So the Academy Awards for this year are now two days in our rearview mirror, and much of what I say here will not be "news" per se, but what the hell, time for my bloviation on what happened on Sunday night anyway.
"Anora" was the big winner with five awards overall including Best Picture, Best Actress for Mikey Madison, and Producer/Director/Writer/Editor Sean Baker taking home four Oscars in each if these categories. I guess that this wasn't a surprise, but - and this is just me - I don't get it. We saw "Anora" back in December, thought it was somewhat entertaining, especially in its second act, but it just didn't say "this is the Best Movie of the year" to us. I gave it only Two Stars when I wrote about it in January. Ten years from now, will we all look back and say "just what were they thinking when they awarded Best Picture to this one?". Hope I'll still be in The Grandstand to actually answer that question.
What follows are my stream of consciousness thoughts from the notes I took as I was watching the show. Yes, I actually did take notes.
*****
I've never been all that big a fan of Conan O'Brien, but I thought that he did a good job as host. His monologue ran 20 minutes and was for the most part pretty funny. However, he should have kept it to 17 minutes and eliminated that "I Won't Waste Time" song-and-dance bit. That was bad.
Speaking of bits, the interchange between O'Brien and Adam Sandler was funny. I was surprised to see on social media (an always reliable source) that people thought that this was for real, that O'Brien was having Sandler kicked out of the ceremony for being improperly dressed. It was a "bit", people. And it was also a bit of satire in light of what happened at the White House two days earlier, but we'll save that discussion for another time and forum.
*****
In my Preview Piece on the Oscars, I only made four actual predictions:
And Some Out of My Butt Predictions
- Best Director - Brady Corbet, The Brutalist
- Best Adapted Screenplay - Peter Straughan, Conclave
- Best Original Screenplay - Jesse Eisenberg, A Real Pain
- Also, each year, one movie comes to Oscars night with a shitload of nominations, and goes home getting shut out, or with some minor technical award. This year, I predict that this dubious distinction will go to Wicked.
I can say "I believe I had that" for only one of the four, Peter Straughan for Adapted Screenplay. I also sort of missed on saying the "Wicked" would get shut out. It did win two technical awards. The one big movie that did get shut out, I'm sorry to say, was "A Complete Unknown", which was my personal favorite of 2024.
*****
Mick Jagger presenting the Award for Best Original Song! THAT was fantastic. Mick will turn 82 this year, and you'd never guess it to look at him. He was great in the few minutes that he was on stage.
And speaking of the Best Original Song, the Academy did something that I have been advocating for years. They did not stage a performance of each original song, which reduced the running time of the show by probably twenty minutes, give or take a few. Bravo.
*****
Why the James Bond Tribute? Didn't they do one of those a few years back, so why again? And if you are going to do such a tribute by singing Bond theme songs, how could you NOT include "Goldfinger"?
And speaking of tributes, the one to Quincy Jones was meh, nothing against Queen Latifah. The tribute to Jones that was staged at the Grammy Awards was so good, that anything else was bound to suffer in comparison.
*****
Now for the Acting Awards.
As predicted, Kieran Culkin was a complete tool in delivering his acceptance speech. He probably deserved the award, but jeez, what a jackass.
I didn't see "Emelia Perez" so I can't comment on Zoe Saldana's performance, but I like her, so good for her!
Biggest surprise of the night was Mikey Madison winning for Best Actress, and the best part of THAT was seeing how pissed off Demi Moore, the odds on favorite, was when the award was announced. Wonder how that meet-up between Madison and her went at the Governor's Ball following the ceremony?
The best part of Moore not winning is that now I do not have to go see "The Substance", which sounds dreadful, but I would have forced myself to see it had she won, so I dodged a bullet there.
Then there was Adrian Brody. The fact that he won was not a surprise, and I do look forward to seeing "The Brutalist" sooner rather than later, but, Good Lord, that acceptance speech. It was clocked in at over five minutes, and it was awful. I guess he figured that if his movie was long enough to need an intermission, then, by God, he would give a speech that needed to have one too.
And one final word on acceptance speeches. The one that Sean Baker gave for Best Director urging that we all return making movies to be seen in movie theaters and to seeing movies in movie theaters was, I thought, one of the best of the night. Streaming movies on your sixty-five inch HD flatscreens in the comfort of your home is great, but in my mind the theater going experience is still the best way to see a movie.
*****
Finally, as promised, my awards for best and worst gowns of the night, plus these additional fashion comments: What was up with Emma Stone's hair style...
...and Timothee Chalamet's suit?
The Best Gown for the evening was worn by Selena Gomez. Simply elegant.
The Worst Gown, or maybe I should just say the Most Ridiculous Gown of the night, and there were a lot from which to choose, was worn by Ariana Grande. I mean, what did she do when she had to go to the bathroom?
Brody, Madison, Saldana, and Culkin
See you all at the movies!
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