Posts Tagged ‘Man on Wire’

Best surprise: With song/dance man Hugh Jackman as host, surprise presenters, and funny gag bits, the Oscar’s was one of the most entertaining it’s been in a long time. (Ratings were even up 6 percent from last year’s telecast.)

Worst surprise: Chances are you won your office pool because just about no surprise winners threw off our ballots. “Slumdog Millionaire” cleaned up winning 8 nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay as predicted, and Kate Winslet, Heath Ledger, and Penélope Cruz won as expected. The biggest upset was Sean Penn winning Best Actor over Mickey Rourke, but really we all knew it was between the two anyway.

Worst use of presenting the Best Pictures:  Up until the last ten minutes of the show, you wouldn’t even know which films were nominated for Best Picture, and isn’t this what the night was really all about? Instead of showcasing clips throughout the night like usual, the clips were only shown right before the award was handed out. Even worse, they were intermingled with previous films that have similar themes making the clips confusing and taking attention away from the nominees.

Best presentation of movies: The montages of film genres recapping the best of 2008 were done so in great pop culture fashion. Coldplay’s “Lovers in Japan” played to the great romance flicks, Wall-E the adorable robot found a tape of the best animation movies, and the hilarious James Franco and Seth Rogen reprised their “Pineapple Express” roles as they watched DVDs of the funniest comedies.

Worst use of presenting the Best Songs: The song nominees, which are usually played in their entirety throughout the night, also weren’t given their full due. The two “Slumdog Millionaire” songs and “Wall-E” song were shortened and played one after the other. We all knew “Jai Ho” was going to win, but “Wall-E” should have been given it’s own set piece rather than making John Legend sing with “Slumdog’s” Indian back-up dancers and drummers.

Best use of presenting awards: Rather than randomly presenting awards, the telecast walked the audience through the making of a movie starting with the screenwriting process to art direction to editing. Stars associated with the category was also a nice touch like action hero Will Smith presenting Best Visual Effects and Sound Mixing and “Religious” filmmaker Bill Maher presenting Best Documentary.

Best presenters: Steve Martin and Tina Fey presented the screenplay awards humorously (“Don’t fall in love with me” Martin stoically told a googly eyed Fey) and controversially (poking fun at Hollywood-favorite Scientology). And don’t forget about Ben Stiller who delivered a dead-on impression of Joaquin Phoenix’s bizarre appearance on the “Late Show with David Letterman” while presenting with Natalie Portman. It would have been even funnier though if it wasn’t just parodied at the previous night’s Independent Spirit Awards.

Best use of presenters: Keeping most of the identities of the presenters top-secret beforehand made for a more exciting show because you never knew who was going to come out next. Hello Will Smith, hello Reese Witherspoon!

Worst use of presenters: While it was fun seeing past winners like Nicole Kidman, Robert De Niro, and Christopher Walken, presenting the nominees, it came off too self-congratulatory. Instead of comments like “You really nailed it” and Marion Cotillard clasping her hands together cooing “Thank you” to Winslet, let’s see some clips instead. Most viewers at home haven’t seen all the movies, so it’d be more interesting to see the performances for which they’re nominated. 

Best acceptance speech: Instead of the director or co-stars accepting on his behalf, the acceptance of Heath Ledger’s Oscar by his family was much more touching. “Tonight we are choosing to be happy and celebrate what he has achieved,” his mother, Sally Bell, said.

Funniest acceptance speeches: Where to begin? First there’s Phillipe Petit, the subject of the documentary, “Man on Wire,” who not only balanced the Oscar on his chin, he also made a coin disappear.  Then the Japanese director of the Best Animated Short, “Kunio Kato thanked Mr. Roboto.” Finally, Best Director, Danny Boyle, bounced up and down in homage of Tigger for his children.  

Worst camera shots: Awkward alert… Not only did Jennifer Aniston have to present an award mere feet away from Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, the camera cut away to Brangelina twice! At least Jolie and Pitt made nice and weren’t giving dirty looks.

Best use of teeny boppers: While baby faced stars like Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens, Robert Pattinson, and Amanda Seyfried presented and performed on stage to most likely draw in the younger audience, their presence was downplayed and didn’t make the Oscars feel like the Teen Choice Awards.

Best secret talent: Anne Hathaway showed off her really good voice in her pretend-impromptu song and dance number with Jackman. Look out Beyoncé. Maybe you won’t be needed next year.

Here are the winners of the major categories:

Best Picture: “Slumdog Millionaire”

Best Actor: Sean Penn, “Milk”

Best Actress: Kate Winslet, “The Reader”

Best Supporting Actor: Heath Ledger, “The Dark Knight”

Best Supporting Actress: Penélope Cruz, “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”

Best Director: Danny Boyle, “Slumdog Millionaire”