Well, I know I'm a couple days late, but with everything that was going on in my life last week, by the time the Oscars telecast wrapped up, I HAD to get to bed and get some sleep. And even on Monday I still couldn't get this done. But here we are, and here it is. You knew I'd be blogging this one! The Academy Awards! They have come and gone once again, and I must honestly say that I enjoyed this year's show more than any in several years.
It seems, though, that I'm in the minority, because at best, the reviews for the show and for host Hugh Jackman have been tepid. Most of the reviews, though, have been worse than that. I don't know why. It did seem he wasn't there too much, but maybe that was the point. And when he WAS there, he shined. It wasn't about cracking jokes, it was about hosting, doing the thing, and getting outta there to let the nominees and presenters be showcased. And when he WAS there, I thought he did great, personable and showmanshippy. Yes, it's a word. Well, it's not really, but it should be, because you understood what I meant, right? So it's a word. Nyaaaahhhhh.
I have three favorite highlights of this past Sunday, and two of them took place on the E! network before the awards telecast even started. One was a video feature that told of and showed the countless parallels between 1994 Best Picture winner "Forrest Gump" and 2008 Best Picture nominee "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button", both written for the screen by Eric Roth. Obviously I wasn't the only one who noticed this when I saw the film, but this little feature told me of so many more similarities that I was just totally dumbfounded. And it also said, "This just scratches the surface." So I noticed about a dozen, and then that told me about a dozen more...Jesus Christ, HOW DID THIS MOVIE EVER GET NOMINATED FOR ANYTHING?! It should have been nominated for "Best Remake of Forrest Gump", because that's all it is and now it's even MORE clear to me. Man, and I even found the film to be OK when I'd seen it a month or so ago, but this ButtonGump thing has now gotten so blatantly obvious that I officially proclaim "Button" to be trash, and I'm never going to speak of this film again. Well, except for here in the blog. Next time Eric Roth writes something, for GOD'S SAKE, will someone do some cross-referencing?!
OK...that rant's over...where were we? Oh, yeah...so that was one of my three favorite highlights of last Sunday. The second was a Ryan Seacrest interview on the Red Carpet, where he was talking to about seven kids who appeared in "Slumdog Millionaire". The cast and crew of the film brought over as many people as possible from India to be there in Hollywood for the big night, and many were children. So Ryan's chatting it up and they're all excited and whooping it up, and Ryan asks one kid how excited he is to be here. The kid just kinda smiles and giggles, and then a couple other kids (including an older one behind the first kid) chime in that the first kid doesn't speak English. So Ryan goes, "Oh, OK," and goes to the older child and asks him to be the translator for that first kid's answer. The older kid says, "There's nothing to translate, he didn't say anything." That, my friends, is why live television is the greatest entity in entertainment. We should have much more of it.
OK, so let's get to the show. It had been kept pretty secret about who was going to be presenting what tonight, and while we perhaps got some clues by seeing who was arriving...it was later learned that several arrivals were snuck in through a back door. Hmmmmmm...
Hugh Jackman comes out, says hello, charms some front-row celebs and remarks how the economy has even hit the Academy. He then channels his inner Billy Crystal and gives us a musical montage of movies, both Best Picture nominees and others, with a constantly-changing backdrop of cheap props and set designs. It was really rather funny, and he did a great job with it. At one point, he pulled Anne Hathaway up and they wound up turning "Frost/Nixon" into a love story, with Anne being Nixon.
And Anne was great too! The number ended and the crowd stood and cheered, giving Hugh a standing ovation after only about 7 minutes on the job. THAT might be a record.
So then came the first category. We saw clips of Best Supporting Actress winners from the past. And then after that...oddly, we got visuals and audio clips of five particular past winners. And then, the pillars rose, and out came those five, including legend Eva Marie Saint, who won in 1955 for "On the Waterfront". The crowd stood again and applauded. So what we had here was all 5 ladies read off the names of the nominees, while also giving about a 30-second tribute to the performance itself and the actress. It was really rather cool. Although, at this point I thought to myself...weren't they supposed to get the show to move along FASTER? This whole thing took about 5 minutes already and they hadn't even opened the envelope. Well, they finally did, and the winner was Penelope Cruz for "Vicky Cristina Barcelona". A surprise, but I don't think an upset. Cruz was welcomed onstage by the five ladies, and I actually think I fell in love with this whole stagey new way of presenting the awards, because it looked like these five were welcoming a new member into a very exclusive and prestigious club. And you know what? That's EXACTLY what they were doing, and it was really an emotional sight, and very cool.
I just wondered...are we going to see this for EVERY AWARD? I mean, it might be entertaining and all, but do we need five past winners of Best Costume Design presenting that award?
Well, turns out this was only done for the acting awards. So OK. What next? Well, we found out the night had a theme to it. Hugh told us tonight we were all going to be taken on a journey, and we would see the steps necessary for a film to be made into a finished product. It starts with the screenplay...
Lights fade and onstage walk two figures, reading a mock script out loud as it "types" onto the large-screen. We hear and see it to be Steve Martin and Tina Fey, and it was actually really funny stuff. They presented the screenplay awards as well, which went to "Milk" (Original Screenplay) and "Slumdog Millionaire" (Adapted Screenplay).
An Oscars show isn't an Oscars show without video montages. Tonight, we were being presented with a yearbook, and the first one would be clips of lots of animated films from the past year. This was kind of cool because it didn't just limit the "Year-in-Review" to the nominated stuff...but at the same time, seeing "Space Chimps" on the Oscars telecast just really, really, really seems wrong. And maybe I missed it, but I didn't see a clip of "Bolt" anywhere in there, and that's one of the nominees for our next award. Best Animated Feature continued the surefire streak for Pixar, as "WALL-E" took the crown, and rightfully so. (Although I was worried about that Panda!)
Best Animated Short was next, with one of the better speeches of the night. A film done in the French language, but actually from Japan, entitled "La Masion de Petits Cubes" won the award. Kunio Kato accepted and gave a semi-broken English speech along the lines of, "Thank you, pencil. Thank you, Academy. Thank you, animation. Domo Arigatou, Mr. Roboto." Yes, he really said that, and it was funny stuff.
One rumour to make the show more streamlined was that the "lesser awards" would be cut down or eliminated. This was a terrible idea to even consider. Movies are important, and every element of them should be respected. I think that was the point of the "journey", and I think that point came across excellently. Next came some technical awards grouped together as we continued our journey into how a film is made. Art/Set Direction went to "ButtonGump" (dammit), Costume Design went to "The Duchess" (royalty trumps again!) and Makeup also went to "ButtonGump" (dammit!). Cinematography followed, with that award going to "Slumdog". So far, "Slumdog" and "ButtonGump" both have 2 awards.
Live Action Short: "Toyland". Once I saw it was about the Holocaust, I guess that became an obvious choice. (See "The Reader" and "Best Picture Nominees".)
Then...at this point...we experienced a flashback. We thought these types of things were history, but alas, we were wrong. The Big Gawdy Musical Number of Oscars Past. Hugh Jackman was joined by a bunch of dancers, and Beyonce Knowles, and Zac Efron, and Vanessa Hudgins, and some people from "Mamma Mia!", and for about six minutes they all took turns singing random half-lines from showtunes and musicals. And it just went on. And on. And on. This was a clusterfuck to end all clusterfucks. And at the end of it, just before I fell to the ground in a drooling seizure at what was about this point:
...Hugh thanked BAZ LUHRMANN for putting this segment together.
Holy.
Bleeping.
Christ.
If Baz Luhrmann is ever...and I mean, EVER...allowed anywhere near another segment, musical performance, stage, rehearsal or ANYTHING REMOTELY RELATED DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY OTHERWISE to the Academy Awards in the future...I just may have to die.
In fact...just writing about that and reliving it in my head has triggered a sensation that in about seventeen seconds, I'm either going to pass out or wet my pants. Perhaps both. So this blog will continue shortly...
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