The Oscars: Confusing the anger center of your brain for 81 years

I am not a fan of the Oscars.

I respect what it is to make movies. I adore it. It's arousing to me in ways that aren't entirely kosher, so to speak, but I recognize one thing about it: Movies are, by and large, horseshit.

I'm watching the "Best Song" Oscar being pre-empted by an overly dramatic musical presentation; someone, somewhere, has changed the channel because they printed that envelope, and they don't care. I do like the song from Wall-E, but Slumdog has two out of the three nominations here. Seems pretty wrapped up to me.

In fact the whole thing seems wrapped up: The inevitability of the winner's column betrays the controversy that seems to have jammed itself into a largely irrelevant show. Will Heath win the Oscar? Of course he f*cking did.

Dear God. The entire "Best Song" performance was one long mash-up of the three nominated songs. This is promotional gold. It's probably giving Don King a hard-on.

But here's the deal: That's not to say I'm not proud of the dude who won (Incidentally, that would be Allah Rakha Rahman, the John Williams of Bollywood). Clearly he is a simple man who has worked very hard to get where he is. He's probably some sort of superhero in India now, and I expect him to actually jump in front of the Bollywood camera soon. Which is why Bollywood still sucks. Seriously, though, his song was pretty good.

The thing this man, and really every one of the winners, has succeeded in doing is beating out pretension itself. Clawing through and climbing over every last pile of crap keeping you from that stage has to be exhausting, almost a torturous obstacle course. It's like punishing yourself for choosing a job most people consider to be make-believe. The individual, then, is the most real moment of the entire show -- every other second is just self-important masturbation, but for the time that the winners are onstage, the point of the whole thing shines through.

As someone who creates -- Acts, writes, directs, films, edits, records, etcetera -- you are clearly looking for one thing: Recognition. With a creative tilt the impulse is to share (hence this blog), but often it's a difficult road to get from idea to success. More often than not, the road ends, and failure sets in. And nine times out of ten, nobody notices either way. But when you've succeeded, and you believe in your work, and then a thousand people you think are more talented than you are congratulate you on being so awesome...

What a day at the office, right?

So yes, it's all crap. I'm not a fan of the Oscars, mostly because I'm not there. But we all do something we feel is important. Most of us do it privately. Most of us work hard in silence, or hope in secret. Recognition comes from a population much smaller than the Oscar audience, but the feeling is the same: Job Well Done. Even if the only people who care are the ones doing the same job.

Really, we could all use an awards show.