It’s Oscars weekend and even though there’s no Citizen Kane in the running — what would happen if we integrated some MMA into the best picture nominees for the Academy Awards?
The Wolf of Wall Street: Martin Scorcese and Leonardo DiCaprio teamed up to make this based-on-a-true story film on stockbroker Jordan Belfort. Belfort’s illegal schemes led him to the slammer for 3 years; but had he known how to pick the winner’s of MMA fights — he’d have made it big without deception.
Captain Phillips: You could easily swap out Oscar winner Tom Hanks for the man with the belly, Roy “Big Country” Nelson. Big Country’s beard fits perfectly for the role of Phillips, whose boat was hijacked by Somalian pirates and Nelson would probably have lost that big belly being held hostage with no food. It would work for UFC President Dana White, who has been calling for him to drop down to 205 for years, but Nelson refusing. Having no food and little water could help expedite “Big Country” losing weight.
American Hustle: What’s American about hustling if there’s not some big brawl involved? It would have been the icing on the cake, had Amy Adams and Jennifer Lawrence duked it out MMA style in the film. Here you would have the crafty veteran in Adams against the young gun in Lawrence. I’ll go ahead and take the one who played Katniss Everdeen in this battle…
You might also like: Oscars 2014: Can Google help you win the office pool?
Dallas Buyers Club: Looks like Matthew McConaughey has been watching a little UFC. In this film, McConaughey’s character defends his transgendered friend played by Jared Leto from being picked on by using some jiu jitsu and putting the bully in a rear naked choke. With the weight he lost for this film, McConaughey could easily make featherweight in the UFC.
Gravity: “Ah,” “Oh no,” “No I can’t see anything,” BE QUIET! Had we switched out Sandra Bullock for MMA star Ronda Rousey, I’m pretty sure there would be no whining and complaining, or fake cries and moans. What about this: we switch out George Clooney for Miesha Tate and now it’s Rousey and Tate in space! I guarantee you someone’s not coming back to Earth.
Her: How is this nominated for best picture? This is the life of most middle aged men not married — constantly asking Siri for sports updates, “who’s winning the game?” “who lost the fight?”, then transitioning into questions like, “Why am I still single?” and “What do you look like, Siri?” What happened to films like Singing in the Rain and Casablanca?
Philomena: What’s the Oscars without a British flick? We all know the Brits love a good fight, so what if Judi Dench’s character came to America and a fast food employee makes fun of her accent? Seeing Dench say, “You want to take this out back?” shoot in immediately and work some ground game and triangle choke Burger King’s finest would put truly make this film Oscar worthy!
You might also like: The Oscars meets MMA: The 5 best Hollywood fight scenes of all time
Nebraska: I guess this was the annual black and white film that had to be nominated; but instead of having the old man chase his phantom $1 million dollars, the film would have been far better had he try to enter an underground fight tournament where the winner won the million dollars, and have him actually win it. Now there’s a story for ya!
12 years a Slave: Some movies are tough to goof on–ones that deal with the Holocaust or other genocides, or slavery. Last year’s Civil War-era slavery picture, Django, was by Quentin Tarantino and traded in his standard hyperbole, dark humor and midnight movie spirit. Much easier to imagine tossing the owners and slaves of that movie into the Octagon to sort things out than to mess with director Steve McQueen‘s very serious, based on a true story, epic.
I hope next year’s best picture nominees are a bit more compelling than this year’s. If the film studios only called me, I’d give them a few truly memorable Oscar winners. Oh well, so much for wishful thinking.
You might also like: Oscars 2014: A Nerd’s Guide
Watch The Best of the UFC on FilmOn:
David Kano is lead writer for MMA Show News and co-host of The Hollywood MMA Show. You can follow him on Twitter @TheDKano.
