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So the Oscars is over for another year, and it’s another year where I haven’t seen any of the films up for any of the awards (bar Transformers and Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End). I’m tight, so I refuse to spend £6 to go to the cinema (which reminds me, I’m majorly peeved that Odeon have decided not to show the new Rambo film - I was looking forward to that!).

It struck me whilst watching that there’s at least a couple of categories that could be gotten rid of. Sound mixing and sound editing are nearly the same thing (well, they’re in the same ballpark anyway), and surely they could combine the two screenplay categories? The actual ceremony seems to drag on for hours, so I wish they’d at least consider combining categories.

This is a minor quibble though!

I don’t think there were any big suprises this year, and the only person I wanted to win anything (Javier Bardem) actually won - which was nice.

Jon Stewart did a great job as host, but it would be nice to see the Academy try out someone else - personally, I’d give Jerry Seinfeld a shot or perhaps Steve Carrell. Maybe next year.

The highlight of the whole thing happened BEFORE the awards ceremony began - watch the video to see what I mean.

Got to love the Busey.

It seems like every week I’ve been posting about somebody who’s died - guess what, it’s happened again.

Roy Schedier passed away on Sunday at the age of 75. He was one of those actors who you knew would put in a good performance, no matter how bad the film was. He was never really considered an "A List" actor, but he never really needed to be one either.

The role he will be most remembered for is, of course, Chief Brody. Even today, Jaws holds up as a very watchable piece of cinema (even if the shark does look a little pathetic) partly due to Schedier’s performance. Throughtout the film his family-man character acts as a stabilising center, the one person we could latch onto and believe in.

He was also in the somewhat enjoyable Seaquest DSV, which I recall watching on a Sunday afternoon on ITV. It wasn’t the best of shows, but it was a good lead in to You’ve Been Framed - please remember that I was only about 8!

I’m glad in some respects that he never returned for the last two Jaws films, as they were rotten to the core. It would have been nice to see him one last time as Chief Brody in a decent Jaws sequel, but alas that was never meant to be.

R.I.P Roy Scheider, heaven’s gonna need a bigger boat.

Yes, I realise I’m a couple of days late - Groundhog Day was on the 2nd of February.

As Punxsutawney Phil, the Seer of Seers, Prognosticator of all Prognosticators proclaimed we’ll have six more weeks of winter it got me to thinking about how much I love the film.

I have a weird semi-obsession with Bill Murray films that has lasted almost my entire life. I think it started with the original Ghostbusters film and has just snowballed from there. I can’t actually think of any films he’s in that I dislike (I’m not counting the Garfield films, so there!), which is unusual for me.

Anyway, got off on a bit of a tangent there - back to Groundhog Day!

I like the fact that Phil Connors doesn’t stop himself from trying new things (OK he has a seemingly endless amount of days to do this in, but you get my point!) or meeting new people.

I also think it’s interesting to see how one person can change his attitude and totally transform his life. To go from being a very negative and dour person to one that can inspire everyone around him is a great thing to watch on screen.

But the thing that I love most about the film though is the message that’s conveyed throughout the film, which is that we should look at every day as a fresh start - forget about what happened yesterday and go into every day as though it was the first day of your life. It’s a good way to go about things as instead of letting trivial incidents fester in your mind, you force yourself to forget about them almost instantly.

I’d recommend that you do this yourself - no matter what has happened yesterday, today is a brand new day full of opportunity and promise.

Sometimes you go into a film blind, without knowing a thing about it. Sometimes you go into a film knowing almost everything about it. And sometimes you go into a film expecting one thing, but getting another.

This latter is what happened to me whilst watching The Pursuit Of Happyness.

To be honest, I was expecting a cliche-ridden Hollywood crapfest - what I got instead was a brilliant picture with an important message.

To really get the full effect you need to watch the film, but I’ll give my thoughts on what I think the filmmakers were trying to convey.

It’s a simple message really - don’t ever let somebody tell you you can’t do something (in fact it’s one of the lines in the film).

I don’t care if you want to be the Prime Minister, an astronaut, a footballer, a millionaire, anything.

As long as you believe it’s going to happen to you, that’s where it starts - then it’s just a matter of time before you get what you desire.

I’ll leave you with the trailer and a suggestion to either get the DVD or watch it next month on Sky.

Goodbye.

What can you say?

I was/am genuinely looking forward to The Dark Knight coming out this summer, but Heath Ledger ending up dead is pretty sad news indeed.

I was trying to think earlier on if I’ve ever seen him in a bad film, and I honestly can’t say that I have (yes, I even though Brokeback Mountain was quite good you homophobes).

It’s such a waste - to think that after the Batman film comes out, he could almost literally have chosen any role that he wished.

Life sucks.

R.I.P.

Predator is one of the best action films ever made, in my opinion.

On paper it looks as though it will just be another generic "bang bang" film, but the reality is much more different - and it’s probably due to the dialogue.

From Jesse Ventura’s "I ain’t got time to bleed" to Arnie’s "stick around" or "GET TO DA CHOPPA!" the dialogue in the film is top drawer. Not the same kind of expression of the English language you would expect to see in a Shakesperian performance, but effective none-the-less.

I recently caught the sequel when it was on TV, and I wish I hadn’t bothered. It’s wrong on so many levels (Danny Glover, Gary Busey, Bill Paxton - enough said) that it just flat out stinks.

Don’t get me started on Alien Vs Predator either - what an absolute mess that was (and the sequel to it looks pretty shit as well).

I like to pretend the other films never happened and just stick with the original.

It’s the best thing to do.

I watched Jeepers Creepers last night.

I’d actually forgotten that Justin Long, of Dodgeball and Die Hard 4.0 fame, was in it.

Aside from that, I’d also forgotten how good a film it actually is.

OK, there’s some fairly stupid plothole-type things - where does The Creeper go when he’s in his van (actually, why does he even have a van!), why did he not attack the people in the diner - but these are minor complaints.

The sequel’s on in about an hour, so I’ll probably end up watching it as well (I’ve seen it before and it’s a total no-brainer, which is my kind of film).

I’m not even a really big horror fan, to be honest - although I’ll never ever watch Arachnaphobia again (spiders, OH MY GOD!).

Just a little insight into my boring ass life.

I saw I Am Legend yesterday.

It’s not a bad film (in fact, it’s probably Will Smith’s best performance since Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air!), it just doesn’t have anything that original in it. I realise that many films rehash old ideas, but this one just seemed to be lacking any originality at all - from the empty streets of New York, ala 28 Days Later (OK, it was London), to the pretty bad CGI mutants, there was very little to make you say "hey, I haven’t seen THAT before!".

The big letdown was the last act. I won’t spoil it for anyone, but be prepared to be disappointed.

All said though, I Am Legend is at least a good chance to see Will Smith acting his socks off - still not gonna get an Oscar!

In other news, Newcastle lost again today (2-1 to Chelsea) but Dunfermline won again!

A 2-1 win over Stirling Albion means it’s three wins in a row - champions?!?

I’ll be back tomorrow.

A programme titled "The 50 Greatest Disaster Films" is currently showing on Channel Five, here in the UK.

What an absolute crock of shit.

Reign Of Fire was a godawful film, Arachnaphobia isn’t a disaster film and Godzilla was crap (even if I enjoyed it!).

As much as I like these list shows, I sometimes wonder which simpletons they bothered asking - my guess is that they either look for films that they have the rights to show clips from, or just have a quick look on the Internet Movie Database for films that look like they might be disaster-types. Probablt the latter, knowing the shower of shit that is British television.

I dread to think what number one is.

Honestly guv, it’s a great film!