Forgive me if I gloat a bit but I did damn well picking the Oscars this year, correctly predicting 20 of 24 categories.
The only misses were for Cinematography, Supporting Actor, Original Song and Documentary Short Subject. I knew Supporting Actor was going to be very close between Clooney and Matt Dillon, so I don't feel too bad for guessing wrong. I didn't see any of the Documentary Short Subject films, making my guess nearly random, so again no concerns. I never for a second thought the Academy would award a hip hop song with an Oscar, which led me to pick the very dull “In the Deep” from Crash. So I was delighted to be wrong and have the far superior “It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp” win the award. I'm flat out startled that Memoirs of a Geisha beat out Brokeback Mountain and Good Night, and Good Luck for cinematography. The biggest surprise of the night of course was Crash's upset win over the heavily favored Brokeback Mountain for Best Picture. My theory is that the generally rather conservative Academy was just a bit uneasy voting for a gay themed film. More importantly, Crash is about Los Angeles, home to many Academy members. That probably helped them connect with that film just a bit more. No film truly dominated the awards this year. Brokeback Mountain, Crash, King Kong and Memoirs of a Geisha each received three Oscars, with no other films winning more than one. You could give the edge to Crash and Brokeback Mountain as the other two got all their wins in the technical categories but that's just nit picking. Multiple nominees Good Night, and Good Luck, Munich, A History of Violence and War of the Worlds were completely shut out. Host Jon Stewart did a fine job his first time out. The group clustered in the site's chat room thought he was a bit nervous but otherwise pretty good. Reaction elsewhere was more complimentary, giving Stewart a lot of credit for remaining on topic, keeping things moving well and getting off plenty of good one-liners and zingers. My favorite example, “The scorecard, Martin Scorsese, 0 Oscars. Three 6 Mafia, one.” Stewart also had ready some great videos pretending to be campaign ads for the nominees in smearing political style. Even funnier was a montage that suggested Brokeback Mountain wasn't the first western to hint at gay cowboys. I had been greatly anticipating the performance of “It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp” during the awards. It seemed so at odds with the traditions of the Academy Awards that I was practically giddy at the thought of trampling on those sensibilities. The actual performance was a bit of a let down though. The addition of a rather pointless dance troupe and the alteration of the lyrics to become acceptable to the thugs at the FCC took the teeth out of the song. The Academy should really take note that the best of the three original song performances belonged to Dolly Parton, who was accompanied by absolutely no one. She came out all alone, with no set alterations and danced and sang with amazing energy for a 60 year old woman. In the future I'd like to see all original song performances done like that. Just the performers. Nothing else. On the bright side, the show whipped by in a brisk three and a half hours. Okay, that's still a long time but compared to past shows it was shockingly fast. Sadly they trampled Crash producer Cathy Schulman's acceptance speech in a hurry to get to a few more commercials before letting Jon Stewart sign off. I know the awards is what provides the Academy with the bulk of its operating budget but was just a tacky moment that spoke of nothing but greed. I'm glad the whole thing is over. While I enjoy the Oscars greatly, it's nice to be done with it. For the first time in months I can pick a movie to watch without any consideration at all as to whether or not it is or could be a nominee for an Oscar. That means it's time to wallow in some crap. Coincidently, that's exactly what the theaters are full of right now. - John Shea Full List of Winners: Best Actor - Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Capote”
Best Actress - Reese Witherspoon in “Walk the Line”
Best Supporting Actor - George Clooney in “Syriana”
Best Supporting Actress - Rachel Weisz in “The Constant Gardener”
Best Animated Feature - “Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit”
Best Director - Ang Lee, “Brokeback Mountain”
Best Picture - “Crash”
Achievement in art direction - “Memoirs of a Geisha” - John Myhre and Gretchen Rau
Achievement in cinematography - “Memoirs of a Geisha” - Dion Beebe
Achievement in costume design - “Memoirs of a Geisha” - Colleen Atwood
Best documentary feature - “March of the Penguins”
Best documentary short subject - “A Note of Triumph: The Golden Age of Norman Corwin”
Achievement in film editing - “Crash” - Hughes Winborne
Best foreign language film - “Tsotsi” - South Africa
Achievement in makeup - “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” - Howard Berger and Tami Lane
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score) - “Brokeback Mountain” - Gustavo Santaolalla
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song) - “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” from “Hustle & Flow” - Music and Lyric by Jordan Houston, Cedric Coleman and Paul Beauregard
Best animated short film - “The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation”
Best live action short film - “Six Shooter”
Achievement in sound editing - “King Kong” - Mike Hopkins and Ethan Van der Ryn
Achievement in sound mixing - “King Kong” - Christopher Boyes, Michael Semanick, Michael Hedges and Hammond Peek
Achievement in visual effects - “King Kong” - Joe Letteri, Brian Van’t Hul, Christian Rivers and Richard Taylor
Adapted screenplay - “Brokeback Mountain” - Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
Original screenplay - “Crash” - Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco
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