Wow, I started covering this year’s Oscars way back in April 2010 and last night it all came to a close. And what’s my immediate reaction? Beyond a sense of relief that we can finally put 2010 behind us and begin looking forward, I’d say the show itself was flat. I do, however, like how the awards were spread around rather than one film taking them all.
I know the immediate reaction is to complain when your favorite film didn’t win Best Picture, but just look at the results. Push the idea of Best Picture out of your mind and two films led the pack with four Oscars, three for another and three others won two. That’s a nice result if you ask me.
- The King’s Speech won 4 Oscars
- Inception won 4 Oscars
- The Social Network won 3 Oscars
- The Fighter won 2 Oscars
- Toy Story 3 won 2 Oscars
- Alice in Wonderland won 2 Oscars
- Inside Job won 1 Oscar
- Black Swan won 1 Oscar
- In a Better World won 1 Oscar
- The Wolfman won 1 Oscar
Looking at the top three films on the winners list I’m sure a discussion could be had with many movie fans as to which film they loved more. Hard to argue when that’s the case, even if you don’t agree with the overall decision on the Best Picture winner.
As Steven Spielberg said before announcing the Best Picture winner, “In a moment, one of these ten movies will join a list that includes On the Waterfront, Midnight Cowboy, The Godfather and The Deer Hunter. The other nine will join a list that includes The Grapes Of Wrath, Citizen Kane, The Graduate and Raging Bull.” The lesson, of course, being just because your favorite film didn’t win Best Picture doesn’t mean it will ever be forgotten.
Now before we dig into the winners and speeches, let’s first look at the show itself. You know, the worst aspect of the entire night.
Anne Hathaway and James Franco simply didn’t work. I blame none of this on Hathaway, she did the absolute best she could and I congratulate her. Franco, on the other hand, seemed tired, listless, bored, aimless and under the influence of a little Pineapple Express. Fifty percent of the time Franco was staring off into the rafters and the rest of the time he was painfully reading his lines off the teleprompter with absolutely zero interest or inflection. Perhaps it was a piece of performance art on Franco’s part. Perhaps it was boredom. If the former, the story is not yet finished. If the latter, it was infectious.
The show began with a pre-taped skit that seemed better suited for the MTV Movie Awards than the Oscars, the opening monologue was painfully childish, why Franco dressed in drag as Marilyn Monroe is inexplicable, Hathaway’s song directed at Hugh Jackman was a failed punch line and the list goes on and on. What happened between deciding on Franco and Hathaway as hosts and the end product is a mystery, but it just didn’t work.
I can only wonder what Franco is thinking of his comments regarding Ricky Gervais’s joke monologue he drafted for the duo. Franco told E!, “He did his award show and he bombed. Why is he trying to get in on ours?” As for Gervais’s jokes, Franco said, “Horrible. His lines weren’t good on the Golden Globes. Why does he want to do our lines?” To quote a line from Franco’s 127 Hours performance, “Oops.”
Maybe Franco was too busy recording his own behind-the-scenes videos to even care about his hosting gig, such as the one seen here to the right. Or perhaps this is further proof it was all a performance and he wanted to capture the moment forever. It’s hard to imagine he would show such disdain for his hosting gig and not have some ulterior motive.
I didn’t understand what sense it made to bring in Billy Crystal for one brief skit to introduce a Bob Hope mini-retrospective only to have the retrospective last something like 60 seconds and then move on. Why not just have Crystal host the entire thing?
As far as the actual awards go. When you look at the numbers there was one surprise that stood out most to me, True Grit being nominated for ten Oscars and going home empty handed. Admittedly, it’s not a major surprise since I only predicted it to win one Oscar, that being Best Cinematography for Roger Deakins, but I guess the ninth time wasn’t the charm for ol’ Roger. That said, hard to deny Wally Pfister’s work in Inception.
I will also say I became increasingly concerned my pick of Tom Hooper for Best Director was going to end up being wrong, especially after The Social Network won for Best Screenplay, Original Score and Film Editing. My personal opinion of The Social Network is that it is technically excellent, but fell a little short narratively, therefore the Oscars seemed to be mimicking my opinion which would seem to lead to a David Fincher win for Director. No dice. My prediction ended up coming true, but I was still a little surprised to hear Hooper’s name called.
As it all turned out, I ended the night 18 for 21 on my predictions, which ties my total from last year. The three I missed were Best Costumes, Cinematography and Original Score. I’m still kicking myself for switching to The King’s Speech for Score rather than The Social Network because it was a last second switch for me and Reznor’s Network score was my favorite of the year, but you can’t win ’em all I guess.
Finally, I thought I would end with a couple of acceptance speeches I particularly enjoyed. I was also going to include Natalie Portman’s and Luke Matheny’s, but the transcripts weren’t yet available. Hopefully I will be able to add them tomorrow.
Bloody hell. Wow, what a room full of talented and inspirational people and what the hell am I doing here in the midst of you? It’s such an honor. David O. Russell, what a great spirit, you know, on the set. Just fantastic, and thank you so much mate for making the work that all of us actors did actually mean something. You know, I mean that’s the director’s job of translating it to the audience and making it mean something. Thank you for that. Thank you to Pamela Martin, likewise, as our editor. The just incredible work of every actor. Melissa, I’m not going to drop the f-bomb like she did, I’ve done that plenty before.
Amy, Jack, Mark, man, you know the guy who just got this whole thing going right from the get go. Everybody in Lowell, all the actors from there. Dicky and Micky, where my quacker? Is he up there? Dicky’s out there somewhere mate, eh mate? You’re the best. You’re the best. I can’t wait, and listen. He’s had a wonderful story and I can’t wait to see the next chapter of his story, you know? If you wanna, if you wanna be a champ, if you wanna get trained with him go meet with him. Dickeklund.com, go do it. Check him out, ok. Alright, he deserves it. Our producers, Mark, David, Todd, incredible. Relativity, and Paramount for just pushing this out there and letting people know it exists. So many movies are just brilliant but nobody ever knows about them, you know. So we’re so lucky to be here tonight and have people recognize that. My team, led by Patrick and Boomer and Carlos and Jen and Anna and Julie, thank you so much for everything that you do.
And of course mostly, my wonderful wife, I didn’t think I was like this. My wonderful wife who’s my mast through the storms of life, I hope I’m likewise to you darling and our little girl who’s taught me so much more than I’ll ever be able to teach her. Thank you, thank you so much.
The writer’s speech, this is terrifying. My father always said to me, I would be a late bloomer. I believe I am the oldest person to win this particular award. I hope that record is broken quickly and often. I’d like to thank my daughter, Maya, my son, Mark, for having faith in their dad as I have faith in you. And I would like to thank my producers, my director, my cast, there’s so many people and they are saying “wrap up now.” I’m sorry. I would like to thank her Majesty, the Queen, for not putting me in the Tower of London for using the Melissa Leo “f” word. And I accept this on behalf of all the stutterers throughout the world. We have a voice, we have been heard, thanks to you the Academy.
If you read our live blog I hope you enjoyed it. If you didn’t read the live blog I hope you had fun doing whatever you were doing. I would love to hear your thoughts on the show and the awards so let your opinion be heard below.
For a complete list of winners you can click here and if you like pictures, I have a full gallery of 120 images from the show right here. And if you missed the RopeofSilicon live blog, just click here for six hours of awards show coverage. Enjoy!
