Yes, the Academy Awards have tradition, they have history, they have class. But might we suggest that they lack a little fun? The MTV Movie Awards spice things up with categories such as best kiss and best fight, and the People's Choice Awards gave an honor for best bromance. Here then are the awards we'd like to see Oscar hand out if he ever had a few too many swigs of Dom and decided to jump up on a table and yell out some new categories.
Foremost feline in a leading role
Forget Uggie, the dog from 2011 best picture winner "The Artist." If you own or are owned by a cat, you know our feline friends are much harder to direct, hence the "herding cats" cliche. So give an award to Ulysses, the strikingly mellow orange tabby from "Inside Llewyn Davis," who pretty much lets star Oscar Isaac carry him around like a handbag. Reportedly more than one cat played the role, but hey, we let the Olsen twins get away with that.
Horrendous hairstyles, lead and supporting roles
We know we had some bad hairstyles in the 1970s and 1980s, but "American Hustle" reminds us just how bad they were. In the film's opening scene, Christian Bale's character spends the first five minutes of the movie carefully arranging — even gluing — his fake hair onto his balding head. And he tops it off with enough hairspray to make Tracy Turnblad proud. The supporting hair award has to go to Bradley Cooper, who's seen onscreen getting one of those home perms with the many tiny curlers. It's so real you almost keel over from the sheer sense-memory of the smell of the perm solution.
Most unnerving body transformation
Watching Matthew McConaughey's gaunt figure in "Dallas Buyers Club" is undeniably difficult. The already slim actor dropped 47 pounds to play Ron Woodruff, the Texan with HIV who smuggled AIDS-fighting drugs into the country in the 1980s. McConaughey said he felt he had a responsibility to Woodruff to portray him accurately, and he's right. He makes Woodruff look so close to death that the movie's very meaning becomes more poignant.
Best reason to put a bird on it
Johnny Depp's "The Lone Ranger" was bad for many reasons, a convoluted plot and overlong run time chief among them. But it's hard to take your eyes off the black bird perched on Depp's head as he plays the Lone Ranger's companion, Tonto. Depp explained that he had seen a painting of a Native American warrior and was inspired by the work. If only the scriptwriters were equally inspired.
Creepiest choppers award
White teeth are fine and all, but Jonah Hill's "Wolf of Wall Street" character Donnie takes dental beauty too far. Hill sports prosthetic teeth that glow like they've been nuked, even brighter than Ross Geller's on "Friends" that time he overbleached his teeth for a date. (The gleaming teeth are taken straight from the character's description in real-life "Wolf" Jordan Belfort's book.) Hill said talking with them was so weird he would call up Best Buy and Target stores and ramble on about their products just to give himself practice.
Best butt joke
Sweet Olaf, the snowman from animated hit "Frozen," just can't keep it together. His body parts, that is. At one point he's reassembled in the wrong order, leading him to declare, "Man, am I out of shape." Another time his legs and middle run off without him. And after falling from a cliff, he's all out of sorts. "Do me a favor, grab my butt," he directs ice salesman Kristoff as his lower part jogs by. And so the preschoolers of America were introduced to their favorite joke ever.
Freakiest future scenario that might just come true
Here's the thing about "Her," in which Joaquin Phoenix's Theodore falls in love with his computer operating system, Samantha (voiced by Scarlett Johansson): It feels like it's not that far off from reality. Phoenix walks around with an earpiece jammed in his ear that allows him to speak directly to the computer, and he has a small book-like phone that allows him to show Samantha what he's looking at. It's not a far jump from our smartphone-packed world. Can actual human-computer romances be far off? Hey Siri, what're you wearing?
Most overexposed movie character
Coming into 2013, many people were excited to see Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell) and his intrepid news crew return in "Anchorman 2," the sequel to the 2004 hit comedy. But suddenly he was everywhere. He appeared in 70 — yes, 70! — car commercials alone, plus innumerable local news appearances, a New Yorker fake autobiography excerpt, a presentation at the MTV European Music Awards, and he even had a (tasty!) Ben & Jerry's flavor, Scotchy Scotch Scotch. How can we miss you if you won't go away?
