Just another night at the office

RICKY Gervais disappointed those who wanted a rerun of last year's Golden Globes performance.

IT was too much to expect the Golden Globes to make predicting Academy Award winners any easier. After all, the host of the annual ceremony, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, is mired in its own murky shenanigans with legal suits alleging questionable business practices in administering its charities and members accepting payola.

Truth be told, the Golden Globes are not the windchime for Academy Award success the HFPA would have everyone believe. Even with two separate film categories -- drama and musical-comedy -- the Globes have only aligned with one best picture Oscar winner, Slumdog Millionaire, in the past seven years.

Nevertheless there is talk about the prospective success of a most unlikely contender. Michel Hazanavicius's daring and beautiful silent film about Hollywood's transition to the talkies, The Artist, did all it had to do at the Golden Globes by winning the musical-comedy category and best actor for its lead Jean Dujardin.

As the Globes would have it, its only competition is Alexander Payne's humble Hawaiian comedic drama, The Descendants, which won the same prizes in the drama category (George Clooney won for his fine performance as a struggling parent and husband; The Artist also won for its score).

But a number of films, most particularly Hugo and The Help, could feel they are still part of the mix in weeks to come with the producers, directors and screen actors guilds' awards likely to throw up some curve balls.

The Golden Globes awarded Martin Scorsese the best director prize for his adaptation of The Invention of Hugo Cabret, the undefinable children's story cum graphic novel by Brian Selznick. Its reference to a glorious cinematic past is likely to charm just as many cinephiles within the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' membership as will The Artist.

Otherwise, this year's Globes ceremony promised far more than it delivered. After the HFPA president Philip Berk described Ricky Gervais's hosting performance last year as "crossing the line", the HFPA was not too proud to grovel and invite Gervais back.

Yet he appeared nobbled in a controversy-free ceremony. He chose not to insult those in the room, as he did last year, preferring to skewer his host, the HFPA, and its broadcaster, NBC.

"The Golden Globes are to the Oscars what Kim Kardashian is to Kate Middleton," Gervais said, grinning. "A bit louder, bit trashier, bit drunker and more easily bought. Allegedly, nothing's been proved."

That was a nod to at least one case brought against the HFPA for questionable business practices in administering its charity work. The HFPA is a not-for-profit organisation that earns tens of millions each year for its Golden Globes broadcast.

Gervais's British creation The Office has earned enough for the host broadcaster NBC for him to quip with impunity, "Tonight, you get Britain's biggest comedian, hosting the world's second biggest award show on America's third biggest network. Sorry, fourth."

The only celebrities targeted by the co-creator of The Office were those who weren't there, including Justin Beiber, Adam Sandler and the comedian who pulled out of hosting the Academy Awards this year, Eddie Murphy.

"When the man who said yes to Norbit says no to you, you know you're in trouble," Gervais said.

The only attendee subjected to a barb was Johnny Depp. Gervais asked him if he'd yet seen The Tourist, the film in which Depp co-starred with Angelina Jolie and which was the source of many of Gervais's taunts last year. Depp awkwardly said no.

Later, Gervais acknowledged a more forgiving audience, noting last year's attendees had a "right stick up their arse".

A higher tone could not be expected of an awards ceremony run by a group whose practices are under increasing scrutiny and whose membership is as closed and as mysterious as a few faltering Middle-Eastern nations.

It is moot to ask for integrity when the months of January and February are largely given over to the marketing and promotion of Hollywood movies under the guise of awards.

Even the rebooted Australian Film Institute, the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts has entered the fray, bestowing its own international awards this year in order to find a seat at Hollywood's table.

It is unclear what one is to make of AACTA's selections, released on Sunday, in the international categories for screenplay, direction, actor, actress and film. The film category has 10 nominations, screenplay eight and the acting categories six each.

All nominees are rather predictable, if hardly definitive, and by their breadth are likely to consign the AACTAs to the jumble of film awards jockeying for position.

Better the films themselves jockey for position and attempt to take commercial advantage of their nominations.

In that regard, The Artist requires award recognition to elevate the arthouse film into the mainstream.

Even Scorsese's big-budget Hugo could do with some more love at the box office while outsiders such as The Help and Midnight in Paris have proven unlikely commercial successes. Might they also pop up on Academy Awards night as unlikely artistic successes too?