Costume: Emma Frost

Even though it has been awhile since the Oscars I wanted to share a little bit about how my Emma Frost costume came together. I went back and forth for quite awhile on what character to choose for this years Oscar Costume Party. It was seriously the day of that I got the final pieces together. This year was tricky for choosing a great female character. My back up plan was to slap on my hot pink bridesmaid dress and call it good. (I have gotten a lot of use out of that dress! Thanks Sarah!) But finally I settled on Emma Frost from X-Men: First Class. I really loved that movie (Michael Fassbender!!! Drool.) I decided to go with Emma for the fun costume possibilities and not so much the love for the character or 'acting'. Sorry January Jones but your body is rocking but your acting just never really does it for me.  I look nothing like Miss Jones so I was not going to go for the bra and mini look that she rocks for most of the movie.

 I found the dress last minute at a thrift store. Pulled on some knee high socks for the 'sixties look' and rocked my sparkly heels. My sister (pictured above as Lisbeth Salander from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) let me borrow this blond curly wig. I brushed out the wig a bit and focused most of my attention on the make up.

I wanted to go for a 'changing into diamond form' look and was completely inspired by this Mermaid Makeup tutorial from Etsy.

In the tutorial she uses spirit gum to attach iridescent sequins to her face to create a bubbly look. I took that idea but used shiny silver sequins from the craft store. I bought the spirit gum at my local party store that carries a bunch of Halloween type makeup all year long. I started with my hairline (before putting on the wig) and layered in towards my face, keeping it thicker towards the outside and thinning it out as it went in. I also applied a lot of sequins to my chest/neck and a few on my arms as well. I felt a bit like a walking disco ball but I think it turned out pretty well. I bought some loose body glitter from Wal-Mart to amp up the sparkle around my eyes and I just applied generously all over. I finished the look with glitter nail polish. The wig ended up covering up quite a bit of the sequins on the face.

I felt pretty sparkly, and a little over-dressed but it was all good friends there so I didn't really care that much. By the end of the night I had taken off the wig and started peeling sequins off. Also I didn't spill anything on the white dress! WIN!!!

Blog Catch Up- Oscar Party

Well March is almost over and I am just now getting around to posting about the Oscars. Oh well! Anyway I wanted to share the few pictures I took during the evening. The one rule for the party was to dress up as a character from a movie in the past year. It did not have to be a character from an Oscar nominated film.

 Here we have not one but TWO Megans from Bridesmaids and a Brad Pitt from Moneyball.

 This is Mr. Popper sans penguin. The penguin is around there somewhere.

 Then we have Hayley Atwell from Captain America and Skeeter from The Help.

 Sisters! Emma frost from Xmen: First Class and the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo from...well you get that one.

 Last minute guest. No costume but she practiced her Oscar acceptance speech with a mini-oscar cupcake complete with the ugly cry so we let it slide.

The gypsy in the corner is from the new Sherlock Holmes movie.

Overall a fun night. I of course was so wishy washy about my costume until about the DAY of but tomorrow I will share how my Emma Frost costume came together.

And the nominees are...

The Oscar nominations went up today and frankly I am underwhelmed. I have not seen a single film nominated for best picture. I actually haven't seen hardly any of the nominated films. Honestly? The only film nominated for Best Picture that I even sort of want to see is 'The Artist'.

Being a film major/buff/nerd lends itself to some stereotypes. In my head I should have already seen all of these nominated films because I am a 'film person'. I have always loved the Academy Awards and have watched them since I was little. I love the glitz and the glam and the long acceptance speeches and all of it. I was at one point convinced that some day I would be up there giving my own drawn-out acceptance speech. But in recent years the Oscars have seemed more like a chore than a joy. Either the nominated films do not come to my city (which is so ridiculous) or I am simply not interested in seeing them. In no way shape or form was I interested in seeing 'The Social Network' so I didn't. Here is the problem, as soon as you assert yourself to not spending money to go watch a movie you are not excited about you loose your 'film person privileges'. This includes but is not limited to voting on the Oscars. You know that thing that people do either in the office, or school, or as we do at our Oscar Party. As soon as you 'miss' one movie, by choice or otherwise, you can't say with any authority that you know what you are talking about. "Well you didn't even see them all, did you?" That will be the response of any other film person. And it is frustrating. I love movies. Always have always will. Someday I might actually get my act together and work in the business but for now I am content being a film lover. There was a time in college when I was trying to impress all these people (read: Boys) and I would ONLY watch 'films' not 'movies'. I was the obnoxious girl who went to the foreign films every week, who refused to watch 'lowly comedies', and generally was a pain in the ass. I have since gotten over that and now enjoy a much larger range of movies.

My favorite films/movies/flicks of 2011? (In no particular order)

-Scream 4
-X-Men: First Class
-Captain America
-Drive
-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
-Jane Eyre


I really wanted to see 'Shame' and 'A Dangerous Method' (Fassbender) but neither of them came to my town. I was hoping that maybe Mr. Fassbender would be nominated for 'Shame' 1. so I could see him on the red carpet and 2. so there was maybe a snow ball's chance in hell it would come to my town.

Golden Globes 2012

The Globes never quite live up to my standards of awesome as far as awards season goes but I watch it nonetheless and it is always a fun time. All you need to do is gather any friends that have the evening free, add some take out food and mix! Even people who don't know anything about the nominees will have something fun to say about dress choices.

As far as fashion goes this year was pretty good. I love the bold shapes and colors that people were rocking and  besides a few near misses I liked the glam looks.

Favorite of the night was actually Kelly Osbourne! She was commentating for E! on the red carpet but her dress was sublime. The color and structure really worked for her and I love love LOVE her granny gray hair thing she has going on. I am such a little old lady at heart.

My other favorite of the night was Evan Rachel Wood. Her dress was the perfect amount of 'wow' without being over the top. The classy silhouette and dark color made her sparkly, scaly, feathery dress perfection.

As far s the show goes it was a bit ho hum. Ricky Gervais played the same act he did last year but this year it just did not work. Where as last year he seemed a little renegade and dangerous this year he felt completely contrived. Over it.

The worst part about the show? NOT ENOUGH MICHAEL FASSBENDER! He had a huge year with Jane Eyre, X Men: First Class, A Dangerous Method, and Shame (for which he was nominated!) Do people really not get how amazing he is? Do they not understand what a huge star he is about to become? Sure I would love to keep him to myself but for people in the know he is already the bees knees and I would appreciate a little more screen time.

Apparently he WAS on the red carpet. Damn you E!. We had to watch every damn kid from Glee strut their stuff but you couldn't afford any screen time with Michael? Grrrrr.

Next up for awards season is the Academy Awards on Feb. 26th. Get ready for party time! We are returning to our old theme of dressing up as your favorite movie character from 2012. It does not have to be from a nominated film, just something from 2012 you liked. Last time we did this I went as James Franco from 'Pineapple Express'. Good times.

Happy Oscar Nomination Day!

 

One of the best days of the year. Basically a comprehensive viewing list for me to watch everything that I didn't get watched yet. I will tell you though with the new '10 Best Picture Nominees' it is getting a little exhausting. I have only seen four so far! Must catch up! And I am sorry, but no amount of good press could make me want to watch a movie about Facebook. I love it and I am on it constantly but I don't want to watch a whole movie about it. No. Thank you.

So let's start with the ol' Best Picture noms:

Best Motion Picture of the Year

Nominees:

127 Hours (2010): Christian Colson, Danny Boyle, John Smithson

Black Swan (2010): Mike Medavoy, Brian Oliver, Scott Franklin

The Fighter (2010): David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman, Mark Wahlberg

Inception (2010): Christopher Nolan, Emma Thomas

The Kids Are All Right (2010): Gary Gilbert, Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, Celine Rattray

The King's Speech (2010): Iain Canning, Emile Sherman, Gareth Unwin

The Social Network (2010): Scott Rudin, Dana Brunetti, Michael De Luca, Ceán Chaffin

Toy Story 3 (2010): Darla K. Anderson

True Grit (2010): Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Scott Rudin

Winter's Bone (2010): Anne Rosellini, Alix Madigan

See, I think this year is going to be perhaps less than exciting because there are a lot of good nominees in each category.

So far I have seen:
Black Swan
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
True Grit

I am personally pretty excited about the True Grit nom. After being snubbed at the Golden Globes it is about time that they got some recognition. I am going to try to see the rest of the films before I put in my final two cents on who I think will win/who I think deserves to win. Yep, I will even sit down and watch 'The Social Network'.

Keep checking in until February 27th for more Oscar talk and (hopefully) some fun movie crafts/treats that you can make to enhance your Oscar party. (Not throwing an Oscar party? You should. Either that or get yourself invited to one!)

Check out all the nominations at imdb. Thoughts?

Golden Globes 2010

(image from cbsnews.com http://wwwimage.cbsnews.com/images/2010/01/18/image6109272.jpg)

I LOVE awards season. I love everything about it. The movies, the stars, the dresses, the speeches- it is all soooo good. I love the 'star machine' of Hollywood and that these people are larger than life and that there is no WAY they are normal human beings but really we wouldn't want them to be. Just to make it clear I am not a fan of the stalking of stars and the ridiculous lengths that people go to to get a shot of them buying groceries or picking up their kids from school- frankly I don't care what they do in their everyday lives what I want is the star I know and love in movies, having interviews in magazines, and rocking it on the red carpet. Award shows always seem to bring back a little bit of that glamour of old Hollywood that I love so much and it never disappoints. The Globes are fun because they are a little bit more laid back and there is a quirkiness that tends to happen in the room that is hard to describe.





As far as the awards go I was fairly happy with the results but I am a little over Avatar and as such I was not pleased to see it get so much attention (they already have all the money in the world I don't think they need awards too!) But how cute was Robert Downey Jr.'s non-acceptance speech? And I loved Martin Scorsese's speech about movies and how the preservation of movies is so important to him. You hear him talk and you just know how much he loves movies- how refreshing is it to see someone who loves their job so much?





Also I really enjoyed seeing all the stars deal with the rain on the red carpet. They seemed to do rather well but a couple of the reporters did not. One in particular looked like a drowning rat and it was so funny. I am really not being mean it was just she was struggling so much to hold it together but you knew she was totally pissed that the rain was ruining her look- I would have been too.

Mickey Rourke and Etsy.

The Oscars last Sunday were pretty epic. My friends and I had a little party with too many sweets (see the Oscar Cupcake post) and silly costumes (High School Musical 3 anyone?) But all fun aside I became very upset when Mickey Rourke lost Best Actor to Sean Penn. Now I loved the movie 'Milk' and I also thought that Sean Penn was amazing but not AS AMAZING as Rourke. I also thought that 'The Wrestler' was one of the best movies I saw this past year and was sad that it was not nominated for best picture.

Maybe it was latent anxiety over the awards show but I had this pretty crazy dream last night about zombies taking over the world so all the humans left were evacuating the major cities. As I went to get on one of the buses that were supposed to take us somewhere safe I see Mickey Rourke walking towards the same van. It was weird because it seemed like me and Mr. Rourke were good pals just about to embark on a road trip. Everyone was scared but it was sort of comforting to have him on our side. When I woke up I pondered this feeling and concluded that at the time it may have been comforting but in real life I don't know how much help he would be in an actual zombie situation.

To get to my actual point of all this though is the awesomeness that is Etsy and the fact that Mr. Rourke's sad but sweet necklace with his dog Loki on it was made by an etsy seller. You can read the article here for yourself. I just really feel like that proves how awesome both Mickey Rourke and Etsy are!

Oscar treats- brainstorming

So I am trying to find a treat/snack to go with each of the 5 nominees for Best picture. I am still in idea stage but here is what I am thinking so far:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: Has to be candies made from the adorable Vintage Button Candy mold that I just got in the mail from Bake It Pretty! (http://www.bakeitpretty.com/)

Frost/Nixon: I am thinking Frosting/Nixon- cupcakes with tons of yummy frosting with Nixon's pic on toothpicks like Emily from 'inside a black apple' http://theblackapple.typepad.com/inside_a_black_apple/food_and_drink/page/2/

Milk: This one might be too obvious. I am going to try to think of something more creative than a glass of milk. Maybe cookies frosted like Harvey Milk's campaign signs? Hmm....

Slumdog Millionaire: Maybe mini hot dogs to get away from the sweets theme. (My little sis suggested using relish to draw dollar signs on them)

The Reader: No idea. Havent seen it yet either. (should be going this week).