The Oscars have Buzzed

This is my review of all things Oscar. The winners, losers, and quirky moments. They were very different this year, and I don't know if that is a good thing or not.

Melissa Leo won the first award and gave the first hint that this year’s award’s ceremony was going to be different. After uttering “Fuck” during her acceptance speech and then having it brought up in others’ speeches, we see that the Oscar’s still maintains that class division that makes a genuine outburst something non-oscar.

This year was a three way dance to take home the most shiny bald men between The Social Network, Inception and The Kings Speech. In a bit of an upset, The King’s Speech won awards for Tom Hooper’s Directing, and David Siedler’s Screenplay. No knock to the King’s Speech, but what Christopher Nolan imagined and created for the screen was something we will not see again until the next Christopher Nolan movie. David Fincher’s directing should have taken the cake, there was a story being told here that in the wrong hands could have become a mockumentary about a book, but Fincher displaying his unique style and vision created a documentary about an entire generation. However, Aaron Sorkin did win for Adapted Screenplay, thanking Fincher and everyone else he could think of in a decidedly classy speech. Inception won most of the technical awards, not surprising, for a film that had to build constructs of the audience’s mind both figuratively and literally.

The other awards of the night such as the live action and animated shorts did what they set out to do, they gave light to pictures that would never enter the collective psyche of the average Oscar viewer. The montage of those films made me seek some of them out on the net, especially after the speech by NYU grad student, Luke Matheny for God of Love, brought some fresh attitudes to the hip-Oscars.

Speaking of which, your emcees for the night, did and did not disappoint. Anne Hathaway was her quirky beautiful self and the Franco was his brooding self. His brand of Apatow-esque awkward comedy did not land consistently with the audience, but i was dying watching the screen. it was somewhat paradoxical however, that Franco and Hathaway knew that they were here as a gimmick to bring in a new demographic, but they were still limited by the Oscar writing, which is as consistent as a M. Night Shamalyan movie.

Also, Christian Bale finally won an Oscar. Bale, the most overlooked actor in Hollywood for about a decade won for The Fighter, which had a good share of acting nominations. Natalie Portman and Colin Firth won for their respective roles in Black Swan and The Kings Speech. These were the most locked categories in years. Even the Franco knew he wasn’t gonna beat a stammering English King. Toy Story won Best Animated Feature, in a category that featured three nominees, something that has to change, since Despicable Me and Tangled, which was nominated for Best Original Song, were noticeably omitted. With Toy Story being nominated for Best Picture, it was only logical that it won the Best Animated Feature.

Other notables was Kirk Douglas (insert joke about age and death) doing an old vaudeville routine while presenting an award, which went on a bit too long. Nearing the end of show, Steven Spielberg presented the award for Best Picture and gave examples of the films that have won in the past and those that didn’t win and presented the idea that they were all winners, except the other eight movies not named The Social Network or The King’s Speech.