Oscar Live Blog. Hour #3 FINALE
Sunday, February 27, 2011 at 10:53PM ARRIVALS | HOUR 1 | HOUR 2 | HOUR 3 (YOU ARE HERE)
10:52 We're almost done. And we'll be like that was so long!" and then next week we'll feel sad that it's so far away.
10:53 SNIFFLE. in memoriam. Sally Menke :( among other greats. But that one is so fresh and still sting because of such unexpected tragedy. I'm glad Celine is singing SMILE. I misheard that she was singing SHINE. oops. And i thought why does that non nominee get sung but not Cher's song? I love the song " STORMY WEATHER" so much. And Lena Horne is awesome yes.
It's not the load that breaks you down. It's the way you carry it.
-Lena Horne.
Great quote.
11:03 sigh. DIRECTOR = TOM HOOPER. Where is Cate Blanchett to say "that's gross" Heh. Sorry. Tom Hooper has great hair. "The triangle of man love" er... i think that was Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law plus TFE reader (see previous poll).
11:08. I've been neglecting the comments.
11:10 I was just telling an angry tweeter -- Fincher's loss will go down as a blight on Oscar -- that many great directors never won: Altman, Kubrick, Hitchock. The ones who don't make warm movies basically. It's like Directors are Actresses!
11:15 BEST ACTRESS. They're choosing good clips. Natalie's best scene in BLACK SWAN "he picked me mommy" Hearing Jeff Bridges say "michelle" freaked me out a little. You know why. and it's NATALIE PORTMAN who we knew it would be.
I feel bad for Annette Bening. I guess she's the new Deborah Kerr / Glenn Close / Julianne Moore. Great company to be in. And even though Natalie Portman wasn't my personal choice (I think Kidman was best this year) can we all agree that it's nice when people win for their best performance. So there's that. Congratulations, Nat!
11:21 Sandra Bullock and Jeff Bridges presenting these awards makes me happy for some reason. Maybe because they're both so damn likeable. BEST ACTOR COLIN FIRTH. Again people: why does everyone say that Oscar don't like to be told who to vote for. They so rarely vote against something that's won everything. All the acting winners have been the same all season.
11:28 I like Colin Firth a lot but he was just named Best Celebrity Neighbor as well. The King's Speech's hard sell is just SO irritating. And now it's going to win. The least ambitious of the five films.
11:35 BEYOND TACKY. Using The King's Speech speech as the voicevoer for the montage of ALL the nominees? So so tacky. And in Spielberg's preamble in which he mentioned "and the other nine will join the ranks of Raging Bull, Citizen Kane, etcetera" he basically exccused them from voting for all the new classics each time. TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY TACKY. Best Picture = The King's Speech
11: 38 James Franco "Anne and I have had an amazing time tonight."
11:43 Credits rolling and such. My takeaway. I don't even care that great stuff lost so much as that they chose SPIELBERG to do Best Picture again. Christ on a cracker how is it that THE ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY has no imagination about this? They work in the imagination department. Would it kill them to let a legendary actress do it once in awhile and not just the rotation of Spielberg/Hanks/Streisand/Nicholson. This almost makes me angrier than lame wins on account of it's such an easy fix. Less fixable is the taste level of the Academy voters.
11:46 One thing I forgot to mention. If only Anne Hathaway's penultimate dress had been a little less dark blue and a little more light turqouise it woulda totally been a tribute to Madonna's Ray of Light cover.
11:47 Okay. Another Year. The 83rd Oscars are now part of history.
11:49 To all the "losers"... It's not the load. It's the way you carry it. Remember your awesomeness.
COME BACK TOMORROW FOR MORE REACTIONS. We'll try to get going by Noon.
Live Blog, Oscars (10)
Reader Comments (85)
What I don't get is the negativity. My fav was Inception, I enjoyed The Social Network and Loved the Kings Speech. Thought Black Swan was brilliant and cried at the end of Toy Story. I haven't seen any of the others yet but for the first time in a long time I am interested in seeing all the Best Movies nominated. Quite happy actually. Just saying...
Ageism is fucked. Two-Time Academy Award Winner Hilary Swank – I will always hold Sally Field in higher esteem. The Academy is so cold blooded knowing that Annette would lose again but rubs it in her face by bringing that abomination on stage to co-introduction director.
Bening needs Harvey Weinstein, so does Kathy Bates, Michelle Pfeiffer, Sigourney Weaver, Glenn Close, Meryl Streep, Alfre Woodard and Julianne Moore.
I know I bitched about it all evening, but when all is said and done, TKS is not a bad movie at all. Solid performances, nice art direction, and a good score. But the problem is the overpraise totally killing it for me. I actually like this film and now I can't stand it! Best Picture of the year? Go fuck yourself! In 5 years, people will have forgotten it even exists, while in a hundred years, The Social Network will still be regarded as a true classic of the first half of the 21st century! Just like nobody remembers Crash anymore, and it was just 5 years ago!
In a year where the Golden Globes are able to name films like The Social Network and The Kids Are All Right as their best pictures, and nominate a performance as good as Ryan Gosling, and years ago choose Brokeback Mountain over an unnominated Crash, and Mickey Rourke could win their best actor award, dare I ask: Why are the Academy Awards the ones of prestige? Why can't the relevant awards show be the Golden Globes. The Academy is just digging its grave deeper and becoming less and less relevant. The Academy is going backwards, and the people are not going to be able to handle it in years to come. Everyone knows The King's Speech will now not be remembered well in film history because of its win tonight. Couldn't Academy members just let it be what it was: a nice, uplifting film that should not have been near the Best Picture race. They are destroying the institution.
To be fair, the Academy did better than GG (Avatar, The Hangover) last year.
In my bad mood about the Tom Hooper win over visionaries like David Fincher and Darren Aronofsky, I have to let off steam: I am so SICK of Nicole Kidman's fake humbleness -- all the awards season, she has been doing this shoulder-shrugging thing whenever her name was called as a nominee, as if she was saying: "What? Me? Oh no come on... I'm not that good, it was nothing....". Tonight she did that even before Jeff Bridges had said anything about her, then her clip rolled and then again TWICE. Annoying. Then don't campaign so hard for that nomination, Nicole, and don't tell everyone how incredibly intense that shooting was so that you would wake up crying. Your performance was great, deal with it.
And I agree about the overall tackiness. So few surprises. And I really, really hoped after TSN's music and editing win that there could be a happy ending still... but then that british TV director won against modern auteurs. Ugh.
And yes, poor Annette Bening. Always winning against those hot+young things. That's mean to Natalie Portman who was terrific in Black Swan and is a very deserving winner actually but still... 4th loss for Bening after those frustrating Swank victories... They should have given it to her for her beautiful, complex performance.
Happy for Colin Firth.
Good:
- The Fighter sweeping the Supporting categories
- TSN winning Score and Editing
- Billy Crystal reminding us how to host the Oscars
- Cate Blanchett's "That's gross"
- Anne Hathaway telling the audience to drink after she flubbed a line
- PS22 singers
- Cool surprises, even if I was rooting for others: In a Better World, Inside Job
Bad:
- Newman-Hooper-Portman-TKS (I'm fine with Colin Firth, I think he was the best since Gosling wasn't nominated)
- Really shaky start to the evening, especially the opening monologue and Melissa Leo's speech (and Kirk Douglas, though funny at first, completely hogging the stage and throwing off Leo's concentration)
- James Franco and Anne Hathaway having nearly no chemistry together
- Steven Spielberg presenting Best Picture
- the BP montage with TKS voiceover
- Eyesore in Wonderland taking two Oscars
Overall, I thought it was one of the weaker shows, certainly weaker than last year. Anne Hathaway got better, but James Franco looked so uncomfortable the whole time.
You know what? I blame Alice in Wonderland even more now! For being a horrible movie, for being an Academy Award winning film, and for getting my hopes up and stealing two awards from TKS that seemed locked! I started watching the broadcast not expecting a big upset, and those two wins made me think it could happen, that the Academy didn't like TKS that much and then, BOOM! In your face, motherfucker! So, screw Alice in Wonderland!
Still glad about The Social Network's Score, Editing and Screenplay wins. Those were absolutely deserving (and not just because I wanted TSN to win Best Picture!)
Andreas...Tom Hanks' super-quick presentation last year was to get the Best Picture winner announced by midnight Eastern Time...he actually announced it at 11:59 PM. This year, they had all the time in the world.
Also, I agree with you, Nat...running Colin Firth's speech over all the clips of the nominated films was pretty tacky...and obvious favouritism.
The Social Network was overrated on this board. There, I said it :-P
Everybody I know loved TKS and those who saw TSN thought it was OK. I personally know nobody who saw both who liked TSN more than TKS. Not saying we are right and you are wrong just offering a different perspective and maybe helping to shed a little light on why the Academy went for TKS.
My set is inclusive of ages 15-70. My 15yr old daughter, loved TKS but despite being Gen Facebook she went to bed during TSN. Of course Inception was hers (and my) favourite. My 70 yr old mum loved TKS and saw it twice at the movies but her favourite was Black Swan surprisingly. Any way I'm want to say- The Kings Speech BRAVO!!!
I'm surprised that they Spielberg presented Best Picture again. They should have gotten Kirk Douglas who was the standout performer all night.
The show was quite good actually. A brilliant opening that then had nowhere to go.
The fact The King's Speech wasn't cleansweeping - as some people predicted - meant that some upsets could have occurred.
The biggest losers were not Christopher Nolan or David Fincher as everyone has been griping about ever since they were born but the film True Grit. 10 nominations and they walk away with nothing.
Does this make it 3rd place behind Turning Point and Colour Purple for films with most nominations losing them all???
I didn't like the fact there was no 5th nominee for Song. Like Randy Newman said - couldn't they have found just one more?
And I really missed the 5 presenters for the Acting awards like they did in 2009 (not 2010).
And finally - WTF was that primary school singing (miming) Somewhere OVer the Rainbow???
Was it the OScars or Show and Tell???
Bizarre ceremony. How does TKS win Director (!!) but no techs at all? I liked the film and was okay with it winning BP but they were really getting my hopes up there for a TSN win during the ceremony.
Love Franco and Hathaway, but jeez... if you obviously don't give a shit at all, don't do it James. He seemed totally baked throughout the entire ceremony.
But Leogend's speech made up for it all. That was almost performance art. Her faux surprise, dramatic pauses, pinching Douglas and then walking. off. with. his. cane. I was worried she wouldn't live up to the hype but man I was wrong.
Bette,
I think Gangs of New York went 0 for 10 the year it was nommed.
I don't think it was really tacky for Spielberg to list a few losers the 9 pictures would be in company with. It was a little strange to use the TKS dialogue over all the films though.
Oh well, bring on next year?
Great to see I'm not alone with that Best Director win. Gag, Academy.
I must say, all the clips chosen for Actor/Actress were fantastic. They even picked Lawrence's awesome bloody scene in the barn. And I forgot to mention earlier that Melissa Leo's hilarious "You still own me $200, you can't say anything!" moment was shown as well. I died.
The beginning montage for the Best Pic contenders that opened that show was AMAZING. The closing one where they played them over the famous speech was a bit tacky considering what that speech is actually about. It was very well edited though.
Sigh. When Best Dir/Pic were announced, all I could think about was what comment mentioned in the podcast (a couple weeks ago) by I can't remember who about assuming the Academy would do a split but as it turned out, '... no, they just REALLY loved Million Dollar Baby!' Again, SIGH.
As for the show? Pretty good, stayed away from needless montages and was more or less entertaining. They need to do something about the Song category. The Doc and Foreign Film winners felt like compromises but at least they weren't ghastly. And the hosts? Franco was either over it before it began or lifelessly exhausted. Anne was fun but she seemed like such a corny fangirl at times. Mixed reactions but the jokes did succeed.
Best Speech of the night: God of Love's director, Luke Matheny
Best Moment: Kirk Douglas
Best Win: Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross's amazing, still-shocking win for Score.
everyone -- am still trying to reconcile the huge applause going to losers. Were they trying to apologize for their quesitonable taste? I feel like there was a lot of that. like "yeah we know it'll be embarrassing in 10 years but the heart wants what it wants!"
Mark -- totally agree on clips. and they were good and long enough. yay,. and you're right on Kirk Douglas too. He was hamming it up, stealing the show.
Bette -THE OSCARS OR SHOW AND TELL. lol.
Rax -- Melissa did come through with the crazy. Bless.
Joanne -- good point. I mean i basically agree as a Best Picture lineup it rocked. There was only two films I thought were questionable choices (and they won the most awards. HA.) but all of them were at least "good" films.
I think it was just TSN people sitting close to the front that made their supporters seem loud. Jessie Eisenberg was on first row, and Justin Timberlake was right behind him, right?
I thought that the clips chosen during the Best Actress presentation were terrible. Sure, Natalie's was awesome (one of my favorite scenes), but Bening's focused heavily on Moore, Kidman's had a lot of Wiest, and Williams's felt more like a clip for Gosling.
The men had much better ones, particularly Bardem, Bridges, and Eisenberg.
For all the putdowns of Hooper, what was so ambitious and revolutionary about Fincher's direction of The Social Network. His work was amazing in Zodiac but I don't see the greatness in his work for TSN. Maybe he'll win next year for Dragon Tattoo and all his fans can finally be happy.
Favorite Hosting Moment of the Night: Franco and Hathaway riding up to Rooster Cogburn in the True Grit bear costume.
Nicest Speech Moment of the Night: Natalie's "I wish the prize was that I could work with you all." Original (as far as I know, at least) and thoughtful.
Second-most WTF Speech Moment of the Night (b/c Leo clearly has the most awkward moment): Aaron Sorkin giving a speech that felt like a Best Picture acceptance speech, as though he was recognizing that The Social Network wouldn't get any other major awards. Better cram all of Fincher's "thank you"s in, too.
"Lest We Remind You" Moment(s): Every Inception winner goes out of their way to discuss the brilliance of Christopher Nolan, most of them saying that he was the creative genius behind the decisions which won them their awards.
Evan ... yeah it was a very good night for chris nolan, despite his own loss in screenplay.
that was good on Portman, that moment.
The Good:
Bale's speech, and reference to his tantrum
Inception winning 1st equal amount of awards.
Kings Speech only winning 4
Original Score. I was rooting for Hans Zimmer but a worthy winner
Melissa Leo's F-bomb. Giggle.
Then hosts...Mostly. Looked nervous but had some good lines.
Acting winners. Not nescesarily may faves, but a good bunch.
Sandra Bulllock. Hilarious.
Cate Blanchett "That's Gross" LOL
Jennifer Lawrence
TSN winning Editing
Florence!!
Kirk Douglas. At first I thought 'OH NO, no-ones gonna be able to understand himnwhen he announces the wnner. But he was hilarious. And giving Leo his cane after lol.
THe Bad:
Best Director/Best Picture. Blah
The entire best song catagory...
AIW picking up Art Direction. REally Academy, REALLY?
Colleen Atwoods (?) speech straight off the cue card.
I just relised how many nomination Black Swan failed to pick up. It should have had at least 9.
Best Song performances. Seemed totally random. Shouldve been made into more of a production. Although I guess the songs sucked...
I wanted to se Banksy...
Anyway, I'm glad Leo won, even though it wasn't my fave performance of the lot, because whoever else won would've forever gotten "Leo wouldv'e won if it werent for those Consider Ads"
Am stoked about POrtman, all this 'Bening is going to win' nonsense was starting to scare me. She will win when she really knocks it out of the park. Her Oscar Clip made more of a case for Julianne.
I always forget why Hiliary Swank is at these things, then I realise shes a 2 time oscar winner lol. She looked pretty good though.
127 Hours, Winter's Bone, The KIds Are Alright, and True Grit all won ZERO awards. Alice in Wonderland won two. The Wolfman won one. Who's pissed!!!
You're so right about the acting clips! Portman's best scene, Weaver and Eisenberg's best quotes, Leo's scene that shows off her comic chops...
Firth's clip was a dud for me, though. I know crying = Oscarbait, but there was too much blubbering. And I wish award shows realized that Ruffalo was good in more than just the "it-feels-better-to-ejaculate-than to bleed" scene they keep showing.
This is one of the worst ceremonies ever. I'm sorry. All of my friends who aren't avid Oscar watchers were BORED TO TEARS. When Billy Crystal stepped out I was hoping by some miracle of god that he would take over the show. James Franco looked so over it--dude, if you didn't want to be there or you are too cool for school, then why the hell did you host? I honestly felt sorry for Anne because I felt like she was trying to overcompensate for Franco's lack of excitement...although she started to verge on shrill for me. And was she drunk at the end? I would've been if I had to host with Franco.
However, I LOVED James Franco's grandmother scream out "I saw Marky Mark!" HILARIOUS! Really happy for Natalie Portman and I thought she gave a great speech. Am sad for Bening, even though I don't think she was the best this year. And I am happy for Colin Firth but I thought his speech was a letdown. He has given much, much better ones this awards season.
Someone please handcuff Melissa Leo and vacate her to a sanatorium. Girlfriend is on something. Makes me think that she really didn't have to dig down deep to play Alice.
Cate's "that's gross"--priceless.
Tom Hooper and The King's Speech win....GAG ME WITH A DIRTY SPOON!!! Seriously, someone walk up to Harvey Weinstein and slap the shit out of him. PLEASE!
Gwyneth's performance...is she tone deaf? My ears were bleeding.
Sorry for the ramblings...
Oooh I just noticed that Michelle Williams brought Busy Phillips as her date. I hear shes the godmother of Michelle's kid. Cute. I wish more people brought their friends. Michelle Williams didn't seem to give a shit that she was at the oscars, she's so ethereal, and is fast becomming a favourite of mine.
Sandra Bullock should have brought some hot hunk o' hunk to make that idiot she used to be married to jealous, but I guess she doesn't care enough.
I left an OSCAR party tonight because it was so lame, only to return to home to an even lamer OSCARS. They try waaaay too hard to make them hip only they turn out to be so bland.
Maybe people think Julianne Moore out-shined Bening in her clip because -- THEY'RE BOTH AMAZING AND NO ONE WAS BETTER THAN THE OTHER. Duets, people! There's nothing wrong with saying they were BOTH equally fantastic when they actually are. Same goes for Williams/Gosling. Just because one gets slightly better material and is slightly more sympathetic does not equal better acting. Gosling/Moore had trickier parts and rose to the occasion completely. People have no problem admitting this about Gosling but this Julianne case has been bothering me all season. BAFTA totally got it right in nominating them both. UGH.
BTW I found a better-than-your-average collection of red carpet photos here that I think you, Nate, would love maybe using considering some of the gems:
http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/oscars/photos/2011/02/27/17426556.html
The Jeremy Renner/ScarJo one is pure LOL.
And for all the Dogtooth fans out there, Yorgos brought Aggeliki!
http://www.altfg.com/blog/movie/yorgos-lanthimos-ariane-labed-aggeliki-papoulia-oscar-red-carpet-photo/
Damn, I wish Dogtooth would've upset. Grrr.
I also forgot to mention how much I really like Christian Bale's touching and totally human speech he gave upon rightfully winning. Shouting out Dickie, his choking up over his wife, his reference to his own f-bombs, etc.
And much as I care nothing for her whatsoever as an actress, I thought Sandra Bullock did great in her mini Best Actor tributes. Jeff Bridges too, his were not as effortless but still very nice.
Nate, I CANNOT wait for the post-Oscar podcast wrap-up to this VERY LONNNNG award season!
Oops, the link address cut off
http://www.torontosun.com/entertainment/oscars/photos/2011/02/27/17426556.html
I think James Franco really hated his job :)
Boring Oscar, so predictable. I would have loved it, when Annette Bening and Helena Bonham Carter would have won.
approx. 5:40 am: mid-European time: Oscars over, went to bed with mixed feelings, exhausted, and fell asleep on the spot
11:?? am: got up, prepared for a shower but then decided to turn on the internet right now instead
12:14 pm: finished reading Nathaniel's Oscar blogging and most of the comments, here are mine...
First the negative, I narrow it down to four things I didn't like:
- Kirk Douglas... I'm sorry, if that makes me ageist maybe I'm guilty... but he seemed barely able to speak, I found it painful to watch. Was Christoph Waltz not available, or didn't they want him? I've never seen anything remotely wrong with that former tradition of the last year's opposite sex winners presenting the acting awards...
- I slept through the IN MEMORIAM segment. I actually hate to miss it... you never remember all the people who passed during the last year, and it's a good thing to remember all of them together. Also, I was a little terrified I might have also missed director, actor or actress
- with 20 awards given, 1 for the TKS and 3 for TSN so far, I though this race was over, TSN's gonna win the top honours, everybody did the Oscars wrong... and then, like many others have said before, I was literally thinking WHAT THE FUCK??
- I hated it when they played the dialogue of TKS over the montage of all the nominees. It really felt like: this is a setup, this is foul play, there is no race, there is no voting body, there is no super-secret envelope, some small powerful conspirating group has decided it in advance! Also, I had forgotten that until I read it again here on the blog: yeah, Spielberg’s reference to Citzen Kane et al. felt like an excuse in advance: "Well folks, y'all know they've picked the wrong movie before, so don't be too mad."
But overall I liked the show:
- I liked the presenters, I found James Franco laid back and cool, not disinterested in an offensive way, but yes, Anne was better, and I didn't mind her occasional shrillness it also had something fresh. It's the young Oscars.
- After the first few cat’s I was feeling pleasantly surprised and content, thinking: there spreading the wealth, it’s not a TKS sweep. Good.
- I usually hate it, when all acting wins are so predictable, but this night I'm totally okay with all of them despite it.
- I feared for Melissa Leo's speech during the first moments, but then it turned out to be great
- "it's been 3 years (...) and none of them has gone jail" - yeah, I normally don't care for the docs but I was rooting for that one after I read about it here
- also liked Bale's speech. I’m really looking forward to “The Fighter” coming to the theatres here, I think it’s in mid-March or late April.
- is there anyone Natalie P. has met in her entire life who she forgot to thank? Maybe her kindergarten teacher... but it's okay. She's deserving it, and though there's actually many people I love more, I like her just well enough to be happy for her. Btw why Mike Nichols, what am I missing/forgetting?
- though I don’t love the movie as much as some do, I still like Inception, and I liked it that it won more awards than expected. But didn’t giving so much love to it feel like “Sorry, that we didn’t nominate Chris Nolan for director. It was a mistake, please forgive us.” And yes, @Evan: the winners didn’t fail to let AMPAS know that too ;-)
@Evan: I totally felt the same about the Best Actress clips, especially Williams/Gosling.
@Gabriel Oak: I’m not sure if I’d want Fincher to win for “Dragon Tattoo”, I don’t generally hate remakes, but I’ve just finished the trilogy of the original Swedish films yesterday, and it makes the thought feel very wrong to me.
@Bette Streep: I for one don’t miss the 5 presenters. I thought it’s too much. As said before, I like the old tradition of the opposite sex winner presenting, and it was okay how they also included the spirit of that 5 presenter thing by having the presenters address the nominees directly.
Re: True Grit being the loser of the evening… well, maybe it was a bit over-hyped to begin with. I haven’t seen it, never thought I’d ever care, but its omnipresence has meanwhile gotten me slightly interested, actually.
- Trivia question: why was Jackie Weaver in third place? Where I come from the alphabet still goes A – B – L – S – W. Though I know they’ve done that before sometimes I find it very strange...
- Trivia: if we agree that the top six contenders for best supporting actress were Amy, Helena, Melissa, Mila, Hailee and Jacki, we can find the following: Hailee was left out of the race at the Golden Globes, and got to present best animated feature (it felt like a compensation given Hailee’s uber-popularity at that time). At the Oscars, Mila was left out, and she got to present… guess which category. I had forgotten who joined Mila and looked it up before I started writing… Wow: both were joined by a male singer approx. their own age by the name of Justin… co-incidence? Joke? Conspiracy? Secret code for something?
- The above brings me to another trivia question I’ve been meaning to pose for a long time: why is it that the Golden Globes every once in a while have six nominees in one of the acting categories?
- Isn’t it something that Mila’s dress was the same colour as Natalie’s?
Franco and Hathaway were pathetic. Not funny at all. Not even a single good joke was said by either of them. He looked so bored and she looked like she way trying way too hard to pick up his slack. I can't believe Franco said Gervais "bombed". How ironic.
Dear Mr. R. and Danny,
when Jeff Bridges said Michelle I felt the same thing.
Marcelo - Brazil.
Dominik - Mike Nichols is the director of Closer, for which Natalie got her first Oscar nomination.
Is there anything that Spielberg does that you don't detest?