The Oscar Hangover
February 23, 2009 by Kath Skerry
Having a few technical glitches with GiveMeMyRemote.com this morning so I’m not sure if you’ll even see this post. But in case you do, I thought I might as well open up a post to talk about last night’s Oscars while we try to get things fixed and normal posting can resume.
I really enjoyed last night’s show. I thought the new, more intimate format made for a beautiful set design. Hugh Jackman was fantastic, and while I wasn’t completely won over by the big song and dance number with Beyone, Zac Efron, Lily Kane and the crew, I thought Hugh’s opening bit was fantastic. He’s so talented. And I like the surprise duet with the talented Anne Hathaway.
The storytelling that was involved in how the awards were handed out was nice too. The sets and the presenters were used to remind us all just how a picture is made. And no one was better suited to talk about the genius of writing than Tina Fey (wow!) and Steve Martin. I could have just watched them on stage all night.
I’m not a big movie goer (I like the pause button on my remote…I get too antsy in movies). But I was happy to see that some of my favorite actors like Kate Winslet won! The speech by Heath Ledger’s family had me a little chocked up. And I hope that Brad and Angie scooped some of those little SLUMDOG kids because they were too cute for words and I’d like to see them again.
Dustin Lance Black, the young writer of MILK got my award for favorite acceptance speech of the night. It was a close time between him and the Japanese filmmaker who said “Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto”. Classic.
I know some were on the fence about how they presented the acting awards. I thought it was beautiful to see past winners honoring the nominees in such an interesting way. It may have made me tear up a few times.
The Ben Stiller bit as Joaquin would have been a bit funnier to me if I didn’t see it done better just the day before at the Independent Spirit Awards. But my favorite LOL moments of the night had to come from the awkward camera cute between Angelina & Brad and Jennifer Aniston as Jennifer was presenting. Awkward…and kind of awesome. But I think everyone’s over it now, and has been for a while. So let’s move on.
As I type I’ve got the song from Slumdog in my head which means I should run off and do some Bollywood dancing.
I really hope that this will post some I can hear what YOU thought of last night’s Oscars! Fingers crossed GMMR will be back up and running soon!
I enjoyed the show for the most part. I will be honest and say I was flipping around to some other things now and then (Confessions of a Teen Idol!). I liked how they did the acting awards. I wasn’t sure I would. I don’t know if I cared for all the young Hollywood crap that seemed to be thrown in to get the tweens to watch. I also didn’t like the camera work when they had stuff up on the screens. You couldn’t see what was going on and it seemed akward. I know I missed some dead people I didn’t know were dead.
I heard Tim Gunn was going to do the red carpet. What net was this on? I didnt’ see it.
I watched the entire show…and was entertained! Hugh was a good choice. I also LOL when the camera panned to Angie during Jenn’s gig. I understand that Angie was in Kung Fu panda with Black so I guess the shot made scense. I didn’t think the muical # was anything to write home about but I am recently intrigued with all things Zac Efron ( and he and VH make a georgeous couple). The only thing that irked me was that Sean Penn didn’t thank his beautiful wife in his acceptance speech…that being said, it was a good speech. I have got to see Slumdog!
I think it’s a good notion I mostly enjoyed the show since I didn’t look at the clock at all until Reese Witherspoon came on and realized we were almost at the 3 hour mark. This show was longer than last year’s but felt not as long. I thought Hugh did great in the opening number. Loved, loved all the emotion in the room. I think the setting really allowed for that. I even enjoyed the new presenting of the acting nominees, despite the fact that it took up way much more time, mostly because it allowed us to see previous winners on stave together. Loved wins for Dustin Lance Black, Kate and Sean Penn. Loved seeing Tina and Steve present and the lead actress presenters (they got a standing O!) And of course, the Slumdog wins.
I actually thought most of the show was pretty boring – I was DVR-ing it and so I could skip over some of the acceptance speeches that I didn’t care about, but I just was getting kind of bored. I don’t know if it was my satellite feed, but the audio was very sketchy for me, sometimes it sounded fine, other times I could barely hear the presenters. Also, I like when they show clips of the nominees when they are announcing them for the acting categories, so while I liked the personal tributes by the former winners, I wanted to see the movie clips too. I’m not sure if they showed clips of all the best pic nominees, my dvr decided to stop recording just as Kate Winslet won, so I wasn’t able to watch anything after that.
The biggest thing I have to complain about was the In Memoriam segment — I liked Queen Latifah’s song, but there was no reason the camera had to keep panning around the stage to show her again and again – you could barely see who was up on the screen most of the time, and I thought it was awfully disrespectful to those they were supposedly memorializing. We all knew that QL was singing, they could have just put the reel up on our screens the whole time like they usually do!!
I did like Hugh Jackman though!
I’m so happy Slumdog Millionaire racked up. It’s really a great movie. I saw it before all the hype started, so I went in not knowing much about it and was pleasantly surprised. The little kids stole the show last night, just like they stole the movie. Dev Patel is a cutie. I just wish he wasn’t so freaking young. ha!
I enjoyed the show last night. It’s the first Oscars that didn’t put me to sleep in a long time. Hugh Jackman did a wonderful job. I loved his opening number and musical montage during the middle of the show. I’m a sucker for musicals though.
Yay for Kate finally getting her Oscar. It’s well deserved.
i wish kung fu panda got best animated feature
Pretty much the only part I saw was Jack Black’s very funny line about being in one Dreamworks picture a year, and then betting it all on Pixar.
Saw Slumdog Millionaire on Sunday morning – excellent movie! Great to see it win so many awards, and great to see the cast up there. Anyone else think that Dev Patel looks like Ross Gellar in the earlier episodes of Friends?
Hugh Jackman was awesome – he should have his own show!
“And I hope that Brad and Angie scooped some of those little SLUMDOG kids”… ok, i literally just spewed Diet Dr. Pepper all over my screen. Classic.
Domo Arigato was awesome. Need to go to Youtube to watch the Ledger family part – I missed that.