The Logie Award nominees were announced yesterday by Dr Chris Brown and Julia Morris with a few surprises. Nominated for the Gold Logie this year is Asher Keddie, Andy Lee, Carrie Bickmore, Essie Davis, Scott Cam and Steve Peacocke. Voting has just started and it’s a little hard to pick a winner at this stage but Asher Keddie would probably be favourite at this early stage. It feels like she’s in every TV show and DVD in recent years and is really one of the finest actors on Australian TV.

Kylie Minogue has been booked to perform at the Logies this year. This is the first time she’s been back since her hay days when she won the Gold Logie. Some of us was hoping for a duet with Jason Donovan after seeing the pair reunite in a UK charity gig number last month but this now doesn’t appear likely. So we have Kylie by herself, we should be so lucky, lucky, lucky, lucky.
Most Popular Actress nominees are Asher Keddie (again), Essie Davis from Miss Fishers Murder Mysteries, the hilarious Julia Morris, Marta Dusseldorp (why wasn’t she nomed for Gold?) and the evergreen Rebecca Gibney.

Chris Lilley is nominated for Most Popular Actor for Ja’Mie Private School Girl. Lilley is not just a comedic genius but a talented actor in his own right and surely deserves this award. Also nominated for this award is Dan Ewing and Steve Peacocke from Home And Away, Hugh Sheridan from Packed To The Rafters and Matthew Le Nevez from Offspring.

The quintessential Aussie Adam Hills was overlooked for a Gold Logie nom this year (boo hiss) but is again nominated in the Most Popular Presenter category (yay) along with Andy Lee, Hamish Blake, Carrie Bickmore and Scott Cam.

The awards are in Melbourne on 27 April and voting has now started.

10 reasons why you should watch an Underbelly DVD.

1. Skip the commercials. Fat Tony And Co DVD is currently showing on channel nine but seriously do you really want to watch all those annoying commercials? In this day and age when we are all super busy who has the time to sit on the couch and be bombarded by commercials. Watch each season the way it was meant to be, in one long binge viewing session.

2. Underbelly is Australian. Support our local Aussie industry that supports Australian jobs from the on-air talent through to the production crew and all the way to wardrobe and catering. Every dollar spent purchasing an Australian DVD is a dollar saved from going overseas. That means more dollars to go around for content producers to make even more Aussie shows which are really expensive to make for our small Australian market.

3. It’s really good. There’s no better reason to purchase a DVD than because you really like it. There are 7 seasons of Underbelly produced so far (plus an Underbelly NZ season), all available to order on DVD and Blu Ray. All of a really high standard and all captivating.

4. You can watch any season in isolation. Whilst there may be some character cross-overs, you can watch any Underbelly season without having had to watch an earlier Underbelly season.

5. All seasons based on real-life events. Whilst some artistic licence is had and some names have been changed due to legal reasons, all Underbelly seasons are based on real-life Australian events.

6. The narrator. Caroline Craig who you may remember from Blue Heelers bring a like unique Aussie style of narration that sort of draws all the seasons together. Because all seasons are stand-alone stories (with a few character cross overs) you aren’t on a journey across 7 seasons so Caroline Craig’s narration along with the annoying Underbelly theme brings all the seasons together.

7. The perfect man-gift. It’s the perfect gift for any bloke. Yes, Underbelly is skewed to a male demographic, with all that violence and shooting and language and nudity, every bloke will love it. Oh ok, yes it makes a great gift for anyone over 18.

8. Matthew Newton in season 2. See the talent the world is missing out on due to his personal issues. In my opinion season 2 is the best Underbelly season, Underbelly Tale Of Two Cities starring Matthew Newton. Due to his well-publicised personal issues Matthew Newton hasn’t really worked much since then which is an incredible shame. It had huge potential to be our next Mel Gibson, oh not sure if that was to aim for, maybe we should say our next superstar. With his pedigree, being the son of Australian TV royalty Burt and Patty Newton he was destined for greatness.

9. Water cooler talk. Underbelly epitomises water cooler talk. You need to have watched the latest Underbelly season to keep up with what everyone else talking about it.

10. Ultraviolet. Underbelly Fat Tony & Co comes with free UV with the DVD and Blu Ray purchase. So you own the DVD or Blu Ray forever and then also own the UV version meaning you can stream or download the season to your PC, TV or Phone. It’s the best of both worlds.

The 2014 86^th Academy Awards have just finished for another year with best picture going to 12 Years A Slave DVD.

I thought host Ellen DeGeneres’s opening was a little flat but also gave us one of the funniest moment of the awards when she joked there are only two options tonight, either 12 Years A Slave wins Best Picture, or you’re all racists.

Raging hot favourite Aussie Cate Blanchett came through and won Best Actress as expected for the incredible Blue Jasmine. Matthew McConaughey was favourite for Best Actor and also won for Dallas Buyers Club.

With the exception of missing out on the big award, the biggest winner of the night was the movie Gravity starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney even though neither won their individual categories but Director Alfonso Cuaron did take out the converted Best Director award. Gravity won a swag of technical awards including for sound and cinematography.

There wasn’t a lot of surprises throughout the night with Frozen DVD winning best animated movie. It also won for best original song.

There were three standing ovations for the night. One went to Bette Midler after her oh-no-not-again performance of Wind Beneath My Wings. The other standing ovation went to Pink for her outstanding performance of Somewhere Over The Rainbow celebrating the 75^th anniversary of the Wizard Of Oz. Must have been a little daunting with Judy Garland’s daughter Liza Minelli in the audience.

One of the most popular decisions of the night went to Lupita Nyong’o who won Best Supporting Actress for 12 Years A Slave and was clearly humbled by the standing ovation. It will be very interesting to see this incredibly talented actress grow over the years. Might have to revisit this blog in 5 years time.

Jared Leto won best supporting actor for Dallas Buyers Club after taking 5 years away from acting while concentrating on his band 30 Seconds To Mars. Though some of us may remember him starring with Claire Danes in the 1990s TV Show My So Called Life.

All up I wouldn’t call it the best Oscars with very few surprises but the movies nominated this year, I think, is one of the best batch in years.

Christmas is well and truly behind us now, doesn’t time fly?  Now wouldn’t it be great if the holiday kilos came off as fast. Unfortunately the weight never leaves as easily and as quickly as it goes on.  Not that I’m complaining about putting on a few kilos, I knew exactly what would happen when I ate all those Christmas goodies.  For example, I was well aware that lemon pound cake with cream cheese icing wasn’t the healthiest breakfast option, but it definitely was a yummy one.   But no more cake for breakfast (sad face), it’s time to lose some kilos.  The first thing that I did was grab some Michelle Bridges DVDs online. Now the Biggest Loser is back on the TV I have found my motivation, if they can lose that much weight in a week, surely I can lose a couple of kilos?

However, let’s be practical about this.  I got the Michelle Bridges DVD so I can get trained by someone who knows what they are doing without making me get up early for the boot camps.  It’s still too hot to exercise outside, so this way I can work out inside in the lounge room with the air conditioning on.  If you think about it I’m also making sure that I don’t get sunburnt as well, another plus – no skin cancer.

Also I don’t have a fancy gym outfit to wear if I go down to the park.  Have you noticed that working out has become much more glamorous these days?  Going for a walk now is like getting ready for a big night out.  You have to make sure that your shoes match your outfit. You need the right accessories, iPhone strapped to your arm and wearing cool headphones.  I’m still at the baggy t-shirt, shorts and worn out trainers stage.

But for now it’s just me and Michelle Bridges working out in the air conditioned comfort of the lounge room.  So now I have a personal trainer, at a fraction of the cost and I can work out when I want. All with the added benefit of a personal trainer that’s actually on a DVD, she doesn’t judge me for my long term fitness goal. Some people have a goal of running a marathon or a triathlon.  Mine is a little simpler and it involves lemon pound cake, next Christmas and breakfast.

Shirley Temple was one of America’s, and the world’s, most loved actresses.  A remarkable feat considering Shirley Temple had already made the bulk of her movies by the time she was 21.  Shirley Temple was the definition of child star, born in 1928, she was dancing in low budget films when she was only 3 ½ years old. By 1940 she had made 43 films.

Shirley was the little girl with curly blonde hair that captured America’s heart in a time of immense struggle.  The Great Depression had started in 1928 with the Wall Street stock market crash. Shirley was a symbol of hope with her youthful optimism and vibrancy.  She became the personification of the dream of the public that times could and would improve.

Her films became instant favourites with the public and the appetite for all things Shirley Temple was insatiable.  To have any Shirley Temple merchandise was a must, dolls, hats, dresses, mugs; anything with Shirley’s picture on it was a hit. Given the economic struggles at the time it showed just how popular she was.

Her films are now classic movies of the time and are just as popular today.  Movies such as Heidi, Baby Take a Bow, Bright Eyes (which famously introduced the song ‘On The Good Ship Lollipop’), Dimples, Stowaway and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm are just a select few of her huge body of work.

Unfortunately, as Shirley grew older she became less popular with the movie going public, as she was not the little girl with dimples anymore.  However Shirley did not let this stop her from becoming a force for change in the world.  She turned her attention to community and helping others, especially the world’s youth.  She worked with the United Nations, was ambassador to Ghana in the 1970’s, and ambassador to Czechoslovakia during the collapse of Communism in 1989.

Shirley Temple showed that she was never going to become a stereotypical child actor that cannot get past their childhood achievements.  She forged a political and humanitarian career where she used her fame to help others, while at the same time maintaining a 55 year long marriage and a happy family.

Shirley Temple passed away on 10^th February 2014 at age 85.  She was a person that captivated so many with her films, her humanitarian work and her efforts to make a real difference in the world. Her work lives on in DVDs and in our memories.