Best Supporting Actor was next. Five former winners once again, but only one obvious choice this time around, and that was Heath Ledger. As his parents and sister took the stage to a long standing ovation, they delivered a moving and eloquent speech that did not ever come close to schmaltz, yet plenty in the audience and yours truly as well found themselves without a dry eye by the time they finished, as we all said goodbye one last time to Heath and honored what truly was a remarkable, remarkable performance in "The Dark Knight".
The award is being given to his estranged wife, Michelle Williams, and their daughter Matilda.
Documentaries were next. "Smile Pinki" won the Short category, and "Man on Wire" won the Feature. We then had a speech with thank yous, a magic trick, a shout-out to Warner Herzog and a balancing act by documentary subject, the high-wire walker Philippe Petit. THIS was fun!
The "journey" continued with a trip into post-production, and Will Smith probably set a record by giving out no less than four awards in this next segment. "Button" won Visual Effects, "The Dark Knight" won for Sound Editing, and then "Slumdog" pulled ahead with wins #3 and #4 for Sound Mixing and Film Editing. And from here on out, there was no stopping this Bollywoodian freight train.
Eddie Murphy surprised us all by coming out next, considering his huffy walking-out a couple years back when he lost for "Dreamgirls", thankx to his public embarrassment of a spectacle with the whole "Melanie B's baby is NOT mine. Oh, shit...the tests said it is?" and concurrent release of the horrific "Norbit". Well, Eddie was holding a statue this time, and it was to present the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to Jerry Lewis, thanking him for his years of work for MS. Lewis came out and gave a quick speech, and fortunately he behaved himself, not delivering a line of "It's about fucking time!" like he said he might in a recent interview. He was gracious and fun, and very humbled. He knows he'll never be honored for his movies (which is arguably wrong), but to have been honored at all with something like this was obviously very special to him after all.
Continuing the "journey", we headed into the music categories next. Best Original Score, not surprisingly, went to "Slumdog" as well. We then had Best Original Song, and as promised, we got a hybrid of each song nomination mixed together into a medley, with John Legend singing Peter Gabriel's "Down to Earth". The medley actually worked nicely, but it still irked me seeing this being condensed when they had time to deliver video yearbooks and that revolting "musical number about musicals" earlier. Nonetheless, "Jai Ho" won from "Slumdog", which was convenient since all the dancers were still on stage and all.
Best Foreign Film then gave us the one pure upset of the evening. Favorite "Waltz With Bashir" and second-favorite "The Class" were upended by the Japanese film "Departures". This film had actually just recently cleaned up at Japan's Academy Awards ceremony, so for that reason I guess it makes sense. The film hasn't yet been released in the States, but I'll be checking it out, despite some reviews I've seen for it that claim it to be overdramatic pap.
(Commercial here for Diet Coke with "Top Chef"'s Tom Colicchio. Best commercial of the night.)
The "journey" then concluded with what was called the foundation of the film: its director. Danny Boyle took the prize, and it was obvious by now that "Slumdog Millionaire" was going to win the big one. It was kinda obvious anyway, because as I'd mentioned in my Oscars predictions blog, none of the other nominees seemed to be on its heels as far as buzz.
However, despite knowing how the show was going to ultimately end, we still had two more awards to give out, and the suspense with these was pea-soup thick. Best Actress was handed out first, with five former winners present to yet another standing ovation, including Sophia Loren and Shirley MacLaine. Sixth time was the charm for Kate Winslet, and she finally won her Oscar. "The Reader" wasn't a great film, but as is always the case, Kate was stellar.
And yes, this time she composed herself rather nicely! Her speech was fun and the excitement definitely won out over her shock. Plus, she got a standing ovation too. Oh, and even more kudos to Anne Hathaway, who despite losing out on this award showed yet another example of her class and respect. Anne was totally ELATED when she heard Kate's name announced.
Best Actor, which I'd said was the hardest to call. Sean Penn? Mickey Rourke? Frank Langhella? All had a real shot in my view. The five actors that came out (to yet another standing ovation) seemed very excited to be there, and I don't think the building was that quiet all night as we all waited to hear the name announced as the winner...which turned out to be Sean Penn for "Milk". Another standing ovation (this had to be a record for one night), another political moment (which we knew would come from Sean, but so be it), another great speech.
So finally, Best Picture. And as I already told you, plus you likely know by now anyway, "Slumdog Millionaire" took the prize. The stage was filled with dozens of people, cast and crew, old and young, adult and child, and it was a great sight to see this film that almost went straight-to-video ultimately be crowned Best.
"Slumdog Millionaire" scored 10 nominations and won 8 awards. It was nominated twice in the Song category, so it had a shot at 9 awards and almost swept them. The only loss was to "The Dark Knight" for Sound Editing. "The Curiously Similar Movie to Forrest Gump of Benjamin Button" scored 13 nominations, and won 3 awards, and all technical. Justice doesn't always need to come at the hands of a comic book superhero.
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