No surprises for me tonight at the Academy Awards. I have been saying for months that The Hurt Locker would win the big award. I concede it’s a well made thriller. My problem was that the few Americans who have seen it (only $15 million at the box office and now has only DVD sales) will think it’s an accurate depiction of what the Army’s Explosive Ordnance Disposal teams do and face in Iraq. It’s not. They rarely wear those heavy suits, they don’t spend a lot of time pulling out scary wires (robots blow up IEDs) and soldiers don’t sneak out of Green Zone on solo missions. I could go on . . . but . . . won’t here. Just to say the “cowboy-ism” of The Hurt Locker borders on disrespecting the real work our troops are doing. (My Best Picture winner wasn’t nominated: Crazy Heart. Of the nominees I would have gone with An Education or Up In The Air.)
Despite my problems with her movie I was delighted to see Kathryn Bigelow win the Best Director Oscar. She is the first woman to win. Only four women have been nominated in the category (Let me give them credit: Linda Wertmüller, Seven Beauties, 1976; Jane Campion, The Piano, 1993; Sofia Coppola, Lost In Translation, 2003).
I was a big fan of Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart and his win was very much expected. I am still bewildered by Sandra Bullock’s rise to the top of the acting world. But most observers saw her win for her role in The Blind Side coming. The supporting wins were expected. Mo’Nique in Precious was a lock for months. I was put off by the movie’s rolling every stereotypical tragedy facing black youth into one young woman that it made the story completely unbelievable, but you can’t deny the power of the performances. Also for months we knew that Christoph Waltz was on his way to a win playing the evil Nazi Jew killer in Inglourious Basterds.
This years show on ABC was sloppy, uneven, poorly directed, had an unexplained homage to the horror film and went, again, way too long. Maybe it was the new broadcast producers that lead to several missed opportunities. Although Avatar director James Cameron (who is Bigelow’s ex husband) was strategically seated directly behind his former wife, when she was named best director, the camera cut away so that viewers were robbed of knowing whether the two bothered to keep up the “No, You’re the Best!” game they’ve been playing for months now. Remember last year how much fun it was when cameras cut back and forth between Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie when Brad Pitt took to the stage?
Thank goodness I was on DVR delay so I could fast-forward through the song and dance numbers; but, to the producers credit there were fewer this year. Co-hosts Steve Martin and Alex Baldwin got a few laughs but most of their humor fell flat (Sample joke: “Oh look, there’s that damn Helen Mirren,” Martin said, pointing at the audience. “That’s Dame Helen Mirren,” Baldwin explained. Doesn’t even look funny on paper). But . . . but . . . I did like how they bookended the program. The broadcast started with kudos from Alec for Steve (a quick segue prevented Steve from saying something nice about Alec) . . . and then kudos for Alec from Steve at the end (and Alec ending the broadcast before a return compliment). You had sit through the 3.5 hour show to get it. If you could remember what happened nearly four hours earlier.
Trivial note 1: Farrah Fawcett and Bea Arthur were left out of the In Memoriam segment.
Trivial note 2: For years, in fact as long as I can remember, upon opening the envelope the presenter would say “And the Oscar goes to . . . ” Tonight all the presenters, but one (Kate Winslet), said “And the winner is . . .” Meaningful? Don’t know. But it’s the kind of thing I catch.
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