The People’s Choice Awards: is there anything as pointless? There are already too many awards shows as is. Audiences already announce their "People’s Choice" of the year when they vote with their dollars, allowing films to be revealed as the highest grossing pictures of the year, or for shows to become The Most Watched Show Of The Week, which, considering the bulk of television, is like winning a shortest giraffe contest. No one cares except the money men, so I guess it’s nice that all these celebrities can get together and celebrate how much cash they've bringing down.
Regardless, The People’s Choice Awards were held last night and it was announced that the Favorite Movie of the year was Shane Black'sIron Man 3 - which actually is about to be lapped by The Hunger Games: Catching Fire as 2013's biggest film. Apparently The Hunger Games was released after the cutoff date for this celebration of avarice, which means we were robbed the sight of Jennifer Lawrence making another awkward award speech. Instead, we got the likes of Robert Downey Jr., who won Best Action Movie Actor clowning around and reminding the audience that no one thinks he’s as great as he does.
Favorite Movie Actor was, weirdly enough, Johnny Depp. Depp appeared in one movie last year, and it was The Lone Ranger. That’s called the power of goodwill, and it lasts a helluva long time, apparently. Sandra Bullock, who did double duty in megahits Gravity and The Heat, won Favorite Movie Actress, Favorite Dramatic Actress and Favorite Comedic Actress (weren’t the last two just kind of assumed?), with the latter movie winning Favorite Comedic Movie. Favorite Comedic Actor went to Adam Sandler for the hate-crime that was Grown Ups 2, and Leonardo DiCaprio won Favorite Dramatic Actor despite a nomination going to Ryan Gosling, clearly robbed for Only God Forgives.
Carrie ended up as the unlikely winner of Favorite Horror Movie, despite being it being the lowest-grossing film in a category that also included The Conjuring, Insidious Chapter Two (how upset do you think James Wan is?), Mama and the truly terrifying Hansel And Gretel: Witch Hunters. Favorite Family Movie was Despicable Me 2 and Favorite Thriller Movie (?) was Now You See Me (with Red 2 and A Good Day To Die Hard splitting the Indifferent Bruce Willis vote).
Really the show's most interesting point of of conversation surrounds the nominees that were selected in the first place. If the cutoff was the late months of the year, keeping megahits like The Hunger Games and Frozen out, then where were last year’s late-arriving hits like Django Unchained and Les Miserables? Shouldn’t Jessica Chastain have been America’s Choice for Best Everything Female for leading the mission that popped Osama Bin Laden? The comedy category, like the others, is filled with the highest-grossing pictures in that genre, but instead of Identity Thief, how did the Spanish-language Instructions Not Included make the final ballot instead? Award results are determined by Gallup Polls, so what does that say about, say, Man Of Steel, the year’s fifth highest grossing film, which couldn’t grab a single nomination in any category? For a complete list of winners, click through to The Hollywood Reporter.
