Monday, March 05, 2018

Oscar Recap: Yeah, Yeah, Osiris. We Get It.



Well, another year, another Academy Awards. And another pile of clunky, ham-fisted symbolism dropped on our heads.

Jimmy Kimmel, who used to run around asking random women to reach around in his pants pockets on a show that usually went to credits running footage of buxom young girls jumping on a trampoline, is a "woke" intersectionalist all of a sudden and shot up some fish in a barrel with his obligatory yet bloodless Harvey Weinstein jokes.


Jimmy, it would have been edgy to tell Harvey Weinstein jokes last year. This year it's just pathetic.




Even so, headline writers went with that as their lede. And why not? Using shockwords like "penis" is always good for a few clicks. But seeing as you were all primed by my Oscars pregame post, you probably sussed out what Worshipful Master Kimmel was really getting at here...

"According to the form of the myth reported by the Greek author Plutarch, Osiris was slain or drowned by Seth, who tore the corpse into 14 pieces and flung them over Egypt. Eventually, Isis and her sister Nephthys found and buried all the pieces, except the phallus, thereby giving new life to Osiris, who thenceforth remained in the underworld as ruler and judge."
So Brother Kimmel's lame, stupid joke -- and the attention-grabbing "penis" insert -- actually points us to who and what "Oscar" actually is-- Oscar is Ausur or Wsr, the great god of the Egyptian builder cults that played such a pivotal role in the formation of the esoteric craft guilds that would later be reborn as Freemasonry.

Plus, there were quite a lot of penises at the Oscars last night. 


There were some expected gun-control calls, like rapper Common addressing the people of Parkland with an enigmatic "we say Ase."


There was speculation he was referring to a principle in Yoruba religions, but my guess is that he was referring to ASE Ltd., which stands for "Allied Security Enterprises." They provided all the heavily-armed thugs with AR15s that kept Common and his cohorts safe and snug.

Apparently, ASE was fresh off some heavy death-squad duty in Yemen and appreciated the change of pace.


"Diversity" was the theme of the ceremony and there were quite a diversity of penises on offer. For example, transgenic chimera penises in the case of this year's Best Picture, The Shape of Water. Which all goes to show that this clutch of symbols we've been sorting through is nowhere near done with us. 

And like I've said before, this film manages to combine a gender-swapped Siren with the old Beauty and the Beast routine, creating maximum memetic (and Fraserian) impact.


Hell yeah, G. You tell 'em.


Christopher Nolan missed all the major awards but his film Drownkirk Dunkirk racked up a few technical-type awards. 


And since there's not enough being done already to ensure that the entire West Coast will be vaporized in a nuclear conflagration, the Academy took a few more whacks at the Russian hornets' nest by granting Icarus an Oscar as well. 

You see the symbolism here, right? Icarus went out in a blaze of glory when he flew too close to the sun and melted his wings. 

So if all you Hollywood types want to do the same, go crash your private jets into Mount Tamalpais. Don't take the rest of us out with you.


Coco - a Pixar film set in Mexico and featuring a Day of the Dead theme-- won best animated feature. One of the producers stepped up and dropped some choice intersectional buzzwords on the crowd, such as "representation matters."

Indeed it does, so how about having more than one Chicano involved at the production level in the sequel? Seeing it's a film about Mexican culture and all. 

Hey, don't get all Tumblrista on me. Just a suggestion. Chill.

Oh man, is that those Antifa punks at my door again? Jesus, you can't say anything these days.


Coco also racked up an Ausur for Best Original Song, beating out this ick-orgy of narcissistic self-validation from what looks like a movie I'd sooner eat a tub of OxyClean than ever watch another second of. This music video was painful enough. 

Yeah, yeah, Bill- you didn't fit in at school. None of us did either. But the rest of us didn't become Hollywood zillionaires so save us the pity party, OK?


And even if it got shut out on the other noms, Jordan Peele won a writing Ausur for his breakthrough horror flick, Get Out. Peele attended with his wife, comedian Chelsea Paretti, who I heard doubles as Peele's bodyguard. Forget where exactly. 


I heard Get Out co-star Allison Williams was tapped to play Bruce Dickinson in The Iron Maiden Story, but don't quote me on that either.


Not a whole lot of Orange on display, surprisingly. Which is fine because we're about to get hit with an Orange tsunami. Gird your loins.


And hey- Margot Emma Robbie Stone paid tribute to Our Lady, Queen Dowager of Sibyls, with her hand-sewn Garlands.


Then there were tacky-as-motherfuck stage sets. The usual grab-bag of Masonic kitsch,of course,  but I couldn't help but notice this backdrop looked like some kind of demonic entity opening its eye and scanning the crowd.

Don't see it? Squint.


Then there were the usual columns and arches and domes and Blue-and-Gold and Mother-of-fuck will you people just get over it, already? 

Does everything have to look like an effin' Tracing Board? Gah. 

Freemasonry, yeah yeah yeah. We get it.


Then we saw Emma Stone or Margot Robbie (whatever) standing in front of this little tableau, which I couldn't decide was supposed to suggest a Stargate, a Wormhole, Hyperspace or a colonoscopy. 

All of the above, probably.


For the big climax they dropped a set that looked like an AI went crazy with a 3D printer's cut-and-paste function after some disgruntled programmer asked it to try to make sense of Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite and fried its logarithms.


Yeah, kind of like that.


And of course a Vega took the stage; trans-actor Daniela Vega from the Chilean film, A Fantastic Woman. Some headlines claimed she was the first transwoman to present an award at the Oscars but that is almost-certainly not true. I can't even say for certain she was the first transwoman to present an award last night.

First openly-trans Vega? Sure, that tracks.


I'm not sure what the inference is here, though. She doesn't look an Oscar to me. I don't get out much these days, though. 


And I gotta say that those Academy hair and makeup people do really amazing work. I never would have guessed that was Margot Robbie. 


Maybe they should have worked on this film.


And maybe this Oscar ad for Twitter as well. Just sayin'. 


And look out- because in keeping with the river and drowning motifs we've been spotting these past several months, there seems to be a new Antinous in town. 

And just like the old version he seems to have been deified out there in Tinseltown. 

For those of you who don't remember, the original Antinous was deified by the Emperor Hadrian as an incarnation of Osiris, Dionysus, Osiris-Dionysus and very possibly Dionysus-Osiris when he drowned in the Nile at the age of 18 or so.


And just because symbolism, the new 'Nous is identified with Roman icons pulled out of rivers in a kind of not-so-oblique connection back to the old 'Nous. 


Of course, I'm talking about the young actor Timothee Chalamet, co-star of Call Me by Your Name. Chalamet plays a very young-looking 17 year-old boy involved with a 24-year-old archaeologist, who in turn is played by a 31 year-old actor who looks 40. 

Got all that?


And just to drive the point home, James Ivory (of Merchant and Ivory fame) had a portrait of young Timothee painted on his dress-shirt in a very Hadrianesque fashion. Only thing is that our Tim here is still alive and well. 

Mr. Ivory, if you're out there reading let me just say this to you, with the deepest respect for you as a writer and producer of several legendary and award-winning films over the years...

...dude, that's just fucking creepy

You're old enough to be his great-grandfather, FFS. And correct me if I'm wrong but this just isn't the kind of thing you customarily do to someone who is still alive. 

I mean, James Dean, Jean Marais, the young Elvis or Brando? Sure, go to town. But generally that's the kind of tribute you see schoolgirls pay their favorite J-Pop stars before getting sent home to change into something appropriate. 

Just trying to help protect the legacy, sir.  


Oh Jesus; Timothee's character is surnamed "Perl-man." 

That does it; someone ring up Chalamet's agent and tell him to make damn sure that poor kid stays out of any oceans, rivers, swimming pools, tidal pools, lakes, ponds, streams, or large puddles.

Hell, tell them to keep this kid's ass out of any bathtubs, for Pete's sake.