The business of 2010 was officially closed with last night’s 83rd Academy Awards. How did everyone do?
THE SHOW: Started off very strong with Tom Hank’s intro for the first three categories…the awesome-looking, multi-dimensional projection screens behind him showing past winners was a nice touch, and it seemed like the show was going to rely heavily on nostalgia. Unfortunately the program then veered away from that. With an 83-year old history, it should be an easy no-brainer to showcase their rich past.
The Bob Hope visual-effect with Billy Crystal was very neat; it just needed a little more interaction. The live-orchestra opening to the Best Score was most-impressive. How about the John Williams dominance?
Hosts James Franco and Anne Hathaway were obviously hired to draw in a younger audience; they were funny at times but mostly stiff and boring. But let’s not be too hard on those young-uns; it was their first time. Oscar hosts have been hit-or-miss in past years; Hugh Jackman arguably was the last one to really hit a home run. Maybe Robert Downey Jr. will soon follow in his Marvel-superhero footsteps, or maybe the Academy should just dust off Crystal for one last hurrah.
Kirk Douglas absolutely stole the show (maybe let him host next year), no one knows what the hell Justin Timberlake was talking about, or what the hell Downey Jr. and Jude Law were supposed to be getting at. It’s always nice to see Steven Spielberg up there, but it would be nicer to see him Get One instead of Giving One. The opening montage was clever and funny, and the Best Picture montage…edited to the finest detail to THE KING’S SPEECH closing monologue, was absolutely rousing. Overall:, this blogger was entertained throughout.
THE AWARDS: INCEPTION impressively tied THE KING’S SPEECH with four wins, but as expected, could not make it out of the technical categories. Christopher Nolan’s hunt for an Oscar seems stuck on his ability to direct a Best Actor performance out of someone. SPEECH director Tom Hooper’s Best Director win proves that you have to impressively direct your actors to nab that statue. It may just be a matter of time for Nolan, and his growth as a filmmaker will be an intriguing one for years to come.
ALICE IN WONDERLAND and THE WOLFMAN, two films that were critically slammed all year long, surprisingly walked off with a few statues. ALICE’s win in Art Direction makes sense, but the Costume Design victory is a head-scratcher with a film that was 90% CGI characters. How many costumes were made, four? THE WOLFMAN’s Best Makeup win feels like a lifetime-affirmation win for Rick Baker in another CGI-heavy film; even the clip they played prior to handing out the award was mostly CG.
As expected, Colin Firth, Christian Bale, Natalie Portman and Melissa Lao ran away with the acting gold, and every one of them gave acceptance speeches reflective of their classiness.
Lauded as the “best movie of the year” by major publications all over the world, THE SOCIAL NETWORK scored only minor wins and failed to make a real dent in history. In any other year, NETWORK could have dominated, but THE KING’S SPEECH was just too strong.
Nearly two months ago, and before the awards season began, this blogger named THE KING’S SPEECH the best of 2010. All the important and required elements were there, and all those elements were justly awarded. On this night, reelspeak got it right, and so did Oscar.
What say you?
Kings speach, awesomeness.
ReplyDelete