Thoughts on the 2007 Oscar ceremony
Wow, was everyone off on their Oscar predictions. Yeah, we got most of the big ones right (Scorsese, Mirren, Whitaker, Hudson, etc.), but everything else was all over the map.
“Pan’s Labyrinth” wins three — the second-highest total of the night — yet fails to win Best Foreign-Language Film, which seemed like its most obvious victory.
“Dreamgirls,” which led the Oscars with eight nominations, got only two wins. Three of the five Best Song nominees were from “Dreamgirls,” yet it still managed to lose that category.
“An Inconvenient Truth,” which everyone figured was a lock for Best Documentary, did indeed win that award. But it also won Best Song, thus putting it ahead of the much-ballyhooed “Babel,” which got only one prize all night long. Poor “Babel.” Poor, crappy “Babel.”
There were surprising upsets (Alan Arkin over Eddie Murphy for Best Supporting Actor; “Happy Feet” over “Cars” for Best Animated Feature), but there were some comforting sure things, too. Helen Mirren is gorgeous, classy, and supremely talented; we should give her awards any chance we get. Martin Scorsese has finally won an Oscar, which helps to right a lot of the unbalance in the universe.
And though “The Departed” wasn’t the best film of 2006 — I’m not even sure it was the best of the five Best Picture nominees — it’s likable enough that we can be happy with its winning the big prize. I know people who didn’t see “The Departed,” and I know people who weren’t blown away by it. But I don’t know anyone who actually disliked it, the way a lot of people have disliked certain past Best Pictures (“Crash,” “Titanic,” “American Beauty,” and “The English Patient,” to name a few). We can feel good about “The Departed.”
Most of all, I am happy about this: I correctly predicted 13 out of 24 awards. That’s not very good, but it’s better than my friend Chris Clark, who routinely outguesses me but who this year only got 11 right. SUCK IT, CLARK!
* * *
As for the show itself:
I’m browsing around the Interwebs, and I’m discovering that I seem to be in the minority for liking the show! In fact, I thought it was one of the most diverse and entertaining broadcasts of recent years. I liked the opening montage of nominees, I liked the dancers making silhouettes of movie images, I liked the medley of movie sound effects as created by a choir of humans, I liked the song by Will Ferrell, Jack Black, and John C. Reilly, and I liked carefully watching Jennifer Hudson’s breasts to see if they would fall out of her dress. (Beyonce, meet Be-ouncy.)
All that stuff was slightly different from the norm, a little creative, a little vaudeville-variety-show-Ed-Sullivan-y. I didn’t love everything about the show — still lots of dull tributes and special awards and so forth — but overall, I came away from it with positive feelings. Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it was the seven doughnuts and one liter of Diet Dr Pepper that I consumed over the course of the broadcast.
* * *
The winners:
Picture: “The Departed”
Director: Martin Scorsese, “The Departed”
Actor: Forest Whitaker, “The Last King of Scotland”
Actress: Helen Mirren, “The Queen”
Supporting Actor: Alan Arkin, “Little Miss Sunshine”
Supporting Actress: Jennifer Hudson, “Dreamgirls”
Original Screenplay: “Little Miss Sunshine”
Adapted Screenplay: “The Departed”
Cinematography: “Pan’s Labyrinth”
Editing: “The Departed”
Foreign-Language Film: “The Lives of Others”
Documentary: “An Inconvenient Truth”
Animated Film: “Happy Feet”
Makeup: “Pan’s Labyrinth”
Art Direction: “Pan’s Labyrinth”
Sound Mixing: “Dreamgirls”
Sound Editing: “Letters from Iwo Jima”
Visual Effects: “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest”
Costume Design: “Marie Antoinette”
Original Score: “Babel”
Original Song: “I Need to Wake Up,” from “An Inconvenient Truth”
Animated Short: “The Danish Poet”
Documentary Short: “The Blood of Yingzhou District”
Live-Action Short: “West Bank Story”
February 26th, 2007 at 8:00 am
I agree it was a particularly entertaining Oscars show. Ellen was funny (not quite as pointed as Jon Stewart last year, but still quite good) and I loved those shadow people. Very cool. Still, I now realize there is no other way to watch an awards show than with the DVR ready to go to the 60x fast forward speed. I got through 3+ hours in about an hour or so, and still saw everything I cared to. Heck, if you just edit out the long walks the presenters have to make out to the mic each time, that probably kills several minutes right there.
February 26th, 2007 at 8:12 am
A bunch of liberals slapping each other on the back. Seriously, any group with so much love for “documentaries” like An Inconvenient Truth and Fahrenheit 9-11 loses much of its credibility.
February 26th, 2007 at 8:32 am
I have to say that I rather enjoyed it too, although in an odd way I think I always do. Like you I also predicted 14 correctly, which actually isn’t bad when you consider there were quite a lot of surprises. Murhpy (who wasn’t as good as Arkin in my view) losing was a shock, but the real gawping moments for me were Pan’s Labyrinth not winning Foreign Film, and Cinematography not going to Children of Men.
The ceremony itself also seemed to go quite quickly this year. I warmed to Ellen as the night went on, and she won me over with the Scorsese/Eastwood segments. And it’s always nice when the Best Picture/Director categories aren’t certainties. When they are there’s either a ghastly shock (like last year), or it’s just boring and inevitable. I thought The Departed might do it (and out of the 5 it would have been my choice), but when it picked up Editing (over United 93) I think that was the moment when I thought it was really going to win.
February 26th, 2007 at 9:34 am
I liked it a lot, too. I thought Ellen was HILARIOUS! She was much more entertaining to me than recent past hosts. I also thought much of the dialog during award presentations was very funny, like Seinfeld and the girls from Devil Wears Prada. That made me laugh so hard. I love how Meryl Streep played with them; it was great. I thought the shadow things were one of the most awesome parts of the show. I was fascinated by them.
Things that happened that were awesome that weren’t necessarily controlled by the show: Helen Mirren is absolutely beautiful and glamorous and graceful. I agree with Eric that we should throw more awards her way. (Has anyone seen Annie Liebovitz’s spread in the March “Vanity Fair”? It’s a film noir theme, and the shoot includes many of the awards nominees. There’s a great photo with Helen Mirren and Judy Dench.) I loved the guy who won for “Happy Feet”; his acceptance speech was sincere, not a list of must-thanks, and entertaining. I kinda wanted JHud to take over “Listen”. She almost did, and it would have been amazing. I’m so in love with her right now. And she was quite jiggly in that dress…her breasteses, I mean.
The show is still majorly weak when it comes to the tributes. They’re SO BORING! Oh my gosh…to the point of driving me to the brink of something negative.
February 26th, 2007 at 11:25 am
I don’t think they should keep giving Helen Mirren awards unless she’s actually the best next year. If she is, then by all means, give her an award. But, I really dispise how people “finally” get awards that they’ve deserved for so long. I don’t think the awards should be a cummulative effect, but rather, a direct reflexion on who or what is actually the best in that given year.
But, then, that may be a little too optimistic.
February 26th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Wait a minute–I counted 13 that you got right.
1 Picture,
2 Director,
3 Actor,
4 Actress,
5 Supporting Actress,
6 Original Screenplay,
7 Adapted Screenplay
8 Editing
9 Makeup
10 Sound Mixing
11 Visual Effects
12 Documentary
13 Live Action Short
You still beat Chris, though, so I guess it’s all good.
February 26th, 2007 at 1:47 pm
I have to say that the one thing that did go right last night was giving the Oscar to Ennio Morriconi. This guy is an Italian national treasure–and a genius to boot. The music from “The Mission” is definitely one of the greatest soundtracks of ALL TIME and Morriconi deserves the accolades.
Except for the Will Farrell song, Ennio and the In Memorium thing they do every year, the rest of the show bit it–HARD. Sucked, pretty much…sadly.
February 26th, 2007 at 2:18 pm
One word:
Vacuum cleaner.
Ellen did a great job. It was paced well. People won. F Whitaker’s speech was moving and creepy all at the same time. I also liked how Beyonce was outsung by her co-stars.
Very entertaining.
February 26th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
What a joke the Oscars were. I mean, I guess they got most of the awards right but how did Eddie Murphy lose to Alan Arkin? Everyone agrees that Eddie Murphy was amazing in Dreamgirls. His singing, dancing, acting, and humor was awesome. Alan Arkin was pretty good, but it was such a small role. How many lines did he have in the whole movie? How did one of the Dreamgirls songs not win? Do they have to always make political statements? As for Pan’s Labyrnith, I didn’t see “The Lives of Others”, but I would be shocked if it was better.
February 26th, 2007 at 2:30 pm
And once again, I have seen almost none of the Oscar winners and very few of the nominees. PotC: Dead Man’s Chest is the only one on there I’ve seen, and I sure wouldn’t have given that movie any awards. Guess I’m just not a fan of Oscar bait.
I look forward to surfing the webs for pictures of celebs wearing stupid stuff to the Oscars, because that’s the best part of the Oscars right there.
February 26th, 2007 at 3:00 pm
I was shocked when “Pan’s Labyrinth” lost for Best Foreign-Language Film, and I was shocked when “The Little Matchgirl” lost for Best Animated Short. I was also shocked when Eric out-predicted Chris, too, but that’s a different picture altogether. (Let’s make that “shocked and apalled,” shall we?)
February 26th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
Oh, and I’m kind of upset that Babel won anything… Oh, well.
February 26th, 2007 at 3:03 pm
Upon looking back, I predicted 10 correctly. I’m way out of league…
February 26th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
I didn’t watch, out of protest for Children of Men not getting a best director and best picture nod, both of which it deserved. Then again, I haven’t watched since Haley Joel Osment lost to Michael Caine in ‘00. I don’t think previous work should be considered for yearly awards.
February 26th, 2007 at 4:26 pm
Be-ouncy. Heh.
February 27th, 2007 at 4:37 pm
My two year old grandson and I agree: “Cars” was robbed!