The Oscar Rundown

(Please be warned that throughout this piece I wasn't able to emote properly and had trouble controlling THE SIZE OF MY TYPE. Apparently, typing all in caps indicates EXTREME emotion. I guess exclamation marks just weren't cutting it!)

1) Cans of soda drunk during show (including red-carpet arrivals) : 3 (I know, so few!)

2) Trips to the bathroom at commercials : 6 (off of only 36oz.! What the hell?)

3) Categories in which non-Americans won : 12 (at least, which was awesome! So many great accents and a spreading of the wealth!)

4) Exclamations of "I love James McAvoy!" : 4 (again, at least)

5) Pieces of trivia looked up during Oscar broadcast : 1 (I was surprised, there's usually more. But just so you know, the question was which 4 other actresses, besides Hilary Swank, have won two for two at the Oscars? The answers are: Helen Hayes in 1932's The Sin of Madelon Claudet and 1970's Airport; Vivien Leigh in 1939's Gone With the Wind and 1951's A Streetcar Named Desire; Luise Rainer in 1936's The Great Zigfield and 1937's The Good Earth; and finally, Sally Field for 1979's Norma Rae and 1984's Places in the Heart. And yes, I looked each one up myself!)

All in all, I was extremely satisfied by the outcome of last night's Academy Awards. After a night of nail-biting I was so relieved that the Coen brothers No Country For Old Men pulled both Best Picture and Best Director(s) out. While it was a quality year, I honestly felt that this film was on a higher plane than the others and it would have seemed an INJUSTICE for anything else to take the big prize!

Other awards were mostly in accordance with my wishes and opinions as well: Daniel Day-Lewis was phenomenal, though Best Actor was by far the most worthy group of candidates in any field; Javier Bardem was deserving and gave a great speech; Marion Cotillard's upset over Julie Christie offered the most touchingly shocked and overwhelmed reaction of the night; and Tilda Swinton pulled out a win for Michael Clayton, in a truly great performance, although, again, a worthy field of competitors. I knew Atonement was in tough company in all of it's categories, so I'm glad it won for score - I'm telling you, that typewriter effect really works in the film! And "Falling Slowly" from Once was recognized - YAY! In a classy move, Jon Stewart brought Marketa Irglova back on stage to finish her acceptance speech after the band cut her off and went to commercial. Stuff like that should happen more often!

The only real bone I have to pick is The Bourne Ultimatum winning both sound mixing and sound editing. Ultimatum was a great flick - totally deserving of some technical awards. However, the sound effects editing used in No Country For Old Men were absolutely essential to the success of that film. Almost all of the suspense is built upon small sounds, from the wind, footsteps, that cattle gun, even the careful use of silence, as well as a million other noises that, combined, create one of the most fascinating exercises in the effect of sound ever demonstrated on film. I won't feel too bad for No Country - after all, it did come out the big winner - but this was a technical award it really deserved.

Onto the dresses! Red was the theme of the night, and as it's my favorite color, I can't really complain. However, other than red and a little navy, there was not a whole lot of color on the carpet this year. Both 2006 and 2007 carpets had a wide range of styles, in lots of vivid colors, and, dammit, that's the way I like it! There weren't too many stupendous flops this year, but there seemed a lack of ingenuity all around.


I don't wanna gush about the red, but I couldn't choose just one of these ladies: I think Helen Mirren (again, she just can't go wrong) and Anne Hathaway were my favorites: Mirren is just stunning, and I think the color and rose decolletage of Hathaway's dress was just lovely with her hair and skin tone. As for the other two, Katherine Heigl's dress just FITS man, to a T, and I dig the Monroe hair. Miley Cyrus, couldn't care less about her career, but the dress was both event-fitting and age appropriate.


Jessica Alba gets a vote as well for just WEARING A DIFFERENT COLOR. That plum is lovely and it's a classy dress to go with her baby bump.

Other than the ladies in red, I thought Jennifer Hudson was great - this is what she SHOULD have worn last year when she was the belle of the ball. It looks great on her figure and was gorgeous on television, but I can't find a photograph that really does it justice - this is the best I could find, so you'll just have to take my word for it!


Also on the nude/white side of things, I thought Marion Cotillard was a goddess, and one of the few women who really took a chance as far as design goes, and it really worked for her. But really, take a look at this woman and tell me she isn't one of the most beautiful people you have ever seen. Seriously.

And my final pic just had to be of James McAvoy. Love him! And check out his beautiful wife, Anne-Marie Duff - really gorgeous eyes and WEARING A BOLD COLOR! Completely won me over! Also, I saw a hilarious interview Ryan Seacrest had with both of them at the BAFTAS (British Oscars) where James said that in their house Ryan is referred to as the "Chicken Bucket guy." Apparently, they saw a segment of E!News where Seacrest refers to Mariah Carey as "hot as a bucket of chicken with biscuits on the side!" So basically, James and his wife are having a nice, public giggle at Seacrest's expense, totally awesome, and then, to make it even better, James does a spot-on impression of Seacrest actually saying the line. So I went searching and found this clip of James doing the same impression on Ryan's morning radio show. Freaking hilarious!