her each day/I don’t think I mean that in a sexual way
Cosette: [singing] That’s too bad because I’m hot and my skin’s milky white/Just look at this Revolutionary experiencing love at first sight
Marius: [singing] It’s true, as you can probably tell from the bulge in my pants/I inexplicably care for you as much as a people’s uprising in France
Eponine: [singing] Wait, Marius, let me add a love triangle to this plot!/Oh never mind, instead I’ll just get shot [dies]
Marius’s Friends: [singing] We’re outmanned and will surely fail this mission/Let’s wait to fight the French army when we have more ammunition
Marius: [singing] No, we must fight on, we must be strong-willed/ [everybody but Marius dies] Oh crap, I just got all of my friends killed
Hugh Jackman: [singing] Russell Crowe, you have done your best to provide me with strife/But to show you I’m a better man, I will save your life
Russell Crowe: [singing] Because a criminal saved my life, I must kill myself now/My logic is as flawed as my singing voice, ciao! [commits suicide]
Hugh Jackman: [singing] Now that my oppressor is dead, I can finally be happy/So why is it that I suddenly feel so crappy? [dies of illness]
Cosette: [singing] I have a suggestion that I hope is not harried/Since everyone we know is dead, let’s get married
Marius: [singing] It almost seems unfair that the two most annoying characters have avoided beheading/But I guess we can have our friends’ ghosts sing at our wedding

Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln: Man, being the president is hard, but I vow to find a way to end both the Civil War and slavery, or my name isn’t Abraham Lincoln.
Sally Field: And your name is Abraham Lincoln! I mean, you’re played by Daniel Day-Lewis, but you’re so convincing in this role, it’s easy to forget. Meanwhile, it’s hard to see me as anything but Sally Field. Only my character is crazy… so, in other words, I’m still just Sally Field. [screams and cries]
Joseph Gordon-Levitt: And I play Lincoln’s son, but I still distractingly seem just like Joseph Gordon-Levitt, except that I’ve suddenly forgotten how to act.
Abraham Lincoln: I love my family, but y’all are a mess. Anyway, how can I secure more Congressional votes in order to abolish slavery?
Secretary of State: Well, politicians are a bunch of racist dicks. But if you bribed them, you could get the votes.
Abraham Lincoln: I pride myself on having ethics, but maybe if it means ending slavery, I could support secretly buying votes. Do the ends justify the means? I guess that’s something the audience can think about as we have repetitive meetings for two hours.
Tommy Lee Jones: As a member of Congress who is secretly in love with my black housekeeper, I support the Thirteenth Amendment since all humans are equal.
Congressmen: Boooo! We won’t end slavery if that means black people are equal. Slippery slope!
Tommy Lee Jones: Okay, even though you all know I’m lying, if I pretend to have less progressive views on race, will you agree to vote to end slavery? 
Congressmen: Yes... After bribery and crises of conscience, we have narrowly voted to end slavery.
Minor Black Characters: [smile]
Abraham Lincoln: Huzzah! What a great, heartwarming way to end the film.
Stephen Spielberg: Actually, for no particular reason, I'm going to skip ahead in time and end the film with you getting shot in the head. 
Abraham Lincoln: I should have stuck to vampire hunting.

Life of Pi 
Pi: Let me tell you a story about the time I got shipwrecked and survived on a lifeboat with a tiger for nearly a year. [tells two hour story]
Other Guy: Wow, that is quite a story; I’m particularly impressed with how long you managed to make it despite the fact that almost nothing happened other than you being on a small boat with a tiger. Considering that no one even saw the tiger once you reached land, surely people must have trouble believing this story is real.
Pi: Yes. You could also interpret the tiger as symbolic, an extension of my id. 
Other Guy: I mean, you were on a boat with plenty of time to dream up this metaphor and lonely enough to invent an imaginary friend...
Pi: Well, which story do you believe?
Other Guy: I’m going to believe the tiger story. [winks]
Pi: Good because we have this whole faith vs. reality theme going here and we’d really like people to lean pro-religion. Plus, that helps justify all that money we spent on the CGI tiger.

Amour

Old Husband: I love you, honey, I would do anything for you.
Old Wife: Thank you, sweetie. [has stroke]
Old Husband: This is unfortunate, but I’m here for you, dearest. How can I help?
Old Wife: No! I can do things for myself. [has another stroke]
Old Husband: Now you definitely can’t do things for yourself. But I love you so I am happy to help.
Old Wife: argarhkfgdsffdgkcfgh Don’t let them put me in a home. Dpdfglkcnklgnerngndjf
Old Husband: I promise, my love.
Adult Daughter: Dad, you really need help, you can’t take care of mom on your own.
Old Husband: I can take care of her just fine!
Old Wife: sdgihdfinbncgeirgjidjg I’m in so much pain. Aerhlsjrthgjszrithkjfgbllkdklg
Old Husband: Okay, I’m in way over my head now, but I made a promise to my wife that I wouldn’t get real care for her.
Old Wife: fghergfbdoghjedrhgjdhjd
Old Husband: Hey, so no big deal, but… [suffocates wife with pillow]
Old Wife: mmmfffmmm! [dies]
Old Husband: Love you! [dies, too]

Beasts of the Southern Wild
Hushpuppy: My name’s Hushpuppy and I live in a community outside of the levee, isolated from normal society. I love my dad and I’m going to be with him forever.
Father: Forever? [clutches heart] If only you understood foreshadowing, Hushpuppy. Besides, I don’t even know how to show you proper affection. Fuck, I have you live in your own shack so I can maintain my own space. But you’re six and old enough for that responsibility.
Hushpuppy: I’m gonna make myself cat food for dinner. [accidentally burns down shack]
Father: Damnit! … Uh oh, looks like a hurricane is coming.
Neighbor: I’m moving to the other side of the levee before our whole podunk town floods.
Father: You pussy! You should stay here and risk drowning with the rest of us. Of course, that’s easy for me to say because I’m already dying. Oh yeah, did I mention I’m dying, Hushpuppy? But you’re six, so it’s time for you to learn to fend for yourself.
Neighbor: Everything we had was destroyed in the flood and now government officials have moved us to a shelter for our own safety.
Father: The doctors checked me out and said I need a surgery to save my life. But fuck modern medicine! I’ll die if I want to. It’s not like I have a kid to look after.
Hushpuppy: Maybe I should try to find my ambiguously dead or deadbeat mom? [swims aimlessly in the ocean and befriends both a water buffalo-like creature and a stripper]
Father: Well, I’m dying now, so it’s a good thing you’re six and all grown up. I guess if you ever need anything you could ask that stripper lady who offered to watch out for you. [dies]
Hushpuppy: [sets father’s body on fire] My name’s Hushpuppy and this film is ending on a triumphant note suggesting that I am empowered and ready for the challenges ahead… despite all common sense to the contrary.

(For the record, not all of the films are as bad as these descriptions might suggest... but they make it so easy to be snarky about.)

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