Treated like royalty

From Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent

Now I'm not one to brag [silence descends as a tumbleweed blows by], but sometimes, something so surreal and downright jammy occurs that you just have to boast about it to all and sundry: I got to see Prince. Live. From the VIP section. For Free. Standing opposite Paris Hilton.



How so, you ask? I was in Las Vegas a few weeks ago with three friends, and we had set our hearts on seeing the Artist Formerly Knownas The Artist Formerly Known as Prince (i.e. Prince) live at the Rio casino.



We excitedly turned up on the night with a pretty flexible budget for tickets, only to learn they were $250 each. That was that plan over.



However, twenty minutes before Prince was set to take to the stage, we decided to give it one more shot. Convinced that the bouncer was "of gay flavouring", I was sent to flirt and charm tickets out of him. Needless to say that was a car crash to behold, but it was at that precise moment that we got talking to one of those Americans who profess their love for Irish people in the most passionate of terms.



This lady then introduced us to the group of New York fund accountants she was with — who happened to have four spare passes for the show.The guy with the tickets then just gave them to us, told us to enjoy the show - oh, and that they were for the VIP section next to the stage, with free drink all night.



It was honestly the most random, no-strings-attached, generous good deed I had ever been party to. Before we knew it, we had a glass inhand, Prince was blasting out a cover of Stevie Wonder's Superstition and Paris Hilton was snogging Edie's hot nephew from Desperate Housewives in the section right in front of us.

A friend who has also been to Vegas says such a thing could only happen in Sin City. Amen to that. As for the rest of that trip, I'm afraid I'm going to have to keep shtum. I've already revealed too much. After all, what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.

Bertie V Enda

What a damp squib that was. Enda didn't land a killer punch - not even on matters of health and quality of life, which are two disastrous areas for Ahern. Enda never quite focused his arguments or provided clear details about how he will implement policies. Disappointing.

Bertie, of course, had all his statistics at hand, but they were largely impenetrable and off-putting. Worse, he came across as arrogant, sarcastic and cynical, with a nauseating sense of entitlement to the post of Taoiseach. He also seems very surly, no doubt due to the public and media pasting over Bertiegate. Do you really want to be stuck with that sulking for the next 5 years?

We have to 'choose' between these two? I'll leave it to Simon and Garfunkel - master chroniclers of lost idealism and cultural stagnation that they are - to sum up my impression of our two potential Taoisigh:

"...Going to the candidates' debate,
Laugh about it, shout about it,
When you have to choose,
Every way you look at this you lose."

Coalition Twister

Seeing how ambivalent the country seems to be about both putative coalitions on offer in the General Election, and in order to spare us from all the tortured post-election deal negotiations, the Dail parties should instead agree to play a game of Coalition Twister.

Considering there's no real difference between any of the parties - other than personnel - it could be a neat and speedy way to bring about the next Government.

President McAleese, as constitutional guardian, could call out theinstructions and each party could be assigned their own colour: Fianna Fail could be grey and the PDs a slightly lighter shade of grey; Fine Gael could be blue, Labour red, Sinn Fein black (as in sheep) and the Greens, naturally, a turquoise colour.

Following the rules of Twister, the various parties could then contort themselves left and right into whatever position is called for - shouldn't be too much of a stretch for any of them - and whatever colour or combination of colours still standing at the end could form the new Government. It would certainly bring some colour to this election for the first time.

In the case of townie V culchie...

From Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent


Ireland may have had its many divisions through the ages, but the great class war was one social conflict that appeared to have bypassed us, even as it swept across other countries such as our closest neighbour across the Irish Sea.


But we can take comfort in the fact that we had our own rather less socialist variant of class war - a conflict that's always been with us and probably always will: that of townie versus culchie.
I guess this divide is not a class struggle per se, but more of a vessel through which Ireland's favourite past-time — slagging — can be channelled.


I should point out that I am indeed a culchie (a ‘riddle inside an enigma inside a country accent’ as I was once described). The way it works, apparently, is that everyone born in Dublin is a townie and everyone born in the 25 other counties of the Republic are culchies, replete with strange, foreign dialects, the likes of which you’d only hear in the far reaches of the Middle East.


However, what Dublin folk often forget is that within the culchie kingdom, the classification system subdivides even more, forging a slew of hyphenated identities. So, for example, in Kilkenny where I am from, I would be considered a culchie-culchie seeing as I was raised in the countryside, whereas my friends who were born in Kilkenny city (and yes, it is a city!) are culchie-townies.


It’s all very complicated and so it can be easy to forget just who you are and where you’re from, which, a lot of the time, is exactly what some people are looking for. Thankfully, the rivalry is largely good-natured – even ironic, as so much is today - and the extremists on both sides who are genuinely vicious to each other are to be pitied more than anything else.


But perhaps the culchie vs townie rivalry persists because we culchies are a threat. We are literally taking over the capital in every walk of life. So with that in mind, all you townies who are so quick to slag should really make the effort to be nice to culchies. Chances are you'll end up working for one someday.
declan.cashin@gmail.com

Stare Master

From Day and Night magazine in Irish Independent, May 4, 2007


“A poor life this if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare”. Wise words indeed from poet William Henry Davies and it’s certainly the maxim by which I seem to live my life, though perhaps more literally than Davies conceived. Yes folks, I am a compulsive starer.



Now, while it might not be up there with body odour, halitosis or flatulence, my staring problem is still considered a major no-no in some quarters.



I guess it has its origins in my bad eye-sight, which requires that I spend a second longer training my gaze on someone in order to make out who they are. Of course, it's even harder to focus when the object in view is a total stunner.



Like a magpie, I can't seem to fight my attraction to shiny, pretty things, so when an alpha male crosses my path in bars, shops, on public transport and even on the street, I can't help gawking or 'rubber-necking' as a mortified friend of mine likes to call it.



But, thanks to the new The Day After Tomorrow climate that global warming has foisted upon us, Irish weather is picking up earlier every year. This brings with it the saviour for all us incorrigible rubber-neckers – sunglasses.



Your shades now become your mask and, by learning how to subtly move your head without actually turning too much, you’re free to gawp to your hearts content. But it can also be laden with traps and pitfalls, seeing as how everyone looks better in the sunshine, so you must learn to stare critically. It’s a fine art I tell you.



By this point, you probably have me written off as some pale, sweaty guy dressed in a cardigan, who sits in a tree with binoculars all day.



But for those of us who are pathologically incapable of flirting or chatting someone up, being a Stare Master can be our only lifeline when words so often fail. Just make sure that your winning stare is more ‘Come up and see me sometime’ rather than ‘Hello Clarice, have the lambs stopped screaming?’ Because that would be just creepy man.
declan.cashin@gmail.com

Reap What You Sow

Review of The Reaping, Irish Independent, April 20

There’s a theory in movie circles that for every bad movie an Oscar winner makes, a layer of gold strips away from their statuette. Hence, Meryl Streep’s two prizes stand relatively untainted, while Cuba Gooding Junior’s award has been reduced to a mere nub. Hilary Swank’s two (deserved) Oscars have taken a lot of hits in their time, but, after The Reaping, one of the gongs should be melted down so the gold can be used to fund a money-back-guarantee for moviegoers who buy a ticket for this staggeringly hokey thriller.



Swank plays Dr Katherine Winter, a former minister and missionary, who lost her faith in God following the death of her husband and child. She now devotes her time to investigating so-called miracles and using scientific procedures to debunk religious arguments.



When a teacher (David Morrissey) from a tiny hick town deep in Bible Belt Louisiana calls on her to examine why their river has turned to blood, Katherine’s scepticism is tested as more and more biblical plagues beset the town. As the frogs fall from the sky and livestock start acting like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park, Katherine comes to suspect that a creepy little girl, whose family are suspected by the God-fearin’ locals on being in a satanic cult, is being used as the vessel to bring Lucifer back to earth.



Director Stephen Hopkins, who helmed many episodes of the nerve-shredding TV thriller 24, certainly fails to replicate any of that show’s suspense in The Reaping. Every single genre cliché – from lights going out to doors blowing open to wind chimes to creepy ‘40s music on the gramophone – is wheeled out as the increasingly preposterous plot hurtles towards its apocalyptic finale. Swank, to her credit, tries to keep it all afloat, but she’s plagued by a witless script that, amazingly, took three people to write.



It just might be possible that The Reaping is actually a clever, metaphorical take on how puberty turns your little angel into a demon or even on the rapid Christian fundamentalism of George W. Bush’s America. I doubt it though, and the best that can be said of this tired, possibly offensive horror, is that its location shoot must have given a much-needed boost to Louisiana’s devastated post-Katrina economy. An unholy mess.
Rating 1/5

Reign Man

Review of Reign Over Me, Irish Independent, April 20

Film-makers have only very recently begun to examine the ripple waves that the 9/11 terrorist attacks sent into the wider American culture and psyche. Whereas Oliver Stone's sentimental World Trade Centre and Paul Greengrass' astounding United 93 were based on the actual events of that day, Reign Over Me focuses on one man who lost everything in the atrocity and the long term effect it had on him.


Don Cheadle plays Alan Johnston, a successful dentist who is becoming increasingly suffocated by the reasonable but persistant demands of his wife (Jada Pinkett Smith) and children. One day, Alan randomly bumps into his old college roommate Charlie Fineman (Adam Sandler), whose wife and three daughters were on one of the planes that hit the Twin Towers.



Since then, Bob Dylan-lookalike Charlie, once a dentist also, has suffered a total mental breakdown due to post traumatic stress disorder, and spends his days drowning out the world with (admittedly excellent) music, playing videogames and spinning around Manhattan on his scooter. Charlie's regression into man-boy anaesthesia offers the buttoned-down Alan a chance to relive his frat days, before he sets about trying to get his disturbed friend to see a caring shrink (Liv Tyler) to deal with his grief.



Sandler demonstrated in Punch Drunk Love that he can ‘do’ serious and his patented infantile demeanour proves to be an effective entry point into Charlie’s profound trauma. In the pivotal scene where Charlie finally discusses what happened to his family, the actor is nothing short of extraordinary. Sandler and the always dependable Cheadle work well together, even when their chemistry is often forced to compensate for director Mike Binder's (The Upside of Anger) lack of pacing.



The real problem with Reign Over Me is that it’s as preoccupied with the modern masculinity crisis as it is 9/11. This would be fine if the two issues didn't mutate into a situation where Alan seems envious of Charlie's ‘freedom’. But Charlie's not free - his family were murdered in a terrorist attack! Does that mean Alan would be happier if he lost his wife and kids?





This tasteless dichotomy is just one of several off-key notes in an over-long film that, much like its central character, constantly finds ways of distracting itself from the fundamental issues.
Rating: 3/5
Declan Cashin

Disappointing Date

Review of Speed Dating from Day and Night in the Irish Independent, April 20

James Van Der Bexton (Hugh O'Conor) is the sensitive heir to a family fortune who is still depressed about his devastating break-up with his girlfriend (Flora Montgomery) three years after the event.




James unsuccessfully turns to speed dating to mend his broken heart, where he tends to scare the girls more than anything with his intensity and lame attempts at seduction.


A girl in his local pub soon catches his eye and he begins following her ("it's not stalking, it's research" goes the movie's blurb), in the course of which he's involved in an accident and develops amnesia.



The target of his affections then disappears and is presumed dead, and through a series of unfortunate coincidences, James becomes the chief suspect. With the help of an Australian nurse (Emma Choy), James tries to rediscover who he was before the accident, clear his name and maybe even find love.


As you can tell from that brief synopsis, debut director Tony Herbert dips his toes into a number of different genres with Speed Dating, but this does little more than destabilise the whole movie with its increasingly bizarre and incongruous shifts in tone.


What's more, the over-packed plot fails to hit the mark either as a thriller or a romantic comedy, and all too often tries to spice things up by injecting relentless bouts of self-conscious quirkiness into proceedings. Hence there are minor subplots revolving around James' oddball family (including Goth sister Nora Jane Noone), eccentric friends and an aggressive detective (played by a scenery-annihilating Don Wycherley).


O'Conor, forever etched in our memories for his extraordinary turn as the young Christy Brown in My Left Foot, is an appealing and charming lead - no easy feat considering how creepy his character is often called upon to behave. Newcomer Choy makes a sparkling debut, while Charlotte Bradley has a great cameo as James' sozzled aristocratic mother.


Speed Dating does have moments when it seems on the verge of providing some insight into the quest for love in modern Ireland. It's just a pity that, like a speed dater, it hastily skips over and flirts with so many different tones and styles, never settling on one long enough to really make a connection.
Rating 2/5
Declan Cashin

Close Shave

This is the Alternatively column for April 20 from Day and Night in the Irish Independent

This week's topic is really just one for the boys I'm afraid, as I wouldn't expect you lady readers to understand anything about punishing beauty regimes or excruciating hair removal procedures. Yes, I'm talking about the bane of every man's — or at the very least my — life: shaving.


I bring it up because I've gone the longest ever without shaving over the past 10 days. What began as shear laziness (pun intended) soon developed into a plan to cultivate male model-esque designer stubble, the kind that looks as if every follicle has been individually stylised and genetically modified (or photoshopped) to achieve perfect growth and texture. Hey, if Matthew Fox can do it on a desert island in Lost, why couldn't I?



Alas, as the days went by, I ended up with facial hair that looked more like I had spilt a pot of jam all over my mug and then fell face down onto a busy barber's messy floor. So I returned to being a slave of the 5 o'clock shadow tyrant and dug out the Mach 3.



Now, you might not know this, but the shaving product industry is the perpetrator of some of the most deceptive, misleading and just plain false advertising campaigns in the history of capitalism. Watch as David Beckham balletically and painlessly glides the razor over his face like the Mikhail Baryshnikov of shaving! Try to replicate that exact style at home and, instead of the Swan Lake of shaves, you end up with a face resembling the pepperoni house special from Dominos Pizza.



Being so manly, I started shaving at 13, and so over the past 12 years, I can honestly say I have tried every shaving product and regime ever devised. 95 percent of the time, it still ends up hurting and nearly always results in razor burn and even acne, all of which, psychologically, can render you a self-conscious, inferiority complex-ridden teenager all over again.



Luckily, my suffering has diminished somewhat as I have stumbled upon my best regime yet that works well, up to a point. Shaving is still an absolute drag though. You ladies don't know how lucky you are.
declan.cashin@gmail.com

Three weeks and counting...

Hog Wash

Review of Wild Hogs from Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent

Leaving the screening of Wild Hogs, I had to ask myself just how this movie became Disney’s biggest March opening ever, raking in almost $40m in its opening weekend. It’s certainly not down to its wit and charm so the only explanation left is that the baby boomer audience is crying out for stories that reflect their middle aged experiences. Lord help them if this hackneyed biker comedy is the only outlet they have.

Four fifty-something friends decide to cast off the shackles of their humdrum, suburban lives and take to the road on their motorbikes to recapture some of their youth. There’s the sensible one (Tim Allen), the hectored one (Martin Lawrence), the too-cool-for-school one (John Travolta, naturally) and the nerdy one (William H.Macy). While resting in New Mexico, the ‘Wild Hogs’, as their gang name goes, run afoul of the nasty nikers, the Del Fuegos (led by the effortlessly menacing Ray Liotta), who they are later forced to confront in a climactic display of slapstick violence and corny life-lessons.

It’s strange that Wild Hogs flounders so much given the comedic talent of (most) of the main stars, as well as of the writer Brad Copeland, one of the head scribes on the brilliant TV sit-com Arrested Development. A major problem lies in the script’s over-reliance on pratfalls and achingly predictable gags, where no gross-out, nude or homophobic stone is left unturned.

Even more detrimental is the at-times embarrassingly strained camaraderie between the four leads. Were these guys ever in the same room together before shooting began? Of them all, William H. Macy has most fun and if this were a just universe, he’d be the biggest star on the planet. Liotta also adds some spark, as does the eternally under-used Marisa Tomei in a late supporting role.

Despite everything, Wild Hogs does provoke a few laughs and I guess it can be forgiven for not pretending to be anything other than it is. But considering its above-average comedic pedigree, it’s a pity that such a sow’s ear was made of a potential silk purse.
Rating: 2/5
Declan Cashin

Alternatively column April 13

This week's column from Day and Night magazine in the Irish Independent

OK I know it’s April, but if you happen to run into someone now that you haven’t seen since December, is it still acceptable to wish them a Happy New Year? If this is literally the first time you have seen them this year, are you not technically still entitled to invoke that January spirit?

I ask because this is the kind of logic I've been applying to my plans to join the gym. I haven't 'run into' one yet, but I intend to soon, so technically - there's that word again - when I do find one, it will be New Year's in spirit. Hence that will mean I haven't squandered the last four months living as a lazy, Jabba the Hut-esque slob, right?

I do feel bad because I swore last Christmas that the gym was the only resolution I was going to make for 2007. But I purposefully didn't join right away. No, my masterplan was to allow all the guilt-plagued, crash-dieting, well-intentioned gym newbies have the month of January to burn themselves out, and then I'd smugly swoop in at the start of February with a more realistic, honest and committed attitude to getting fit.

But, like a politician at election time, I lied to myself and others by making promises I knew I wouldn't and/or couldn't keep.

However, now that spring is in the air, I have renewed vigour to take on the challenges of January. It has nothing at all to do with the fact that I've recently taken the term 'tight-fitting shirt' to literal, almost ironic extremes, and that my hitherto perfectly-fitting favourite jeans now look as if I was uncomfortably sown into them a la Olivia Newton John and those leather pants at the end of Grease.

So this is it. I have the budget, I have an end goal and I even know the gym I'm joining. So if you see me on a treadmill, flailing about, gasping and wailing like a rhinoceros that's just been shot with a tranquilizer gun, don't point and laugh. Come over and wish me Happy New Year instead.

Alternatively April 6, 2007

This week's 'Alternatively' column in Day and Night magazine in today's the Irish Independent

I've been all about the man-love this week. Oh stop your sniggering down the back — I'm talking about male friendship, a topic that’s been on my mind due to my latest TV obsession, Entourage.

For all you squares out there, Entourage is an American comedy about a New York pretty boy actor who moves to LA with his brother and two of his childhood friends to indulge in a Bacchanalian lifestyle of parties, girls and assorted Hollywood adventures.

It's complete boys own entertainment and while it may be macho, priapic, and testosterone-fuelled, there is a deep, albeit, obliquely articulated affection running through all four guys’ banter and slagging.

In that regard, it’s a quite canny representation of male friendship. Men, by their nature, seem to find it difficult to express emotion, particularly when it comes to their friends. It’s complicated but, for many men, their male friendships are one of the most important things in their lives.

Of course, you’d find that hard to believe if you were to accept the findings of research published last week that found female friendships are superior to men’s and that women tend to form ‘deep and lasting’ friendships with each other, while men are calculating, fickle and only choose friendships that they can ‘get something out of’.

The findings from surveys like this seem to conform to the worst sexist stereotypes we have of both men and women. Men, for their part, yet again come out as callous, unfeeling Neanderthals, whose friendships are meaningless essentially because they’re not carbon copies of women’s.

And that’s where this survey renders itself pointless: it ignores the fundamental fact that men and women are different and so often need and seek different things from their friendships.

The Entourage boys might appear to be superficial liggers, but fans will have seen that they are extremely sensitive about one another’s feelings and fortunes and are each one’s first port of call whenever they get into trouble. Maybe us blokes are really just - horror of horrors - the more fascinating of the species? What are the chances of research ever being commissioned to back that claim up?

declan.cashin@gmail.com

'Reluctant Hero'

Interview from Day and Night magazine in today's Irish Independent

Declan Cashin

Cillian Murphy is often referred to as a ‘reluctant superstar’, which could be just media code for ‘reluctant interviewee’. He’s certainly cautious when speaking to journalists, but, then again, it is a Monday morning, it’s the first interview of the day and the Cork-born actor has just spent the previous week just hanging out in the homestead of Ballintemple. We’ll forgive him if it takes a little while to warm up.

Murphy is in Dublin’s Merrion Hotel to talk about Sunshine, an intense, effects-laden science-fiction thriller that reunites him with his 28 Days Later director Danny Boyle. In the movie, Murphy plays one of an eight-person crew who is sent on a mission to save the dying sun. In order to do so, Murphy’s physicist Capa and the other astronauts must drop a nuclear ‘payload’ the size of Manhattan into the fading star in order to reignite it and, you know, save humanity and stuff.

Sunshine makes for a nerve-wracking two hours and it’s very much a sci-fi lover’s movie, with more than a passing reference made to a range of genre classics, such as The Abyss and Alien. For a CGI-freshman like Murphy, the movie provided him with the chance to engage with a style of film-making that had long held him in awe.

“I loved Star Wars as a kid, but that didn’t qualify as ‘proper’ sci-fi I guess,” he explains, his Cork-lilt still as prominent as ever. “I love those masterpieces of the genre like Solaris, 2001, and Alien and they are inspiration for this. To be mentioned in the same breath as those would be quite an achievement and you can see that Danny is tipping his hat to them throughout the movie.

“This was the first time I made a film where there was that much of a green screen element to it,” he continues. “But Danny made sure the effects were always secondary to the performance. It never involved acting to a dot or anything.

“So, for instance, when we were acting to the sun, Danny would rig up this ginormous 20 foot curtain of gold and sparkly material that they shone a load of lights off so there was something there to tangibly react to, which makes it easier.”

It’s just one more impressive experience that the talented 30-year-old has clocked up during his steady rise up the A-list. Born in Cork, Murphy was educated in the Presentation Brothers and partially completed a law degree in UCC. It was during college that he began acting and landed the role of the disturbed Pig in Enda Walsh’s multi-award winning stage play Disco Pigs, with which he toured in Canada, Britain and Australia.

His extraordinary performance in Kirsten Sheridan’s film adaptation of the play in 2001 led to roles in short films, plays and movies like On The Edge (2001) and the smash hit Intermission (2003). However, it was when Danny Boyle cast him as the leading man in the post-apocalyptic zombie flick 28 Days Later (2003) that Murphy’s international career really took off into orbit. That movie was released in the US just after the invasion of Iraq and, by tapping into deeply engrained cultural anxieties about chemical warfare and terrorism, it became a huge hit and put Murphy firmly on the map (he refers it as his “watershed role”).

Supporting roles in the Hollywood blockbusters Girl With a Pearl Earring and Cold Mountain followed suit, before delivering the villainous double whammy of Red Eye and Batman Begins in 2005. Last year, he received a Golden Globe nomination for playing transsexual Kitten Braden in Neil Jordan’s Breakfast on Pluto and also assayed the lead role in Ken Loach’s civil war drama The Wind that Shakes the Barley, which won the Palme D’or at the Cannes Film Festival.

The immense intensity that Murphy often brings to roles – aided, in no small part, by those famous blue eyes that you could cut diamonds off – was called upon yet again to ratchet up the tension in the claustrophobic spaceship setting of Sunshine. But director Boyle had another trick up his sleeve in order to affect that level of familiarity and sense of constriction amongst the cast.

“Danny put us all up in student digs in east London,” he reveals. “We all lived together for two weeks. The idea behind it was for the opening scene of the film where you’re introduced to all of the characters individually at the dinner table. You can act that stuff, but when you’ve lived with someone, it brings a whole different energy to the dynamic and the interaction. There’s a familiarity and an irritability that develops. You can’t put your finger on the essence of what we achieved, but we certainly had lived very much within each other’s personal space. And I think you can see that on screen.”

Considering that Sunshine is a movie that is quite trippy and psychedelic, it’s fitting that the scientific adviser on set also has his own surreal background story. Murphy’s go-to man for ‘the science part’ was Dr Brian Cox, who was once the keyboard player with ‘90s pop group D:REAM.

“It’s an obvious progression: keyboard player in D:REAM to particle physicist,” Murphy laughs. He may joke about it, but it’s clear from talking to him that the science element involved in preparing for the movie did get under his skin. In fact, it’s fair to say that Sunshine has, dare I say it, turned Murphy into a bit of a nerd.

“Dr Brian Cox is just a brilliant man,” he says. “I spent a lot of time with him and he was my sounding board for everything to do with that world because I had no reference for it or no understanding or grasp on it.

“He’s not your stereotypical physicist, which I think is an image that has been manufactured by films of the eccentric elder gentleman with hygiene issues. Someone like Cox, through him being such an accessible individual, makes it kind of sexy.

“It is pretty incredible what they’re doing at the moment. I went over to visit CERN (European Council for Nuclear Research) in Geneva, where Cox and others are building this particle accelerator which is 27km in circumference and 100ft underneath the ground.

“They’re smashing together protons in there, basically recreating the conditions of the Big Bang. It’s remarkable to talk to Dr Cox because he’s every day grappling with the most profound of questions, whereas we’re discussing the kind of milk we should buy. It does change your perspective when you spend time with these people.”

One of the over-arching themes that drives Sunshine is a recurring tension between science and faith. As the movie progresses to its knuckle-whitening finale, certain characters become increasingly involved in a literal and metaphorical clash of ideologies and beliefs. Does Murphy think there’s a religious element to the movie?

“I think this definitely touches on that science versus faith/religion argument,” he replies. “Certainly, one character we meet at the end does represent a more fanatical and a more fundamentalist viewpoint. This is someone who believes they’re in direct communion with God.

“My character Capa represents the other side. He’s all about logic, empirical evidence and science and so these two characters clash. Without giving too much away, there’s one scene where my character seems to be entering a more metaphysical realm. It is like him having this connection with the universe. Personally, I tend to think that it’s not a quasi-religious thing because I’m not religious, but there is something about Capa recognising his unimportance in the large scheme of things and the awesomeness of this thing he’s involved in.”

Murphy actually filmed Sunshine 18 months ago and in the meantime has made his next movie Watching the Detectives, a comedy co-starring Lucy Liu. While it appears to us that he hasn’t stopped working in years, Murphy has actually had a lot of time off recently at home in London. The timing was perfect as he has a 15-month old son, Malachy, with his wife of two years, Yvonne.

“I was doing a play in London [Love Songs] which allowed me to be at home during the day with the little man, so that was great,” he explains.

He’s also signed on to participate in another project even closer to home. Sitting in a hotel across the road from Government Buildings, Murphy, the son-in-law of an elected TD, tells me he’s supporting the new Irish Rock the Vote initiative, which aims to get people – particularly young people – out to vote in this year’s General Election.

“I’m just going to do a little piece for Rock the Vote to try get people motivated,” he says. “I think apathy is dangerous nowadays. People feel that politics has no relevance to their lives. But if you feel there isn’t any relevance, you have the ability to change it and make it relevant.”

As for his future movie projects, Murphy is remaining tight-lipped, but there is one that everyone keeps pestering him about: will he reprise his role as The Scarecrow in the next Batman?

He sighs and smiles. “I know nothing. As far as I know, there’s a script. It’s a film about Batman versus Joker and Two Face and we know Heath Ledger and Aaron Eckhart have been cast in those roles. But I’ll just wait for the call.

“Batman Begins was a brilliant experience. It was my first time working on that scale of a project. It was overwhelming.”

Was he at his co-star Katie Holmes’ famous Italian wedding to Tom Cruise last year? Murphy arches an eye-brow and stares at me. “What do you think?,” comes the reply.

Non-invite to the Tom-Kat wedding notwithstanding, there is no doubt that Cillian Murphy is a bona-fide star. It might not be a mantle he wears comfortably, but he is smart enough to realise how lucky he has been.

“Every now and again, you have to go, ‘F***ing hell, what the hell am I doing in space saving the world?!’ he says. “That doesn’t compute easily in my mind! But then you have to be aware of how lucky you are and not ever take it for granted. It’s a tough business and just to be working is an achievement.

“To get to work with people who’s DVDs you own in your collection is quite another thing altogether. It’s surreal, which is always why I love going home to Cork to hang out with my buddies. We never even talk about that, it’s not a big deal. It’s not relevant, not with friends you’ve known since you were 10 years of age.”

As we get up to leave, I ask Murphy if he still plays with his band, Sons of Mr Greengenes. “No I just play for fun with my buddies and on my own for recreation,” he says.

“In college, we were much more serious about it. We had great ambitions to take over the world - or at least release an EP,” he laughs. Settling for a humble EP over world domination? Maybe Cillian Murphy is the reluctant superstar afterall.

Ellen + 10

This is my article on the 1oth anniversary of Ellen DeGeneres' coming out on screen and off, published in this month's Gay Community News

In our ‘post-gay’ era of Will and Grace, The L Word and Queer as Folk, when audiences have grown largely desensitised to seeing homosexuality on TV and in movies, it can be easy to forget just how momentous a decision it was for comedienne Ellen DeGeneres to come out as a lesbian, both on screen and off.

This month marks the tenth anniversary of Ellen’s famous coming out episode, which proved to be a milestone in American culture, despite – or perhaps because of – the fact that it provoked a socio-political controversy not seen since Murphy Brown (but, crucially, not Candice Bergan, the actress who played her) was condemned for becoming a single mother by then Vice President Dan Quayle in 1992.

Throughout the early 1990s, British television saw an explosion of gay storylines in soaps and dramas, but gay characters had only begun to creep into American television series like My So-Called Life, Melrose Place and thirtysomething and into reality shows like the popular MTV Real World series.

Stand-up comedienne Ellen DeGeneres landed a sit-com based around her own witty, self-deprecating stage personality in 1994, the same year that Roseanne Barr shared a lesbian kiss with Mariel Hemingway in Roseanne and where David Schwimmer’s character Ross discovered his wife was gay on the new sit-com behemoth Friends.

The show, Ellen, was well-received, but, as San Francisco Examiner journalist Joyce Millman perceptively observed in a 1995 column, there was an ambivalence encoded in the show towards dating and romance that marked it out from other comedies. Ellen the character, Millman wrote, was really a closet lesbian.

Rumours about DeGeneres’ sexuality were common in showbiz circles, and in March 1996, the then 39-year-old made the decision for her and the character to come out during the show’s fourth season.

DeGeneres spent the summer of 1996 in secret meetings with Disney, the owners of the show and ABC, the network that aired it. Michael Eisner, the CEO of Disney, was reluctant and expressed concerns that the broad American public was not ready for “a weekly show about lesbianism”.

At the same time as these secret discussions were going on, network executives told the writers that they needed to make the character Ellen Morgan care about something in the next season, and that if she wasn’t going to have a boyfriend, she should at least have a puppy. From August 1996, the planned coming out episode was code-named ‘The Puppy Episode’ to preserve its secrecy, and the name stuck.

But in September, somebody leaked the plans to The Hollywood Reporter and the American media “went crazy with it”, as DeGeneres later recalled. From then until March 1997, Disney and ABC refused to comment on whether Ellen’s character would come out.

Evangelists and right-wing family rights groups filled the ensuing vacuum. The notorious Pat Robertson professed that Ellen couldn’t be a lesbian because “she was such an attractive actress”. Reverend Lou Sheldon, from the Traditional Values Coalition, called for a boycott of Disney and the show, during which his supporters sold their Disney stock, and refused to purchase Disney merchandise. Protestors mounted pickets outside Disney and ABC with signs reading ‘Ellen Degenerate’ and ‘Fags worthy of death’.

Such was the impact of the boycott, that when the fourth series began in September 1996, producers were told to move the coming out episode from the scheduled sixth episode of the series to the following spring, so as to avoid it clashing with a crucial meeting of the Disney stockholders.

As the air date kept being pushed back and back, gay activists took to the internet to keep pressure on the show, led by Chastity Bono, entertainment director for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), who set up an ‘Ellen Watch’ website. The show’s writers kept dropping hints into episodes to arc the season so viewers could see the revelation coming (for instance, in one episode, Ellen asks, ‘What if my life is a lie and I find I’m really, I dunno, left handed?’). DeGeneres herself kept speculation alive by creatively dodging, but not killing, the rumours (‘I’m going to discover I’m really Lebonese’, she told David Letterman).

In January and February 1997, the first draft of ‘The Puppy Episode’ was written (on maroon paper so it couldn’t be copied) and sent to Disney, who vetoed it on the grounds that it was dancing around the issue. After a week of rewrites, Disney gave the green light. On March 5, ABC announced that Ellen would come out.

At the same time, DeGeneres came out via a TV interview with Diane Sawyer, and by appearing on the cover of Time magazine accompanied by the headline, ‘Yep, I’m gay’. Stars began lining up to appear in the episode, the most significant being America’s national therapist Oprah Winfrey, who was cast as Ellen’s own councillor. Laura Dern was cast as Ellen’s love interest, and there were scheduled cameos from Demi Moore, Billy Bob Thornton, Melissa Etheridge, k.d Lang and Gina Gershon.

The episode was taped in March (during which the set had to be cleared and the bomb squad brought in after a threatening call was made). Also that month, DeGeneres began a high-profile romance with actress Anne Heche, drawing undeserved criticism for being “too affectionate” (i.e. holding hands and hugging) in front of President Clinton at the White House Correspondents Dinner (DeGeneres and Heche split in 2000. DeGeneres has been in a relationship with Arrested Development star Portia de Rossi since 2004).

On April 30, 1997, ‘The Puppy Episode’ was broadcast on ABC. Huge parties were held on the east and west coasts for the event, and even in Birmingham, Alabama, whose ABC affiliate had refused to broadcast the episode. In the end, 42 million people tuned in to watch the poignant but extremely funny moment when Ellen accidentally announced over an airport tannoy that she was gay. As an executive told the show’s director Gil Junger, “if that episode were a feature film, you just directed a $280 million opening night”.

The episode was highly praised, and was editorialised by in The New York Times. DeGeneres won a Peabody award and Emmy for writing the episode (but egregiously lost the acting prize to Hollywood’s blandest actress Helen Hunt, for Mad About You).

But after the hoopla died down, DeGeneres and the show’s writers had to determine how they were to explore Ellen’s sexuality without scaring off viewers and, more importantly, advertisers. The network issued a statement saying they would be taking “baby steps” with the character, but when the fifth series of the show began in September 1997, the ratings flatlined at just 12 million. A parental advisory warning was slapped onto each episode, much to DeGeneres’ chagrin, as Ellen slowly began dating. But the studios were extremely nervous, and when Chastity Bono admonished the show for being “too gay”, it not only ended her career with GLAAD, it also expedited the network’s decision to axe Ellen in March 1998.

DeGeneres returned to TV in 2001 playing a lesbian (though it wasn’t forced) in the short-lived sit-com The Ellen Show, which was cancelled after one season. But later that year, DeGeneres drew rave reviews for her tasteful emceeing duties on the Emmy awards, which were held two months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks (DeGeneres also hosted the awards after the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005 to similar acclaim).

Following a critically praised voiceover job as the forgetful fish Dory in the animated film Finding Nemo (2003), DeGeneres started her own talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, which is now in its fourth season and has won her seven Emmy awards, and boosted her personal wealth to an estimated $65 million. Two months ago, DeGeneres’ was elevated higher into the entertainment pantheon by landing the prestigious gig of hosting the Oscars, becoming the first gay person and only the second woman (after Whoopi Goldberg) to serve as emcee.

But DeGeneres must have been surprised when, six months after her sit-com was taken off the air in 1998 for having a gay lead that was “too gay”, a new sit-com was commissioned by NBC that would feature not just one, but two gay characters in a four-person ensemble – that show being, of course, Will and Grace, which went on for eight years and was a huge hit during its run. The politics and specifics of Will and Grace’s success – and Ellen’s ultimate failure - are complex, but it was clear from that point on that homosexuality was becoming embraced by the mainstream.

In the decade since DeGeneres’coming out, the dynamic had shifted in favour of gay characters on television, almost to the point where some believe that gay culture has been too commodified by the entertainment industry.

Yes, gay representation on screen is not perfect and gay actors still face deeply engrained prejudices. But a new discussion and sensibility about homosexuality had begun, and, for good and for bad, that change was midwifed by the historic move made by the goofy and charming sit-com star Ellen DeGeneres. Whoever said the revolution would not be televised?

And from today's Irish Times, in relation to the previous post...


PD POLICY ON CIVIL UNIONS
Madam, - Fintan O'Toole's comments on the Progressive Democrats' policy on civil unions are extremely disingenuous (Opinion, February 27th). He is wrong to suggest that deferring the Civil Unions Bill 2007 was an illiberal act.
The PDs were the first government party to make it their policy to introduce civil unions. In March 2005 an overwhelming majority of members passed a motion to introduce civil unions.
As a current court case on the constitutional status of civil partnerships is being appealed to the Supreme Court, it would be premature and irresponsible of the Oireachtas to pass new legislation in this area.
The Minister for Justice is quite right to ask for a postponement of the Labour bill until the current legal status is defined by the Supreme Court. It would be a mistake to act on civil unions before then. - Yours, etc,
JOHN KENNY,
Monkstown Valley,
Co Dublin.
Fintan O'Toole writes: The Zappone/Gilligan case before the Supreme Court deals with marriage for gay and lesbian couples. The Civil Unions Bill was explicitly framed to avoid the issue of such marriages altogether. The Supreme Court appeal is therefore irrelevant to the bill.
*****

Madam, - While I do not always agree with him, may I congratulate Fintan O'Toole for his column condemning the sheer gutlessness of Michael McDowell and the Regressive Undemocrats regarding last week's shunting of the Civil Unions Bill for gay and lesbian people?
I advise all voting citizens of this country to keep a note of this Government's failings, U-turns, broken promises and pure self-serving political cowardice from now until the election, and throw them all back in the Government parties' faces when they come grovelling at our doorsteps.
Perhaps the Minister would care to clearly explain on these pages his reasons for shooting down the Bill? - Yours, etc,
DECLAN CASHIN,

Bravo Fintan

From yesterday's Irish Times...

McDowell blows last PD assets

Tue, Feb 27, 2007

If it is true that one legacy of the colonial past, Anglophobia, died at Croke Park last Saturday, it is rather ironic that another - sleeveenism - had reasserted its place in Irish politics just a few days earlier, writes Fintan O'Toole.

Sleeveenism is a combination of cunning and cowardice, the sly use of low tricks to avoid facing up to a potentially difficult situation. It is a skill with which our rulers have long been imbued, and the only surprise about its deployment in the Dáil on Wednesday and Thursday last is that it should have been done by Michael McDowell, a man who once prided himself on his contempt for the old ways of devious cowardice. Anyone who wants to understand how the PDs have become more Fianna Fáil than Fianna Fáil themselves should look at what happened to the Labour Party's Civil Unions Bill last week.

When Des O'Malley founded the PDs, there were four things that distinguished the party from Fianna Fáil. They were more accommodating on Northern Ireland, and more attached to neo-liberal economics. Those differences have been eroded by the Belfast Agreement and by 10 years in government. The other differences were a deep distaste for the culture of corruption around Charles Haughey and an enthusiasm for the so-called liberal agenda on personal and sexual freedom. Remarkably, in two weeks, Michael McDowell has blown both of these remaining assets. No one from the PDs bothered to mutter a single word in the Dáil debate on the Moriarty report.

Then, last week, Michael McDowell was faced with having to take a very mildly courageous stand on a social issue, that of civil partnerships for gay and lesbian couples. He dealt with it in a way that made Haughey's infamous "Irish solution to an Irish problem" on contraception look like an epic act of statesmanship.

It is important to understand the context for Labour's bill. It is generally accepted that gay and lesbian couples face serious discrimination in areas like taxation, family-formation, inheritance, pensions and welfare rights. (Co-habiting couples of the opposite sex do so too, but they at least have the option of marriage.) The issue has been looked at by a range of bodies, including the Law Reform Commission, the All Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution and the Working Group on Domestic Partnership established by Michael McDowell himself and chaired by his former party colleague Anne Colley. A clear consensus has emerged.

It recognises that the obvious solution - allowing same-sex marriage - would require a constitutional amendment, since both Irish and European courts have defined marriage as existing only between a man and a woman. Given that a referendum to change the definition of marriage might be lost, the consensus, supported by the Gay and Lesbian Equality Network, is that the way forward is civil unions which give those within them broadly the same rights as married couples. Crucially, the all-party committee and the Colley group, both of whom had access to expert legal advice, stressed that this solution would not raise constitutional problems.
The Colley group reported to Michael McDowell last November and it received a broad welcome. Labour introduced a bill giving effect to its recommendations on same-sex partnerships, and it came up for debate last week. The Fianna Fáil TD Barry Andrews, who was a member of the all-party committee, had the guts to welcome the bill and to say, truthfully, that Government inaction on the issue might reasonably be taken "to infer that this constituted a judgment on gay and lesbian couples and that the failure to legislate implies their relationships are in some way inferior to those of heterosexual couples". He also said the committee "took specific legal advice" on the constitutionality of the kind of civil partnerships that Labour was proposing and was assured that there was no problem.

Michael McDowell had the courage neither to accept or reject the Labour bill. He put down an amendment stating that "the terms of the Civil Unions Bill 2006 as presented appear to be inconsistent with the provisions of the Constitution" - a herring so red that you can't see it blush. And then he engaged in an act of supreme sleeveenism. He proposed, not that the bill be rejected, but that its reading be postponed for six months. Six months from now, of course, there will be a new Dáil and all motions left over from the old Dáil will lapse. The effect of the McDowell amendment is to consign the Civil Unions Bill to oblivion without anyone having to actually vote against it.

Fianna Fáil and PD TDs can go to the doorsteps, tell gay people that they support their right to equality and tell social conservatives that they sunk an attempt to recognise gay partnerships. Among those who voted for this contemptible manoeuvre were Mary Harney, Liz O'Donnell, Michael McDowell and Fiona O'Malley. Charlie Haughey would be proud of them.

© 2007 The Irish Times

It's a wonderful night for Oscar etc etc

Can it really be Oscar night again? It only seems like yesterday that Ang Lee was left reeling in the Kodac Theatre as his stunning Brokeback Mountain fell at the last hurdle to the melting pot drama Crash. Well, if that's how it seems, maybe it's because the awards year has become ever more shortened by the ridiculous number of gongfests that are held prior to the Oscars.

Those early prize-giving ceremonies established the frontrunners for this year's Academy Awards, of which there are many this year. It's shaping up to be a horrendously predictable night, unless Academy voters, kind of like Irish voters, don't see the point in voting (or else register protest votes) because the winners are foregone conclusions. Some of these races are tighter than you might think, so a few complacent or rebel voters could shake things up considerably.

And so here are my predictions for tomorrow night. I have listed those who I think should win (the heart picks) and those who I think will win (the head). Feel free to argue or contest...

Best Supporting Actor:
Alan Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Djimon Hounsou (Blood Diamond)
Jackie Earl Haley (Little Children)
Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)
Mark Wahlberg (The Departed)

Murphy appears to have the edge, having first won the Golden Globe and then cementing the all-important actors’ support by claiming the Screen Actors Guild award. Having said that, Academy voting only closed last Tuesday, so a late boost for Arkin, basking in the publicity of a Bafta win in the category, is still possible.

Despite his success so far, I’m still reluctant to give my full backing to Murphy. On the one hand, Dreamgirls marked an impressive comeback for the comic, but, on the other side, he was never that well-liked within the community to begin with. Haley’s comeback as an unnervingly sympathetic sex offender in the criminally underrepresented Little Children will also have fans, but it’s the two nominees that are considered the underdogs that deserve to win the most.

Hounsou gave a fantastic performance in what was essentially the lead role in Blood Diamond (he shares at least the same amount of screen time as Best Actor nominee Leonardo di Caprio). The movie has attracted a huge deal of attention due to its controversial subject matter (the sourcing of conflict diamonds) which will do him no harm. Elsewhere, Wahlberg’s turn as a foul-mouthed cop completely stole the show from underneath his more heavy hitting co-stars in Scorsese’s The Departed. I’d give the Oscar to Wahlberg, who could shape an impressive career on the back of that kind of industry respect. I suspect that only an unlikely Departed sweep will push it his way though.

My heart says: Mark Wahlberg (The Departed)
My head says: Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)

Best Supporting Actress:
Adriana Barraza (Babel)
Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal)
Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)
Rinko Kikuchi (Babel)

In another extremely strong category, former American Idol-reject Hudson has dominated the pre-Oscar Supporting awards for her powerhouse turn in Dreamgirls. She remains the favourite going into the awards, with her only serious competition coming from 10-year-old Breslin, who as the heart of her little gem of a film, is bound to be carried along by the movie’s success in other categories. The final result could be closer than you think, however. Afterall, the Academy clearly has problems with Dreamgirls because they didn’t nominate it for Best Picture or Director, something that might trip Eddie Murphy up in the Supporting Actor race too.

Babel may be seriously flawed as a whole, but nobody could doubt the talent on screen. Barraza and Kikuchi delivered the finest performances in a strong ensemble. Kikuchi, in particular, drew raves for her intense portrayal of a deaf-mute teen, whereas Barraza was unbearably poignant as the increasingly desperate migrant nanny. Blanchett deserves to be nominated, but not to win – not in the face of this competition.

Hudson should take it, but who isn’t secretly rooting for Breslin? I know I am.

My heart says: Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine)
My head says: Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)

Best Actor
Leonardo di Caprio (Blood Diamond)
Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson)
Will Smith (The Pursuit of Happyness)
Peter O’Toole (Venus)
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland)

Will Irish legend O’Toole pull off a last minute victory? Or is he destined to go down in history as the most nominated performer (8 nominations) never to win the gong? O’Toole certainly has an uphill struggle to topple Forest Whitaker, who has dominated the award season in this category with his astounding portrayal of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in The Last Kingof Scotland.

The 45-year-old gentle giant has clocked up 17 Best Actor awards, and like in the Best Actress race, no other contender has gotten a look in since the Golden Globes, which divides lead performances into Drama and Comedy. DiCaprio has had a great year, but it isn't his time. Will Smith gave a good performance in a mediocre movie, which in any other year would have been enough. It would be great to see the true underdog, Ryan Gosling, snatch it out from under the nose of the favourites, Adrien Brody-style, but I seriously cannot see this happening. This is Whitaker's for the taking, and it's hard to deny him it.

My heart says: Forest Whitaker
My head says: ForestWhitaker

Best Actress
Penelope Cruz (Volver)
Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal)
Helen Mirren (The Queen)
Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada)
Kate Winslet (Little Children)

These five ladies must be sick of the sight of one another, seeing as their names have consistently dominated lead actress award lists all year. There has been, and only is, one real winner though, and that's Helen Mirren. She's bagged an amazing 23 pre-Oscar prizes for her witty, poignant and textured portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II, including Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival, a Golden Globe, Bafta and Screen Actors Guild. There has been no contest - quite fittingly, it has been a coronation all year for Mirren. It was a shock last year when Crash won Best Picture over the heavy favourite Brokeback Mountain. If Mirren doesn't win tomorrow night, it will surely count as one of the top 5 biggest Oscar shocks ever.

Is it even worth making a case for the other four? Not really, which is sad because this race has been the strongest Best Actress list in over a decade. What's more, it's great to see Hollywood's elder ladies dominating for a change. If/when Mirren wins tomorrow night, it will be the first time since Susan Sarandon won in 1996 that an actress over the age of 50 has won the Best Actress award. And just for the sake of it, I think Mirren is fantastic, but Dench deserves to actually win the award for her astonishing turn in Notes on a Scandal, which is surely the performance of her screen career so far.

My heart says: Judi Dench
My head says: Helen Mirren

Best Director
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Babel)
Martin Scorsese (The Departed)
Clint Eastwood (Letters from Iwo Jima)
Stephen Frears (The Queen)
Paul Greengrass (United 93)

Oh Marty, will you finally get your dues and walk home with the Directing trophy? It looks better for him this year than it ever has. There's certainly a general consensus that this madness has gone on long enough and that the legendary monobrowed one will go the whole way to the podium. He thoroughly deserves to win and who could argue otherwise?

Well, I could. The Departed is a good movie, and Scorsese does a fantastic directing job on it. But it's not his best work. That doesn't matter at the Oscars I guess, and in any other year, I'd just let it go. But I'm rooting for British director Paul Greengrass, who did what I think is the best directing job I've seen this decade so far, on his absolutely devastating recreation of the events on board the fourth hijacked plane on 9/11, United 93. Greengrass was the surprise winner of the Bafta, and I'm hoping it will have given him a crucial last minute surge in the Academy's votes, however difficult it was for American members to sit through his unbearably intense movie.

My heart says: Paul Greengrass
My head says: Martin Scorsese

Best Picture

Babel

The Departed

Letters from Iwo Jima

Little Miss Sunshine

The Queen

The one category in this year's race where a surprise is genuinely possible, if not inevitable. There is no frontrunner per se. Babel won the Golden Globe, but I don't think it has the support to cross the finishing line here, nor does it deserve it to. Tom O'Neill at the Gold Derby has detected a thirteenth hour swing behind the multi-cultural drama, but I'm not convinced. If Babel does win, it will be the weakest Best Picture winner since, well, last year, when Crash won.

The spectre of Crash haunts this category actually. Its shock win over Brokeback last year was either a sign of how shockingly conservative and homophobic the Academy really is, or else a demonstration of voters' love for actor-driven vehicles. The Crash contender here is Little Miss Sunshine, the breakout Sundance hit which is the only film of the five that I suspect the Academy actually likes. The Academy votes with their hearts, not their heads: it's always a case of what film they genuinely like. For that reason, I don't think The Departed will win, despite what many are predicting. It's just not an explicitely enjoyable or likeable film. The Queen and Clint Eastwood's profound and moving Letters from Iwo Jima are both fine films, but ones that will command respect, more than love.

No, I'm sticking my neck out and going for Sunshine, which won the Producers Guild and the Ensemble gong at the Screen Actors Guild. It might not be the most sophisticated movie in the race, but it certainly inspires the most passion, and has, at its heart, a beautiful, timely and subversive message that winning isn't everything. Which would make its victory here all the sweeter.

My heart says: Little Miss Sunshine

My head says: Little Miss Sunshine

Oscar predix

Oscar nominations are due tomorrow (Tuesday) at around 1.40pm. Here are my guesses for what's shaping up to be a worthy but infuriatingly predictable competition...

Best Picture:
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
The Departed
Babel
The Queen

Watch out for: Letters from Iwo Jima

Best Director:
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Babel)
Martin Scorsese (The Departed)
Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris (Little Miss Sunshine)
Bill Condon (Dreamgirls)
Clint Eastwood (Letters from Iwo Jima)

Watch out for: Stephen Frears (The Queen)

Best Actor:
Leonardo diCaprio (The Departed)
Peter O'Toole (Venus)
Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson)
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland)
Will Smith (The Pursuit of Happyness)

Watch out for: Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat)

Best Actress:
Penelope Cruz (Volver)
Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal)
Helen Mirren (The Queen)
Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada)
Kate Winslet (Little Children)

Watch out for: Maggie Gyllenhaal (Sherrybaby)

Best Supporting Actor:
Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)
Alan Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Mark Wahlberg (The Departed)
Jack Nicholson (The Departed)
Jackie Earle Haley (Little Children)

Watch out for: Micheal Sheen (The Queen)/Brad Pitt (Babel)

Best Supporting Actress:
Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Adriana Barraza (Babel)
Rinko Kikuchi (Babel)
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)
Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal)

Watch out for: Emily Blunt (The Devil Wears Prada)

Best Original Screenplay:
The Queen
Little Miss Sunshine
Babel
Pan's Labyrinth
Stranger Than Fiction

Best Adapted Screenplay:
The Departed
Notes on a Scandal
The Devil Wears Prada
Dreamgirls
Little Children

Golden Opportunities

The first major award ceremony - and by major, of course, I mean the glitziest and most critically illegitimate - kicks off later tonight with the presentation of the 2007 Golden Globe awards. Voted for by a small contingent of journalists working for foreign news outlets, the Globes provide crucial publicity for movies and stars in the run-up to the gong-fest that really matters (to them) - the Oscars. The sway that the Globes hold on the Academy Awards is considerable, so the results tonight will provide an early clue as to how things may pan out over the next few weeks. Here are my predictions....





Best Motion Picture - Drama
Babel
Bobby
The Departed
Little Children
The Queen

Babel is in the strongest position in this category purely on the basis that it has the most nominations (7) of any film in the running this year . It may have divided critics in the US but the reviews overseas so far have been glowing, and don’t forget that the winners of the Globes are voted by the Foreign Press Association.

Having said that, the Globes could be the season’s first indicator of whether or not the major award committees are getting behind Scorsese and The Departed, which was a blistering return to form for the director after a slew of so-so productions.

Bobby is the weakest link in the category and is expected to be phased out in the run-up to the Oscars. Little Children received unanimously strong reviews but may would have an almighty task to overcome its heavier competitors. The Queen could pull off a major surprise and claim the trophy. Stephen Frear’s insightful and moving drama has become a major contender, largely on the back of Helen Mirren’s award-guzzling portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II.

If there were any justice, United 93 would be in here, and it would unreservedly get my vote. It is the movie of the year – if not, of this generation.

Prediction: Babel
Watch out for: The Departed


Best Motion Picture - Musical Or Comedy
Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation Of Kazakhstan
The Devil Wears Prada
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
Thank You For Smoking

Can Borat’s incredible run of success pull off another coup and trounce its huge Hollywood competitors? It’d be great to see but I would be very surprised if it did. The clear favourite in this race – and apparently in the Oscar race – is Bill Condon’s movie adaptation of the stage musical Dreamgirls, a thinly-veiled account of the rise of Diana Ross and the Supremes. Phenomenal reviews have propelled it to the top of most experts’ picks for the year’s top awards, and Dreamgirls certainly is a very Golden Globes kind of movie.

It was great to see the coruscating satire Thank You For Smoking get a boost but it seems the nomination will have to be its reward, whereas the highly enjoyable but creatively lightweight Devil Wears Prada was lucky to even get this far.

The one to watch here – and everywhere else – is my favourite movie of this entire awards year: Little Miss Sunshine. Having made a further impact in the nominations for the Screen Actors Guild, the PGA and, most surprisingly, the DGA, this beautifully crafted and performed road movie is the year’s true underdog. Overwhelmingly positive reviews, a strong ensemble cast and a clever marketing campaign that’s slowly but surely creating a deafening buzz has ensured that this sleeper cannot be discounted from the race. Definitely the one to watch. In fact, I’ll take bets that Little Miss Sunshine ends up as the surprise winner of the Best Picture Oscar next month.

Prediction: Dreamgirls
Watch out for: Little Miss Sunshine

Best Animated Film
Cars
Happy Feet
Monster House

Cars is definitely the outsider in this race. Happy Feet, with its cute penguins, good music, green credentials and an Aladdin-esque Robin Williams should run away with it. I’m rooting for the deliciously dark Monster House but I’d be surprised.

Prediction: Happy Feet
Watch out for: Monster House

Best Actor In A Leading Role - Drama
Leonardo DiCaprio in Blood Diamond
Leonardo DiCaprio in The Departed
Peter O'Toole in Venus
Will Smith in The Pursuit Of Happyness
Forest Whitaker in The Last King Of Scotland

In any other year, 74-year-old O’Toole would be the clear winner of this and every other Best Actor award this year. A true Hollywood legend, O’Toole nearly declined an Honorary Oscar a few years ago because he believed he could still win a competitive statuette. And indeed he might. He hasn’t won any of the critics citations so far, but a Globe victory could change the trajectory of this year’s Best Actor race.

That trajectory has been set by Forest Whitaker, who has mopped up 12 critics' prizes so far for his ferocious portrayal of mercurial Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in the riveting The Last King of Scotland. Whitaker will be hard to dislodge as the favourite from here on in. DiCaprio would seem to have an advantage, with two highly considered performances up for gongs in the one race, but it just doesn’t seem to be his year. Elsewhere Will Smith delivers a moving performance in the treacly The Pursuit of Happyness, but just how he got a place here over Ryan Gosling’s astonishing performance in Half Nelson (an aberration thankfully corrected in the SAG Best Actor list) is beyond me.

Prediction: Forest Whitaker
Watch out for: Peter O’Toole


Best Actor In A Leading Role - Musical Or Comedy
Sacha Baron Cohen in Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation Of Kazakhstan
Johnny Depp in Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Aaron Eckhart in Thank You For Smoking
Chiwetel Ejiofor in Kinky Boots
Will Ferrell in Stranger Than Fiction

Could there be a more worthy winner in this category than Baron Cohen? As comedic performances go, his was a tour de force, even going as far as staying in character to do the press interviews during the promotion of the film. The four other nominees pale in comparison and the FPA are not usually as snobby as other award committees, some of whom have been reluctant to view Baron Cohen’s racist, misogynistic, homophobic anti-Semitic creation for what it is: a comedic work of art.

If things don’t go as planned, then Eckhart should win for his deadpan performance in Thank You For Smoking.

Prediction: Sacha Baron Cohen
Watch out for: Aaron Eckhart


Best Actress In A Leading Role - Drama
Penelope Cruz in Volver
Judi Dench in Notes On A Scandal
Maggie Gyllenhaal in Sherrybaby
Helen Mirren in The Queen
Kate Winslet in Little Children

Like Whitaker, Helen Mirren has dominated proceedings in her category since the year’s first film prizes were handed out last autumn. So far she has clocked up 15 gongs, including the Lead Actress prize at the Venice Film Festival. I will be flabbergasted if she doesn’t romp home with the Globe.

But how great it is to see such a strong field of nominees, after a lacklustre few years for actresses? By rights, any one of this five could legitimately lay claim to the prize. Cruz – who won Best Actress at Cannes – delivers the performance of her life in Almodovar’s stunning Volver while Gyllenhaal does incredible work as a recovering addict in Sherrybaby (almost good enough to erase the memories of her participation in the woeful combo of Trust the Man and World Trade Centre).

Mirren’s fellow Brits are the most likely to pull off any surprises. Dench is positively monstrous as the obsessed Barbara in the adaptation of Zoe Heller’s Notes on a Scandal – and has clocked up arguably the best reviews of her already illustrious career. One critic even likened her unnerving performance to Hopkins’ Hannibal Lector. Winslet has been equally praised for an intense portrayal of a desperate housewife in Todd Field’s Little Children. However I’d be surprised if either gets the prize ahead of Mirren, a triple nominee here tonight .

Prediction: Helen Mirren
Watch out for: Judi Dench


Best Actress In A Leading Role - Musical Or Comedy
Annette Bening in Running With Scissors
Toni Collette in Little Miss Sunshine
Beyoncé Knowles in Dreamgirls
Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada
Renée Zellweger in Miss Potter

There’s a sense that Beyonce is completely punching above her weight in this category, and although she’s had a positive reception for her turn in Dreamgirls, I’d be very surprised if she emerged victorious here. She might pull it off, but I have a feeling this is where the good will towards her ends. The Academy, in particular, are always deeply hostile towards singers and pop stars moonlighting as actors, as Cher, Barbara Streisand, Madonna and Debbie Reynolds have all learned in the past.

The undisputed champ here is the incomparable Meryl Streep, who has been rightly lauded for a scene-stealing role that was the perfect vehicle for her kooky sense of humour and impeccable comic timing. Streep tapped into hidden layers and gave her largely cartoon-ish character more depth and humanity than the material warranted. Collette was also superb in a quietly powerful role as the mother trying to keep her fractured, troubled family together in Little Miss Sunshine.

Bening was superb in a movie that received a poor critical and commercial response, whereas Zellweger, who I’m normally pretty amenable to, delivered an alright performance in an excruciatingly twee film.

Prediction: Meryl Streep
Watch out for: Toni Collette

Best Supporting Actor
Ben Affleck in Hollywoodland
Eddie Murphy in Dreamgirls
Jack Nicholson in The Departed
Brad Pitt in Babel
Mark Wahlberg in The Departed

Like last year, the two supporting races are packed with the finest performances and are extremely competitive. The Supporting Actor category here is very hard to call. Affleck resurrected – some would say, created – his acting career with a perfectly pitched performance as has-been actor (however did he learn to play that?) George Reeves in Hollywoodland. The role won him the Best Actor prize at Venice but his early lead seems to have been eroded by the emergence of some heavy-hitting end of year performances.

Pitt effectively ‘does a Clooney’ (now now) in Babel, aging himself and sporting a salt and pepper beard for his performance as a desperate husband trying to save his wounded wife in the African desert. His star wattage was rightly subsumed by the fine international ensemble work done in Babel, but it remains to be seen what effect, if any, his turbulent private life has had on his career. There might be a backlash.

Nicholson and Wahlberg were the two scene-stealers in The Departed, but run the risk of cancelling each other out in the voting. Wahlberg, in particular, has been a critics fave for his foul-mouthed turn, and he’s overdue for some acknowledgement of his acting talent from the Hollywood community. Nicholson can never be ruled out, and he delivered an absolute barnstormer, but there’s a feeling that he’s been duly awarded already.

The man of the moment is Eddie Murphy, whose turn as a James Brown-esque singer in Dreamgirls, has won him the best reviews of his career. Expect him to claim the prize, and just about every Supporting gong from here on in – including the Oscar.

Prediction: Eddie Murphy
Watch out for: Brad Pitt

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza in Babel
Cate Blanchett in Notes On A Scandal
Emily Blunt in The Devil Wears Prada
Jennifer Hudson in Dreamgirls
Rinko Kikuchi in Babel

Another extremely close and tough race. Can I say first of all how great it is to see the terrific Emily Blunt get a look-in for her pithy Prada supporting turn that effectively stole those few scenes that Queen Meryl didn't completely devour herself. It's a great boost for Blunt but I#s be very surprised if she gets the prize here.

Ditto for Blanchett, who has had an extraordinary year. In addition to her nominated turn in Scandal, she also plays pivotal roles in Babel and The Good German. The two Babel nominees delivered the finest acting work in the movie. Barraza is particularly good as the immigrant nanny plunged into cross-border hell, whereas her young Japanese co-star Kikuchi has been singled out for the most praise as the deaf teen struggling to communicate her profound grief as well as her raging hormonal urges.

The woman to watch is Jennifer Hudson, who was installed as the early favourite from the minute critics got a preview of her work: one sequence apparently had audiences standing up and applauding right in the middle of the movie. The former American Idol contestant is the breakout star of the year and is the one to beat here and in every supporting race from now on. Kikuchi could upset but I'm going for Hudson.

Prediction: Jennifer Hudson
Watch out for: Rinko Kikuchi

Best Director
Clint Eastwood for Flags Of Our Fathers
Clint Eastwood for Letters From Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears for The Queen
Alejandro González Iñárritu for Babel
Martin Scorsese for The Departed

The race EVERYONE is watching. Will - can - Scorsese finally pull off an Oscar win as Best Director? This would be a good indication. Of course, he's up against his old sparring partner Clint Eastwood, a double nominee this year who trounced Marty for the Oscar two years ago (Clint won for his sleeper Million Dollar Baby over Marty for The Aviator). Nobody is going to argue that Scorsese doesn't deserve an Oscar and just about every other directing prize going...but maybe not this year.

Eastwood pulled off an astonishing double whammy, gifting audiences two daring, profound and moving takes on the one story. It's a remarkable directing achievement that cannot be ignored. The old dog could yet again upset Scorsese. Inirritu won this category at Cannes but he and Frears are rank outsiders for the gong. The best directing job of the year (if not the decade) - Paul Greengrass for United 93 - isn't even nominated, to the HFPA's eternal shame.

Prediction: Martin Scorsese
Watch out for: Clint Eastwood


Best Screenplay
Babel
Written by Guillermo Arriaga
The Departed
Written by William Monahan
Little Children
Written by Todd Field, Tom Perrotta
Notes On A Scandal
Written by Patrick Marber
The Queen
Written by Peter Morgan

Another strong category. Babel will put up a good fight but I'm plumping for Peter Morgan's clever, witty and revealing screenplay for The Queen. Morgan is THE hottest writer around, having also co-penned The Last King of Soctland as well as The Deal and current stage sensation Frost/Nixon.

Prediction: The Queen
Watch out for: Babel


Best Foreign Language Film
Apocalypto
Letters From Iwo Jima
The Lives Of Others
Pan's Labyrinth
Volver

An historic one here: two of the contenders for the Best Foreign film were directed by American directors. Clint Eastwood should shade it for Letters above Mel Gibson's Apocalypto, although a victory for Gibson would be a potent demonstration of the community's forgiveness for his bizarre anti-Semetic rant last summer. Pan's Labyrinth and Volver - two awesome achievements - will struggle to overshadow their higher profile competitors. Lives of Others is a total outsider, though a fine movie.

Prediction: Letters from Iwo Jima
Watch out for: Volver
__________________________________________________________________
Television Series - Drama
Big Love
Grey's Anatomy
Heroes
Lost
24

Prediction: Heroes
Watch out for: Grey's Anatomy
Television Series - Musical Or Comedy
Desperate Housewives
Entourage
The Office
Ugly Betty
Weeds

Prediction: Ugly Betty
Watch out for: Entourage

Mini-Series Or Television Movie
Bleak House
Broken Trail
Elizabeth I
Mrs. Harris
Prime Suspect: The Final Act

Prediction: Bleak House
Watch out for: Prime Suspect

Actor In A Leading Role - Drama Series
Patrick Dempsey in Grey's Anatomy
Michael C. Hall in Dexter
Hugh Laurie in House, M. D.
Bill Paxton in Big Love
Kiefer Sutherland in 24

Prediction: Michael C Hall
Watch out for: Patrick Dempsey
Actor In A Leading Role - Musical Or Comedy Series
Alec Baldwin in 30 Rock
Zach Braff in Scrubs
Steve Carell in The Office
Jason Lee in My Name Is Earl
Tony Shalhoub in Monk

Prediction: Steve Carell
Watch out for: Alec Baldwin


Actor In A Leading Role - Mini-Series Or Television Movie
André Braugher in Thief
Robert Duvall in Broken Trail
Michael Ealy in Sleeper Cell
Chiwetel Ejiofor in Tsunami: The Aftermath
Ben Kingsley in Mrs. Harris
Bill Nighy in Gideon's Daughter
Matthew Perry in The Ron Clark Story

Prediction: Michael Ealy
Watch out for: Chiwetel Ejiofar


Actress In A Leading Role - Drama Series
Patricia Arquette in Medium
Edie Falco in The Sopranos
Evangeline Lilly in Lost
Ellen Pompeo in Grey's Anatomy
Kyra Sedgwick in The Closer

Prediction: Ellen Pompeo
Watch out for: Kyra Sedgwick


Actress In A Leading Role - Musical Or Comedy Series
Marcia Cross in Desperate Housewives
America Ferrera in Ugly Betty
Felicity Huffman in Desperate Housewives
Julia Louis-Dreyfus in The New Adventures Of Old Christine
Mary-Louise Parker in Weeds

Prediction: America Ferrera
Watch out for: Julia Louis-Dreyfuss


Actress In A Leading Role - Mini-Series Or Television Movie
Gillian Anderson in Bleak House
Annette Bening in Mrs. Harris
Helen Mirren in Elizabeth I
Helen Mirren in Prime Suspect: The Final Act
Sophie Okonedo in Tsunami: The Aftermath

Prediction: Helen Mirren (Prime Suspect)
Watch out for: Gillian Anderson


Actor In A Supporting Role - Series, Mini-Series Or Television Movie
Thomas Haden Church in Broken Trail
Jeremy Irons in Elizabeth I
Justin Kirk in Weeds
Masi Oka in Heroes
Jeremy Piven in Entourage

Prediction: Jeremy Piven
Watch out for: Masi Oka


Actress In A Supporting Role - Series, Mini-Series Or Television Movie
Emily Blunt in Gideon's Daughter
Toni Collette in Tsunami: The Aftermath
Katherine Heigl in Grey's Anatomy
Sarah Paulson in Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip
Elizabeth Perkins in Weeds

Prediction: Katherine Heigl
Watch out for: Toni Collette

Diaz of Wine and Roses

From the Irish Independent and The Belfast Telegraph...

She commands multi-million fees to front movies and regularly tops the world's sexiest women polls. Declan Cashin meets golden girl Cameron Diaz....continue reading here

Not so Clueless after all

You can read my interview with Brittany Murphy here, first published in the Irish Independent and then the Belfast Telegraph.