I had wanted to post this yesterday, but then came the report of Don Sutton's passing, and that scuttled my plans for the rest of the night, as I had several Excel spreadsheets to update while writing my tribute post while watching Sutton's 300th win. But now I can come back to present a little bit more about a little about my fake movies.
As I mentioned when presenting the winners of the Awards for Motion Picture Services (AMPS), this was one of my fake awards for fake movies from my fake country. There are actually three sets of awards that I've come up with. The L Awards was the first set of awards I made up, way back in 1998 to celebrate the films of 1997. This was the most prestigious set of awards and is similar to the Academy Awards. However, a few years later I came up with two other awards to act as precursors for the L Awards, just as how there are other awards to predict the Oscars. One of these is the Movie Magazine Awards, which was designed to be the awards voted on and presented by the editors of the Movie Magazine, who also annually selects the ten best movies of the year as well as the ten best performances. They actually hold two sets of awards, one for comedy films and one for drama, so it's similar in that way to the Golden Globes. And then there's AMPS, which is nominally voted on by a select group of industry professionals but are similar to the Critics Choice Awards.
Anyways, even though the L Awards are the most prestigious and Movie Magazine Awards has the most potential to be fun with its two separate sets of categories, the AMPS has been the set of awards that I've made the most public. I actually started out by allowing users of the Nintendo NSider forums to vote on the final Best Picture nominees for the L Awards in 2006 and 2007, but they made some dubious selections, so I switched to having votes for the final Best Picture nominee in 2008. I took a break in 2009 and 2010 as I was just trying to survive the first two years of medical school, but I went back to holding the votes in 2011, and they have been held annually since then, and this year I went with having a public vote for Best Picture. I thought it went fairly well, so maybe I will continue doing this going forward.
With all that said, I've decided to present the AMPS awards that had been going on since 2000. I've actually retroactively come up with winners dating back to 1989, but I'm going to keep this to 2000 onwards, largely because the "All persons fictitious clause" don't necessarily apply for the years before 2000. Anyways, I will present the winners in all 15 categories after the break, plus the Best Picture winners for Movie Magazine and L Awards, and some commentary just to show how much time I've wasted in coming up with these fake awards. And I'll post the five films nominated for AMPS Best Picture nominees for the heck of it. Names would be given only for acting and directing awards. We start with 2000 after the break.
2000
Best Picture: Comedy
Best Director: Joe Lee, The Nintendo Club
Best Actor: James Turnboil, Incompetence
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, Fresh Talk High
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Nintendo Club
Best Supporting Actress: Angela Klao, The Nintendo Club
Best Screenplay: Comedy
Best Editing: Happy Campers
Best Cinematography: Comedy
Best Score: The Told Tale
Best Art Direction: Yi Ching
Best Sound: Yi Ching
Best Sound Effects: Yi Ching
Best Visual Effects: Yi Ching
Best Makeup: Happy Campers
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Comedy
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Nintendo Club
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Comedy
AMPS Best Picture Nominees
Comedy
Damned Injustice
Happy Campers
The Nintendo Club
The Told Tale
Commentary:
Well, the first year I held AMPS there was certainly a sign that there would be differences from expectations. I had come up with nominees for every category (something I'm too damned lazy to do nowadays), and I was expecting the filmmaking comedy aptly named
Comedy and the drama about adult gamers
The Nintendo Club to be the main competitors for Best Picture. However, both of those are relatively quiet films that won't wow with their technical achievements. Thus, the biggest winner of the night was
Yi Ching, the adventure thriller based on the classical Chinese text that introduced the concept of the
hexagrams (which we were learning about in Chinese School), which wasn't even nominated for Best Picture. Ultimately, I decided to go for the Best Picture/Director split, with Best Director going to Joe Lee, the baseball star-turned-director and Best Picture going to
Comedy. Comedy was directed by Max Snow, who that year teamed up with his best friend Jim Abrahms to form a movie production company that they called Double Entendre Productions. Their best film was the animated Shakespearean comedy
The Told Tale, nominated for Best Picture. Abrahms made another film earlier in the year,
Fresh Talk High, which won 15-year-old Ellen Hurse her first AMPS win in Best Actress. Meanwhile, Pete Klao, another former baseball star that went into moviemaking (albeit in acting) won his first AMPS, in the Best Supporting Actor category. All of these names would come up again and again in the coming years. Meanwhile,
Happy Campers, a summer camp horror flick that was the highest grossing film of the year, picked up a Best Picture nomination but would win only two awards.
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2001
Best Picture: Rated R
Best Director: Jim Abrahms, Rated R
Best Actor: Rick Jennings, Rated R
Best Actress: Jennifer Heather, The Maiden
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, Let's Make a Deal
Best Supporting Actress: Susan Harrison, Let's Make a Deal
Best Screenplay: Rated R
Best Editing: Class Trip
Best Cinematography: Rated R
Best Score: The United States of America
Best Art Direction: The Maiden
Best Sound: Class Trip
Best Sound Effects: Class Trip
Best Visual Effects: The Adventures of the Fucking Gang
Best Makeup: Boots
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Rated R
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Class Trip
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Class Trip
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Adventures of the Fucking Gang
Class Trip
Let's Make a Deal
The Maiden
Rated R
Commentary:
The willingness of AMPS to embrace controversial films certainly came true in 2001 with the nomination of The Adventures of the Fucking Gang, an NC-17 animated film whose concept that only a teenager can come up with. Thankfully it had no chance of winning, as AMPS went with Rated R, the first live-action production from Double Entendre, a crime caper comedy whose title came from director Jim Abrahms's off-beat sense of humor. (L World uses the same rating system as the MPAA.) It beat out three films from a very busy Joe Lee: The Maiden, a historical dramedy about a British lass who became a concubine for the Chinese emperor Qianlong (Joe Lee wrote the screenplay and appeared in a supporting role); Let's Make a Deal, a crime comedy about a pair of con artists (which won Pete Klao another AMPS award); and Class Trip. The action thriller about a foreign language class whose trip to the country is interrupted by a civil war that envelops the class would go on to win Best Picture at the L Awards, but 19 years later Rated R stands tall as the film whose legacy endures.
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2002
Best Picture: The Cell Cycle
Best Director: Hamelin Jacobs, The Cell Cycle
Best Actor: Nathan Busford, The Busford Project
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, My Evil Twin
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Lighthouse
Best Supporting Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Lighthouse
Best Screenplay: The Lighthouse
Best Editing: The Bogotan Chronology
Best Cinematography: The Cell Cycle
Best Score: People's Republic of China
Best Art Direction: The Cell Cycle
Best Sound: The Puppetmaster
Best Sound Effects: The Cell Cycle
Best Visual Effects: The Cell Cycle
Best Makeup: The Puppetmaster
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: The Bogotan Chronology
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: People's Republic of China
L Awards Best Picture Winner: The Lighthouse
AMPS Best Picture Nominees
The Bogotan Chronology
The Cell Cycle
My Evil Twin
People's Republic of China
Return to Camp McCarthy
Commentary:
2002 was a strange year where none of the voting bodies could decide on a winner. Movie Magazine went with The Bogotan Chronology, the avant-garde feature from Double Entendre Productions that could best be described as a stream-of-consciousness movie, and People's Republic of China, a film from director Rebel Edwards's "The Countries" series where he made a movie set in every country. (How a fake country like L World feature countries from Earth is something that is never adequately explained just deal with it.) Meanwhile, the L Awards went for The Lighthouse, the domestic drama from 95-year-old director Victor A. Slomon who passed away two months after the film's release. The Lighthouse wasn't even nominated for Best Picture in AMPS, although they awarded the two supporting players Pete Klao and Ellen Hurse as well as the screenplay. AMPS gave the honor instead to Return to Camp McCarthy, the sequel to the 2000 smash hit Happy Campers, and My Evil Twin, which featured Ellen Hurse in a dual role that helped her win Best Actress. Yet the Best Picture prize went to The Cell Cycle, a thrilling dramatization of the inner workings of the cell that culminates in mitosis. Hey, I was taking AP Biology at the time, what did you expect?
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2003
Best Picture: Obsession
Best Director: George Cattell, Obsession
Best Actor: Eddie Fawn, Obsession
Best Actress: Janice Wilford, The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, Malaprop Man
Best Supporting Actress: Nancy Anson, The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Screenplay: Obsession
Best Editing: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Cinematography: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: Episode I
Best Art Direction: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Sound: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Sound Effects: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Best Makeup: The Rite of Passage
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Scheiss
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Obsession
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Obsession
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
A Journey Through Chinese History: Episode I
Leadershit
Obsession
Scheiss
The Quest: Destiny Awakened
Commentary:
2003 saw the beginning of two films series that would put their stamp on the L World cinematic scene for the next decade and more. One of these is the "A Journey Through Chinese History" series, which was begun by Double Entendre Productions in conjuncture with director Chen Yizhi (who made Yi Ching and The Maiden) and dramatizes major stories from the history of China. The bulk of the history came in a TV series, but the 3.5-hour pilot was released theatrically, and began the tradition of a theatrical release a year that continues to this day. The other was "The Quest," which was Joe Lee's pet project. It tells the story of Amy Quick, a teenager who is thrust into a quest that takes her around the world to activate hidden pillars of light in order to stop the demon Heylel from rebirth, accompanied by her sister Susie. The first film of the series Destiny Awakened was extremely popular with the AMPS voters, winning eight awards including acting honors for Janice Wilford (as Amy) and Nancy Anson (as Susie) as well as a multitude of technical prizes. Yet the biggest awards went to Obsession, the psychological thriller about another teenager's crumbling psyche as he obsesses about a famous actress. It took home Best Picture and Best Director, leaving The Quest: Destiny Awakened as the winningest film in AMPS history without a Best Picture win.
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2004
Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Director: Jim Abrahms & Chen Yizhi, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Actor: Yan-hao Lee, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Actress: Janice Wilford, The Quest: Survival of the Fittest
Best Supporting Actor: Marvin Ward, The Wrong Way Home
Best Supporting Actress: Nancy Anson, The Quest: Downhill
Best Screenplay: The Wrong Way Home
Best Editing: The Quest: Downhill
Best Cinematography: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Sound: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Sound Effects: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Visual Effects: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: The Wrong Way Home
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou
The Quest: Downhill
The Quest: Survival of the Fittest
Sporks!
The Wrong Way Home
Commentary:
It was "A Journey Through Chinese History" that came out as the big winner in 2004. The ultra-violent The Rise of Zhou about the revolution that took down the corrupt King Zhou of Shang leading to the formation of the Zhou dynasty took home nine awards. It swept most of the technical awards, Best Picture, Best Director, and also saw Yan-Hao Lee take home Best Actor for his chilling portrayal of the cruel King. The biggest victims of The Rise of Zhou's success was The Wrong Way Home, another film from Double Entendre Productions. It closed out the crime trilogy that began with Rated R in 2001 and was followed by Not as Simple as It Seems in 2003. The Wrong Way Home tells the story of the crime quartet from Rated R as they try to elude recapture following the prison escape that made up most of Not as Simple as It Seems. It was noted for its film noir aesthetics including the black and white cinematography. With The Rise of Zhou capturing most of the honors, The Wrong Way Home was only able to win awards for its screenplay and for Marvin Ward who played the relentless detective. Ward's win in Best Supporting Actor ended the four-year winning streak by Pete Klao. Janice Wilford and Nancy Anson repeated as Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress for two separate The Quest films.
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2005
Best Picture: The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Best Director: Jim Abrahms, The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Best Actor: Andy Ray, The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Best Actress: Janice Wilford, The Quest: Out of the Frying Pan
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Best Supporting Actress: Phyllis Denver, No Questions Asked
Best Screenplay: The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Best Editing: Cancer
Best Cinematography: Cancer
Best Score: A Chemist's Guide to Love & Revenge
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: Gou Jian's Revenge
Best Sound: Cancer
Best Sound Effects: The Quest: Out of the Frying Pan
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: Out of the Frying Pan
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: Gou Jian's Revenge
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Cancer
L Awards Best Picture Winner: The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves
Cancer
A Chemist's Guide to Love & Revenge
A Journey Through Chinese History: Gou Jian's Revenge
The Quest: Out of the Frying Pan
Commentary:
While The Wrong Way Home was overshadowed by A Journey Through Chinese History: The Rise of Zhou, director Jim Abrahms was already planning on further progressing the story of the Rated R quartet. He planned out a prequel series that tells the successful heists of the group, which would be punctuated by feature films that tell the tale of how the group came together and another that drove them apart prior to the events of Rated R. The initial prequel film came to be The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves*. The action comedy tells the tale of how the four main players met while stranded in the Taoyuan airport and their eventual heist that takes them from Taiwan to Hong Kong. It was shot in a style reminiscent of John Woo and was a huge box office and critical success. It left Cancer, Hamelin Jacobs's spiritual successor to The Cell Cycle, an also-fan with only a few technical awards. Meanwhile Janice Wilford won her third straight Best Actress crown for The Quest because I'm too lazy to come up with other actresses.
*If you want to know, I am somewhat proud of the hidden meanings in the title The Brotherhood of the Peach Groves. It is a reference to the classic Chinese text "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" as the main characters took an oath within a peach grove. It presents the main characters as being like Liu Bei, Zhang Fei and Guan Yu, and the fourth as a reluctant participant much in the same vein as Zhuge Liang. Even though the film is set in Taiwan and Hong Kong in 1987 instead of China in the 180s, the fact that the main characters meet in the Taoyuan International Airport adds to the plot as the literal translation of Taoyuan is "Peach Grove"
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2006
Best Picture: Unkept Promises
Best Director: Jim Abrahms & Max Snow, Unkept Promises
Best Actor: Andy Ray, Unkept Promises
Best Actress: Wilma Dent, The Serviceman's Wife
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Serviceman's Wife
Best Supporting Actress: Ellen Hurse, Unkept Promises
Best Screenplay: Unkept Promises
Best Editing: The Pro
Best Cinematography: Unkept Promises
Best Score: Unkept Promises
Best Art Direction: The Country Bumpkin
Best Sound: Unkept Promises
Best Sound Effects: The Pro
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: Saving a Sister
Best Makeup: The Quest: The Power of Fear
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Unkept Promises
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Serviceman's Wife
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Unkept Promises
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Elites
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Laws of Shang Yang
The Quest: Saving a Sister
The Serviceman's Wife
Unkept Promises
Commentary:
A year later and following the conclusion of the successful heist mini-series "The Years of Yonder" came the release of Unkept Promises, the conclusion of the Rated R prequel series. This time the quartet goes to England to con a prominent mob boss of his riches. There they get entangled with the mob boss's girlfriend, whose loyalty is always in question. While the film is an action comedy reminiscent of the works of Guy Ritchie, the tragic conclusion left viewers stunned, and was a big reason why Unkept Promises was named by Movie Magazine as the Best Film of the 2000s in 2020. Much of the success is due to the powerful performance by Ellen Hurse in her return to film after taking a year off to star in the theatrical production of Fresh Talk High. She took home acting honors alongside her co-star Andy Ray. The pair had made their film debuts a decade earlier in the (sadly fictional) adaptation of Wayside School as Joy and Jason respectively. The role of Mrs. Jewls in the made-up Wayside School film was Wilma Dent, who won Best Actress for her titular role in The Serviceman's Wife, a drama about a wife who finds out that her soldier's husband is having an affair overseas. She ended Janice Wilford's streak of wins for The Quest at three.
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2007
Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Director: Jim Abrahms & Chen Yizhi, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Actor: Max Snow, A Fucker Named Bob
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Groupies
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Double Entendre Comedy Hour
Best Supporting Actress: Mana Gafouri, The Death of Innocents
Best Screenplay: A Fucker Named Bob
Best Editing: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Cinematography: And to the Victor Goes the Spoils
Best Score: The Death of Innocents
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Sound: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Sound Effects: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Visual Effects: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: A Fucker Named Bob
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Death of Innocents
The Double Entendre Comedy Hour
A Fucker Named Bob
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chu-Han Contention
The Quest: Angst and Desperation
Commentary:
After four movies that ranged between 143 and 224 minutes in length, "A Journey Through Chinese History" decided to come up with their most ambitious project yet, a film that details the entire war between Xiang Yu's Kingdom of Chu and Liu Bang's Kingdom of Han for domination of China following the death of Qin Shi Huangdi. The epic, four year, multi-front battle was told in a film that totaled seven hours and 37 minutes. Moviegoers balked at the running length resulting in the lowest box office returns, but the efforts of Double Entendre Productions was well rewarded in AMPS voting, as they took home eight awards including Best Picture and Best Director. As if capturing Best Picture wasn't enough, Double Entendre Productions had two other films in the running. The first was The Double Entendre Comedy Hour, a sketch comedy film with skits from Jim Abrahms, Max Snow, and the numerous other filmmakers that had joined the company. It netted Pete Klao another Best Supporting Actor crown for his role in a recurring sketch of a private eye trying to solve a murder with confounding clues. The other was the provocatively titled A Fucker Named Bob. (It was marketed simply as Bob). The darkly comic tale of a misanthropic "fucker" (named Bob) was named the Best Film of the Year by Movie Magazine and helped director-turned-actor Max Snow capture a Best Actor award. The Iranian Revolution drama The Death of Innocents (I swear I came up with this before I heard about Persepolis) also did well.
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2008
Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
Best Director: Jim Abrahms & Chen Yizhi, A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
Best Actor: Reginald Stovey, A Life Worth Living?
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Danville Quarterly
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Danville Quarterly
Best Supporting Actress: Nancy Anson, The Quest: The Garden of False Glory
Best Screenplay: A Life Worth Living?
Best Editing: The Danville Quarterly
Best Cinematography: The Danville Quarterly
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
Best Sound: The Quest: Going Off the Path
Best Sound Effects: The Orb of Serena
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: Going Off the Path
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Silica
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Danville Quarterly
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Life Worth Living?
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Danville Quarterly
A Journey Through Chinese History: Shiji
A Life Worth Living?
The Quest: Going Off the Path
Silica
Commentary:
As I mentioned, in 2006 and 2007, I opened up voting for Best Picture in L Awards to members of Nintendo NSider forums. That resulted in
The Country Bumpkin and
And to the Victor Goes the Spoils getting Best Picture nominations. While both films had captured AMPS wins, they were far from the films I would have nominated (
The Elites in 2006 and
Loose Change in 2007). Therefore, I decided to allow public voting for the
final AMPS Best Picture spot, opening the vote up to my Facebook friends. They voted in
Silica, the crime saga told in Seussian rhyme, which would have been my choice. 2008 turned out to be a repeat of 2002, where four different films won the four different Best Picture honors.
Silica captured the crown for Movie Magazine's Comedy division, while
The Danville Quartery won the Drama division, which shouldn't have been a surprise as the small town newspaper thriller was named the Best Film of the Year by the esteemed publication.
A Life Worth Living?, the conclusion of the
Rated R series, took home Best Picture at the L Awards. While AMPS gave acting awards to Ellen Hurse and Pete Klao for
The Danville Quarterly and Reginald Stovey for
A Life Worth Living?, the final honors for Best Picture went to that year's entry in the "A Journey Through Chinese History" series, a dramatization of the life of historian Sima Qian and the sacrifices he made to complete his historical masterpiece "Shiji", or the Record of the Grand Historian. (Seriously, I'd advise you not to look up Sima Qian's fate.)
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2009
Best Picture: Mikey Boulevard
Best Director: Perry Cantu, Mikey Boulevard
Best Actor: James Turnboil, Mikey Boulevard
Best Actress: Patricia Geunard, The Plywood Fence
Best Supporting Actor: Rick Jennings, Mikey Boulevard
Best Supporting Actress: Kit Pettigrew, Heaven's Saints
Best Screenplay: Mikey Boulevard
Best Editing: Mikey Boulevard
Best Cinematography: Home
Best Score: The Lost Days
Best Art Direction: The Quest: The Way of the Dead
Best Sound: The Quest: The Way of the Dead
Best Sound Effects: Asphalt
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: The Voyage to Nowhere
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Story of Cai Lun
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Mikey Boulevard
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Home
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Mikey Boulevard
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Asphalt
Home
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Story of Cai Lun
Mikey Boulevard
The Quest: The Way of the Dead
Commentary:
In 2009 I entered medical school and also watched
Randy Johnson's 300th Win. I was so busy either studying or writing about the Big Unit's milestone victory that I never spent much time thinking about the movies. I came up with a lot of titles but thought very little about the plotlines. One that I did was the action thriller
Home. I imagined it as a
Max Payne-like revenge story, only this time it featured a detective by the name of John Home. (I was so pissed off by Dreamwork's
Home because it had the same name but a much dumber plot.) Naturally,
Home won the Movie Magazine Drama division. The other film was
Mikey Boulevard. It was the conclusion of a trilogy of film about the titular character that began in 1999 with the fantasy comedy
Mikeytown and in 2004 with
The Maturation of Mikey. While all three were comedies about the same character, they occupied three different genres.
Mikeytown was a slapstick fantasy about Mikey in a fantasy world made up of himself while
The Maturation of Mikey was a romantic comedy about Mikey having an affair only to realize his love for his wife. Meanwhile
Mikey Boulevard was a neo-noir black comedy about Mikey's past fling in the world of crime coming back to cost him his family and his happiness. Naturally, it was the big winner in all three awards.
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2010
Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Director: Chen Yizhi, A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Actor: Zack Timutkus, The Graveyard Shift
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, I'm in Love With You
Best Supporting Actor: Sanhsia Hsu, A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Supporting Actress: Susie Mannard, Dust of Time
Best Screenplay: The Graveyard Shift
Best Editing: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Cinematography: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
Best Sound: The Quest: Wilted Hopes
Best Sound Effects: Will of the Wisp
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: Wilted Hopes
Best Makeup: The Quest: Wilted Hopes
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: I'm in Love With You
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Graveyard Shift
A Journey Through Chinese History: Three Visits to the Cottage
The Quest: Wilted Hopes
Timeless Moments
Will of the Wisp
Commentary:
2010 came when I was in my academically heavy second year of medical school, and needless to say it didn't give me a lot of time to come up with many movies. By the end of the year I was just coming up with generic-sounding titles and nominating the ones that sound good. To this day I still don't know what Will of the Wisp is about, and it received Best Picture nominations in AMPS, Movie Magazine and the L Awards. Therefore, the films that did the best where I had some sort of an inkling of a plot. For example, I'm in Love with You is a musical showcasing the singing and dancing abilities of Ellen Hurse, although the love triangle storyline is very similar to Fresh Talk High from ten years earlier. Meanwhile, The Graveyard Shift is a coming of age drama about a teenager who gets a summer job as a nighttime security guard at a graveyard. And then there's the A Journey Through Chinese History film. By then Double Entendre Productions had stepped back in their involvement while supervising director Chen Yizhi formed another company to oversee production, and they learned an important lesson from the dismal box office showings of The Chu-Han Contention three years earlier. They dedicated an entire season of the TV show towards the turbulent Three Kingdoms era, and focused the film on the legend of Liu Bei's three visits to the domicile of Zhuge Liang to obtain [Liang]'s services. The film turned out to be a box office and critical success, and in a year of limited options, that became the overwhelming choice for Best Picture.
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2011
Best Picture: Excrement
Best Director: Jim Abrahms, Excrement
Best Actor: Pete Poteet, FUUF
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, Excrement
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, Excrement
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Howard, Survivor
Best Screenplay: Excrememt
Best Editing: Excrement
Best Cinematography: Excrement
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: War of the Eight Princes
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: War of the Eight Princes
Best Sound: The Quest: Approaching Oblivion
Best Sound Effects: The Quest: The Power of the Damned
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: The Power of the Damned
Best Makeup: The Quest: The Power of the Damned
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Excrement
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: War of the Eight Princes
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Excrement
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Condemned
Excerment
FUUF
A Journey Through Chinese History: War of the Eight Princes
The Quest: The Power of the Damned
Commentary:
In 2011, I entered the clinical years of medical school, and while the days were busy, I had a lot more free time after work to come up with movie ideas. Thus I held a Best Picture nominee vote for the first time in two years. The people's choice went with the death row drama The Condemned, which was a worthy pick, but there was no way it was beating the year's front-runner. Jim Abrahms had long served as the co-director for the A Journey Through Chinese History films in addition to his work on the Rated R hexalogy. However, in 2011 he would release what he considered his magnum opus: Excrement, an ensemble epic about a sunny young girl's effects on an apartment complex. (The film's title is a reference to the philosophies held by one of the characters and also Abrahms himself that life is shit.) After almost three years in production, Excrement came out to rave reviews despite a daunting running time of 14 hours and 28 minutes. (Abrahms would eventually release two director's cuts, a Diarrhea Edition running six hours and 56 minutes and a Constipation Edition running 29 hours and 27 minutes.) Unfortunately, Abrahms's stubborn desire to release Excrement as a theatrical release instead of a television miniseries led to the film being restricted to very few theaters as many theaters were loath to dedicate a screen for a showing that would take essentially a full day. It turned out to be a major box office bomb despite its tremendous media coverage, and not even its awards haul including Best Picture and acting honors for Ellen Hurse and Pete Klao could rescue the blow that Jim Abrahms took to his reputation. Meanwhile, many other great films such as The Condemned and the rollicking slapstick comedy FUUF which was the number one box office hit of the year went largely ignored other than their Best Picture nominations.
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2012
Best Picture: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Director: George Cattell, The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Actor: Max Snow, Bob's Birthday
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Supporting Actress: Zoe Chunlun, The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Screenplay: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Editing: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Cinematography: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Score: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Art Direction: The Quest: Seeking Salvation
Best Sound: The Secret Life of 'M'
Best Sound Effects: The Quest: Seeking Salvation
Best Visual Effects: The Quest: The Final Battle
Best Makeup: The Secret Life of 'M'
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: The Demon's Mount
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Secret Life of 'M'
L Awards Best Picture Winner: The Secret Life of 'M'
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Bob's Birthday
The Demon's Mount
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Bodhisattva Emperor
The Quest: Seeking Salvation
The Secret Life of 'M'
Commentary:
During my med school years, I spent a lot of my free time playing The Sims 3. I spent most of my time playing the same family, and during my playthrough, one Sim came up as my favorite. It was May French, my first evil Sim. As an evil Sim she took delight in the misery of other Sims, and needless to say that allowed her to advance quickly in her career and skills because she was always in a great mood because all of the other Sims were suffering. Early in 2012 I had the idea that a May French movie could be great. So I came up with an idea for a film that follows May from her humble beginnings (she was raised by a mother who fell into drug addiction after her father left the family to focus on his career as a composer) into her life climbing the ladder to the top of a criminal empire and toppling the mob boss Charles Foster "Lanky" Kong (who was based off of a Sim I created and sent into a life of crime in the original The Sims game where all the characters were named after Donkey Kong 64 characters). And of course playing the cold-blooded anti-hero would be none other than Ellen Hurse, the most respected actress in L World. If you've been paying attention, her name pops up again and again. As I mentioned, she made her film debut at the age of 11 playing the antisocial Joy in the fake Wayside School adaptation in 1996. She made a few brief but memorable film roles through the rest of the 1990s before breaking out with Fresh Talk High, which won her Best Actress honors in 2000. Since then she had success in many of her other roles, winning eight acting AMPS, including double honors in 2002. And because I lord over my fictional nation Big Brother style, she would accept the role and dominate. The Secret Life of 'M' would become a massive box office blockbuster, and of course it would sweep the AMPS, capturing 11 of 15 awards, the most in the 2000s. Of course Ellen Hurse would win Best Actress again, but Pete Klao would take home Best Supporting Actor for his role as Lanky Kong, and Zoe Chunlun would win Best Supporting Actress for playing May's mother Sandi.
The massive success of The Secret Life of 'M' obscured another important storyline in L World cinema: the decline of Jim Abrahms and Double Entendre Productions. In the 12 years since 2000, Abrahms had become one of most prolific directors, finding great success with the Rated R hexalogy as well as the A Journey Through Chinese History series. They welcomed an influx of talent who helped them to many other successful projects, such as A Fucker Named Bob in 2007. However, the box office failure of Excrement was a major blow to the company's finances. Jim Abrahms was hoping that two major projects coming that year could help Double Entendre return to their past glory. The first was Bob's Birthday, a sequel to A Fucker Named Bob. The most notable feature for Bob's Birthday was that it stretched out Double Entendre's production logo to a full length feature film, essentially making the film a double feature. In the normal Double Entendre production logo, the sound of dice is heard before two die come rolling down, landing on ace deuce. For Bob's Birthday the original logo is interrupted by the camera pulling out to reveal that it was thrown by a man (played by Abrahms) hanging out with his friend (played by Max Snow, assumed to be but never explicitly mentioned to be Bob). The two spend the day walking around the city, only to find that in the end the man with the dice is betrayed by his buddy. The segment ends with the dice man getting shot, and as his body falls to the ground the dice falls out of his hands, landing on ace deuce, after which the company title appears. It was an ambitious idea, but the production logo segment was 96 minutes long. With the 120-minute runtime of the actual feature, that meant Bob's Birthday ran at 216 minutes in total, which limited its box office appeal.
Bob's Birthday was directed by Josh Redmond and Claude Rayner, two of the other directors that developed under Double Entendre. The other film was directed by Jim Abrahms himself. It was titled The Demon's Mount, and was structured to be a Choose Your Own Adventure type film, where after every reel audiences could select the next action taken by the protagonist. The audiences choices would lead to different outcomes that would change the film's genre from grossout slapstick comedy to film noir to horror. Unfortunately, the technology required to make the film a reality in theaters was very expensive, And Abrahms had spent millions commissioning intricate works of art from some of the greatest artisans, all of which were destroyed during filming. Audiences ended up staying away due to the gimmicky nature of the film, and it was yet another bomb. While both Bob's Birthday and The Demon's Mount were well received critically, and both received Best Picture nominations, they essentially bankrupted Double Entendre Productions. Jim Abrahms couldn't deal with the failure. While he made public reports that he was working on another film project, he was suffering from severe depression, which ended with him taking his own life from a self-inflicted gunshot wound early in 2014. He was only 46. Thus ended the life and career of one of the biggest visionaries in L World cinema in the first decade of the 21st century.
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2013
Best Picture: The Quest: The Lost Years
Best Director: Joe Lee, The Quest: The Lost Years
Best Actor: Yan-hao Lee, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
Best Actress: Janice Wilford, The Quest: The Lost Years
Best Supporting Actor: Richard Folston, The Fiend
Best Supporting Actress: Nancy Anson, The Quest: The Lost Years
Best Screenplay: Soup
Best Editing: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
Best Cinematography: The Quest: The Lost Years
Best Score: Undying Love
Best Art Direction: Fairgrounds
Best Sound: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
Best Sound Effects: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
Best Visual Effects: Limitless Boundaries
Best Makeup: Snooty Nooty
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: The People's Church
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Quest: The Lost Years
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal
Paint Thinner
The People's Church
The Quest: The Lost Years
Soup
Commentary:
While Double Entendre Productions was dealing with its own issues in 2012, Joe Lee was coming to terms with the fact that his epic The Quest series didn't quite click with audiences as he had hoped. It didn't help that there were multiple releases per year, and each entry ran well over five hours in length. And while the series netted a grand total of 37 Best Picture nominations in the three different awards, it failed to win a single one. The ten-year journey finally came to an end with the explosive The Quest: The Final Battle in 2012, but Joe Lee had one more coda film. The Quest: The Lost Years was released ten years after The Quest: Destiny Awakened and traced Amy and Susie Quick's attempts to return to their normal lives back in their hometown. They had to deal with the fact they were presumed to be dead in addition to the traumatic memories of their experiences, which turned out to be too much for Susie to handle. The Quest: The Lost Years turned out to be a box office smash hit and became the highest grossing film in The Quest series. It was named Best Film of the Year by Movie Magazine, and captured Best Picture with AMPS and Movie Magazine (although it lost to A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal with L Awards). Meanwhile Max Snow's low-budget food comedy Soup, the final film released under the Double Entendre Production label, also received a Best Picture nomination, along with the crime comedy The People's Church, about a pair of con artists trying to swindle a third world village by pretending to build a church. It was the first Best Picture nominee directed by Mark Paul Rennart, a director that many felt has come to view as the successor to Jim Abrahms, at least in terms of their biting wit. Rennart has imbued his films with a strong sense of social justice, one that would become apparent a few years later.
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2014
Best Picture: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Director: George Cattell & Joe Lee, The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Actor: Tom Bradford, Hospice
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Supporting Actor: Geoffrey Hale, Potholes
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Howard, The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Screenplay: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Editing: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Cinematography: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Score: Saria
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Voyage of Xuanzang
Best Sound: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Best Sound Effects: Cataclysm
Best Visual Effects: Cataclysm
Best Makeup: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Socks
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
L Awards Best Picture Winner: The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Cataclysm
Hospice
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Voyage of Xuanzang
Kids Court
The Trials and Tribulations of 'M'
Commentary:
In 2014, I held a
vote for the final Best Picture nominee, and while the vote had received a good response, I never did present the list of the five Best Picture nominees. Maybe it was because I didn't really feel like it because the winning film
Kids Court was ranked tenth in the Movie Magazine list of the 10 Best Films of the Year. (In future years, I would modify the Best Picture nominee vote to include only the fourth, sixth, and seventh ranked films, with the first through third and the fifth ranked securing automatic nominations.) Or maybe it was because the plots of the nominated films were fairly complex, and I was feeling lazy, especially it was in the middle of my internal medicine residency. At any rate, it was readily apparent who the winner was going to be. With the massive success of
The Secret Life of 'M' there was no doubt that there would be a sequel. (For some reason a lot of the films I come up with are sequels and more often than not trilogies.)
The Trials and Tribulations of 'M' would be about May's burgeoning lesbian relationship with her lover Helen Li, introduced as a subplot in
The Secret Life of 'M', while dealing with the emergence of a new police chief Georgia Jennings who threatens May's criminal empire. The ebbs and flows of the two parallel storylines would be reflected in scenes of passionate intercourse, which earned the film an NC-17 rating. (I took a page out of the
Lust, Caution playbook for this.) Despite the advanced rating that kept it from reaching the heights of the first film in its box office earnings,
The Trials and Tribulations of 'M' was also a huge winner with AMPS, taking home Best Picture as well as another Best Actress title for Ellen Hurse as well as Best Supporting Actress honor for Melissa Howard (who played Georgia). That left just crumbs for the historical epic
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Voyage of Xuanzang, the hospital drama
Hospice, and the art-house sci-fi epic
Cataclysm.
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2015
Best Picture: Raep Tiem
Best Director: Mark Paul Rennart, Raep Tiem
Best Actor: Ted Gaylor, Dangerous Inquisitions
Best Actress: Chen Yunxiang, A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, Astros: The Lost Heroes
Best Supporting Actress: Diane Pye, The Divination
Best Screenplay: Astros: The Lost Heroes
Best Editing: Dangerous Inquisitions
Best Cinematography: Family
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress
Best Sound: Flickering Lights
Best Sound Effects: Moment of Revenge
Best Visual Effects: Washout
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Astros: The Lost Heroes
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Dangerous Inquisitions
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Astros: The Lost Heroes
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Astros: The Lost Heroes
Dangerous Inquisitions
A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress
Murder in a Small Town
Raep Tiem
Commentary:
So, let me stop and talk a little bit about Predetermined Contenders. Usually, I come into a year with an idea for one or two movies that will serve as contenders in the coming year. More often than not those would go on to win. Sometimes they're just one-shots, films like Comedy and Obsession that I think of the year prior, but decide to delay their release by a year just because I don't want to put them up against the films in that year. And then there are a lot of films that come in trilogies or hexalogies, and I usually time their release in certain patterns. For example, with the Rated R prequel trilogy, I basically reversed the release schedule of the original Rated R trilogy, so I knew Unkept Promises and A Life Worth Living? would be strong contenders in 2006 and 2008 respectively. Similarly, the Mikey Boulevard trilogy came out in five-year increments, so Mikey Boulevard would be a contender in 2009. More recently, I decided that the films in the May French trilogy would be released every two years. (Stay tuned). That brings up to the Heroes Astros trilogy. In 1997 I came up with a silly movie idea called Heroes: Astros where members of the Houston Astros would help some detectives solve crimes. It was a fun little one-shot, but then in the mid-2000s the Astros found playoff success and even won a pennant. That led me to decide on a sequel in 2006 called Astros 2: New Age of Heroes. I didn't think of continuing, but then the team went through their three consecutive >105 loss seasons in the 2010s. That gave me an idea of coming up with an idea of a third film called Astros: The Lost Heroes where the main characters had fallen on hard times just as their favorite team, and the Astros have to lift them up together. I came up the idea with their 111-loss season, but then I decided I had to continue the nine-year cycle, which would put the release in 2015. And then the Astros went on a tear to lead the AL West for most of the seasons before capturing the playoffs in 2015. That fortunate timing just made Astros: The Lost Heroes a film of destiny, right?
Not necessarily. The thing is that sometimes there are more than one Predetermined Contender, and that's when things get exciting. For example, in 2000 The Nintendo Club was also a Predetermined Contender as I came up with that in 1999, but ultimately decided on Comedy. A year later, Rated R and Class Trip were both Predetermined Contenders, but even though I came up with the idea of Class Trip first, Rated R took the title. There was another Predetermined Contender going into 2015. Sometime in early 2014 I thought of a title for a film called Raep Tiem which is basically just "Rape Time" with the last two letters reversed. Rape is a terrible thing, and the idea of a film about rape is just too repulsive and so I shelved it. However, late in 2014 Rolling Stones published an article about a rape that had happened at the University of Virginia. Even though the article was eventually discredited and retracted, it still left a mark on me in how much rape victims suffer. They go through terrible trauma, and are often disbelieved if they come out in public. While films about people committing rapes would be a terrible thing, I thought a film that showed the effects of a rape on its victim could be a powerful message. So I revived the idea, and assigned it to the filmmaker who would be crass enough to name a film Raep Tiem yet have enough social consciousness to make a film like this: Mark Paul Rennart.
Even then, I didn't think it had any chance of toppling Astros: The Lost Heroes, who would go on to sweep Best Picture in all three awards. Yet as I was typing up the final list of Best Picture nominees, I couldn't help but think "This is actually a pretty stupid movie idea," and I couldn't find any way to make it sound good. Meanwhile, as I was typing up Raep Tiem I kept thinking of ideas that would make the film more powerful, such as featuring a scene of a support group where actual rape victims would tell their stories. Even then, I still had Astros: The Lost Heroes on top. When it came time for me to actually decide the winners, I usually go from Best Makeup and work my way up. And naturally Raep Tiem didn't show up for any of the technical awards. Yet Astros: The Lost Heroes wasn't running away with the awards either. In fact the big winner was A Journey Through Chinese History: Sacred and Divine Empress about the empress Wu Zetian, but that just didn't seem like Best Picture material. In the end when I got to Best Director, I gave it to Mark Paul Rennart for Raep Tiem. And then came time for Best Picture. I couldn't bring myself to give it to Astros: The Lost Heroes, so Raep Tiem ended up capturing Best Picture. Astros: The Lost Heroes ended up winning Best Picture for Movie Magazine and L Awards, but looking back, I still think AMPS made the best choice.
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2016
Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
Best Director: Kegang Lin, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
Best Actor: Yan-hao Lee, A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Last Stand of 'M'
Best Supporting Actor: Zack Timutkus, American Menace
Best Supporting Actress: Tammy Buyos, The Last Stand of 'M'
Best Screenplay: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
Best Editing: American Menace
Best Cinematography: American Menace
Best Score: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
Best Art Direction: American Menace
Best Sound: The Last Stand of 'M'
Best Sound Effects: The Killer
Best Visual Effects: Bombshell
Best Makeup: American Menace
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Cupcakes & Lollipops
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
American Menace
Cupcakes & Lollipops
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
The Last Stand of 'M'
Urine
Commentary:
2016 was a fascinating year. I had no less than three Predetermined Contenders. The final film in the May French trilogy,
The Last Stand of 'M' was due to come out that year. The
A Journey Through Chinese History series was due to come out with the film about the romance between Tang Xuanzong and Yang Guifei. It's one of the most famous stories in Chinese histories and also one of the most tragic. And then there was
Cupcakes & Lollipop, a film designed as a showcase for Diane Pye, basically Pinkie Pie if she was an actress in L World, who had came out of nowhere to win Best Supporting Actress in
The Divination the year before. And then I came up with a couple of movie ideas for the
Best Picture nominee vote that my friend Adam couldn't stop talking about how great the choices were. If I had a choice I would have picked
The Killer, which was based off of an inside joke my sister used to say when we were younger, that I turned into a full length movie because I was having some difficulty filling out the lineup. (I need at least ten potential contenders which would form an L Awards Best Picture shortlist, but preferably I'd have more like 15.) Yet the winner of the final spot turned out to be
American Menace, a satirical action film about a lower class revolt against the ultra-rich upper class. I had come up with the idea for the film in January of 2016, but the film's message became far more timely after the 2016 elections. It ended up dominating much of the technical categories, even if ultimately
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow took home Best Picture honors, as well as yet another Best Actor accolade for Yan-Hao Lee, winning for the third time playing a somewhat corrupt king. However, Julie Chen lost Best Actress for her portrayal of Yang Guifei to Ellen Hurse for her third AMPS win as May French. The interesting thing is that Julie Chen played May's lover Helen Li in the May French trilogy. Tammy Buyos, who won Best Supporting Actress for
The Last Stand of 'M', was another veteran of the fake
Wayside School adaptation. She played Kathy.
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2017
Best Picture: A Family Affair
Best Director: George Bond, Earl Liu & Ted McIntosh, A Family Affair
Best Actor: Ralph Smorgen, Howard: Class on the Diamond
Best Actress: Julie Chen, A Family Affair
Best Supporting Actor: Gabriel Tomas, The Darkest Night
Best Supporting Actress: Tina Hsiao, Blossoming Flower
Best Screenplay: Blossoming Flower
Best Editing: Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U
Best Cinematography: Blossoming Flower
Best Score: Wasted Castle
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Sweet Dew Incident
Best Sound: A Family Affair
Best Sound Effects: Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U
Best Visual Effects: Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U
Best Makeup: A Family Affair
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Family Affair
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Family Affair
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Blossoming Flower
Bob
A Family Affair
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Sweet Dew Incident
Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U
Commentary:
As I mentioned, a Predetermined Contender would usually win out against any film I come up with over the course of the year. The only exception in the 2000-2016 timespan would probably be The Cell Cycle, which won Best Picture over the Predetermined Contender The Lighthouse in 2002. Of course, The Lighthouse wasn't even competing for Best Picture wins AMPS. And then came 2017. There was a Predetermined Contender going into 2017, Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U. The Survivor of the Fittest series stemmed from Survival of the Fittest, a film that I came up with in 2002 about an underground Super Smash Bros. league where the punishment for losing a match is dead. (It was eventually modified to be ten losses would mean death.) By then Super Smash Bros. Melee was out, and given the fact that Survival of the Fittest came out three years after Super Smash Bros., I set Survival of the Fittest Melee for a release in 2004, three years after Super Smash Bros, Melee's release. I did the same for Survival of the Fittest Brawl in 2011. In 2014, Nintendo released two different versions of Super Smash Bros., one for 3DS and one for Wii U. However, the two games are almost always presented as Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U. I imagined that there could be two films that would be released theatrically separately, but when it comes to awards submission they'd be presented as one five-hour epic film. It towered over the other Predetermined Contender, the third film in the Fucker Named Bob trilogy whose films come out once every five years. Naturally, at the end of the year, Movie Magazine named Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U the Best Film of the Year.
However, by then there was another five-hour epic that threatened to take the title. For films I come up with throughout the year, I usually find some inspiration. In the 2010s dreams have become an increasingly important source. For example, The Condemned in 2011 was the result of a dream, as was The People's Church in 2013, Cataclysm in 2014, Dangerous Inquisitions in 2015 and American Menace in 2016. Sometime in 2017 I had a dream that I was alive in WWII China, surviving the war and then getting killed in a car accident during the Chinese civil war later in the decade. Normally a dream about me dying should be something scary, but alleviated the fear by reasoning that I was a character in a movie. Then I started musing over the possibilities of a movie that would involve an advancement in time from WWII to the Chinese civil war. Pretty soon I was able to flesh out a story that would span 100 years from 1917 to 2017 with the main focus placed on 25 year intervals that would include important Chinese historical moments such as World War II in 1942 and also the Cultural Revolution. It would tell the story of the effects of history on one family, with new generations born in these turbulent moments. At the center was the matriarch, one who would bear witness to the events. Since the film would be about one family, I came up with A Family Affair as an English title, but all of my Chinese movies have a Chinese title, and in this case this film would be called 五代同堂, which would translate to "Five Generations Under One Roof.
As the film's plot becomes more revealed, the backstory was as well. I imagined the film as being the brainchild of one Ted McIntosh, a solid director that was never able to break through the stranglehold Jim Abrahms and Double Entendre Productions, even with Best Picture nominated films such as
The Serviceman's Wife and
The Condemned. He recruited Earl Liu, director of
The Country Bumpkin, to work with the exclusively Chinese cast. And because I enjoy adversity, I imagined McIntosh dying suddenly at 67 from an abdominal aortic aneurysm, forcing the hiring of George Bond, director of
The Danville Quarterly to complete the film alongside Liu. The character of matriarch Wang Mei Lian would be especially important as she would be present for the entire saga. I decided that the critical role would go to Julie Chen, fresh off her memorable performance as Yang Guifei, who would portray the character at four different ages, as well as her great granddaughter Lin Mei Kang to put things in full circle. With so much I've come up with about the film, it became an attractive option to beat out
Survival of the Fittest for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U for the Best Picture crown. Similarly, Julie Chen is an easy choice for Best Actress, her first AMPS win after winning earlier for
The Secret Life of 'M' and
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Song of Everlasting Sorrow in the Movie Magazine and L Awards. Another Cultural Revolution drama,
Blossoming Flower, which won the
Best Picture nominee vote, also performed well, winning Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress among its three wins.
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2018
Best Picture: Unyielding
Best Director: George Wilkinson
Best Actor: Jay Anson, Billy
Best Actress: Samantha Banner, Lesbian Ladies
Best Supporting Actor: Eduardo Santiago, The Hanging of Abraham
Best Supporting Actress: Amy Billingsley, Medieval Miracle
Best Screenplay: Unyielding
Best Editing: Unyielding
Best Cinematography: Billy
Best Score: Billy
Best Art Direction: Mission Antarctica
Best Sound: Unyielding
Best Sound Effects: Mission Antarctica
Best Visual Effects: Lost Ark Lodge
Best Makeup: The Stormy Seas
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Lesbian Ladies
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: Unyielding
L Awards Best Picture Winner: Unyielding
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
Billy
The Hanging of Abraham
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Huang Chao Rebellion
Lesbian Ladies
Unyielding
Commentary:
Since I started doing the vote for the Best Picture nominee vote, I've generally presented the final set of five. It generally gives me an opportunity to hold myself accountable. I skipped in 2015 for no good reason other than laziness, but at least I had a pretty good idea of what the films were about. Three years later I skipped again, and it was for a much more serious reason. I just didn't have any idea of what these films were about. I had titles and a general idea of the plot, but there was no passion for me to go into more detail. The lack of a Predetermined Contender didn't help, and the fact that I got only one vote in the
Best Picture nominee vote left me with little motivation to put too much thought into these things.
A Journey Through Chinese History had an entry as they do every year, but I had to search into the history of Tang dynasty before settling on the Huang Chao Rebellion, which was the spark that eventually led to the fall of the Tang, but it didn't seem sufficiently impressive to get to a win.
The Hanging of Abraham was a film about drug smuggling, but I was too lazy to come up with the Biblical allegory that led to its title.
Lesbian Ladies was an alliterative phrase I came up with 20 years ago that I reluctantly brought back just because I was lacking in contenders. I decided that it works as a Mark Paul Rennart project to explore the topic of female sexuality. And then I decided to give Best Picture honors to
Unyielding, a drama about an anti-hero in a family of lawmen going into a life of crime, just because the idea came to me in a dream as a movie I saw and thought, "Man, this movie is good." Maybe the film is good, but this film year sure wasn't.
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2019
Best Picture: Hang 'Em High
Best Director: Mark Paul Rennart, Hang 'Em High
Best Actor: Jon Chen, The Missing Piece
Best Actress: Ellen Hurse, The Boulevard Necromancy
Best Supporting Actor: Pete Klao, Hang 'Em High
Best Supporting Actress: Diane Pye, Hang 'Em High
Best Screenplay: Hang 'Em High
Best Editing: Hang 'Em High
Best Cinematography: Hang 'Em High
Best Score: Hang 'Em High
Best Art Direction: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Coup at Chen Bridge
Best Sound: Hang 'Em High
Best Sound Effects: The Rockport Chronicles: Retribution
Best Visual Effects: The Boulevard Necromancy
Best Makeup: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Coup at Chen Bridge
Movie Magazine Comedy Best Picture: Hang 'Em High
Movie Magazine Drama Best Picture: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Coup at Chen Bridge
L Awards Best Picture Winner: A Journey Through Chinese History: The Coup at Chen Bridge
AMPS Best Picture Nominees:
The Boulevard Necromancy
Desolation
Hang 'Em High
A Journey Through Chinese History: The Coup at Chen Bridge
Lost Autumn
Commentary:
If 2018 was difficult because of the lack of any Predetermined Contenders, I didn't have to worry about it for 2019, because I had a super film in the waiting. In 2012 Mark Paul Rennart had a film called Leave 'Em Hanging. That reminded me of the old Halo level "Hang 'Em High." I thought it would be a good title for a Mark Paul Rennart movie. However, Clint Eastwood already had a movie called Hang Em High, so this one went on the discard pile. However, as I was having difficulties coming up with films to fill out rosters late in the decade, I decided it was okay to have multiple movies with the same title. So I revived the idea, and decided that it should be comedic Western about a several teams of bounty hunters competing with each other to track down two escaped convicts. Then I had some fun coming up with the teams, and it became an impressive ensemble of talent, a who's who of great actors whose names appear repeatedly in this post: Ellen Hurse, Eddie Fawn (a former couple who split up on good terms after Hurse came out as being lesbian), Pete Klao, Tigger Noland (two former baseball players from my other fake league), Samantha Banner, Matthew Dergeron (frequent Rennart collaborators), Rick Jennings, Jesse Mullins, Jonathan Bell, Reginald Stovey (the Rated R quartet), Andy Ray, Nixon Johnson, Willie Embryo (three of the four Rated R prequel counterparts), Janice Wilford, Nancy Anson (the Quick sisters from The Quest), Chen Yunxiang (playing a woman disguising herself as a man calling herself the Chinaman), and Diane Pye (playing all four members of the Rockfarm sisters). Finally, the actors playing the convicts were legends themselves: James Turnboil and Joe Lee, who made cameos as the robbers in the fake adaptation of Wayside School 23 years earlier.
As strong as Hang 'Em High would seem, it's not the only Predetermined Contender at play. The Mikey Boulevard Trilogy was a major awards player with films coming every five years from 1999 to 2009. Director Perry Cantu denied any plans to continue Mikey's story when 2014 came around, but then late in 2018 there was the stunning announcement of a new spinoff film starring Mikey's daughter Joanie, played by Ellen Hurse. The rub was that Joanie was killed in the climax of Mikey Boulevard. Evidently Joanie's spirit survived in the spiritual realm, where she received training to become a fighter in a spiritual war against evil spirits that haunt the real world. Yes, The Boulevard Necromancy has an absolutely bizarre concept, but it fits in with the genre-bending nature of the previous films in the trilogy. Unfortunately, in the end it wasn't enough to topple the grand vision of Hang 'Em High, winning only for its Visual Effects and yet another Best Actress crown for Hurse. Meanwhile Hang 'Em High walked away with Best Picture as well as acting honors for Klao and Pye.
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Well, there you go. The winners from the first 20 years of the AMPS awards. As I mentioned, AMPS is the first of the three awards that I make up. Being the first award certainly leads to a different dynamic, as it sets the tone for the other awards, especially in a lot of tech categories. For the most part the winners are all the same. However, there were a few years where there was a split in winners, even in the Best Picture category. Even though the L Awards is supposed to be the most prestigious, looking back at the years with Best Picture splits, it seems like the AMPS winners were ones that aged better, liked Rated R over Class Trip in 2001, The Quest: The Lost Years over A Journey Through Chinese History: The Grand Canal in 2013, Raep Tiem over Astros: The Lost Heroes in 2015, and Hang 'Em High over A Journey Through Chinese History: The Chen Bridge Coup in 2019 etc. Anyways, hope you enjoyed looking back at my past.
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