Alright, another Academy Awards show has come and gone and as always, I like to give my take on what went down.
I’ve been covering The Oscars for five years now and from what I’ve noticed the best ceremonies seem to be the years where the Best Picture winner is legitimately great and is accompanied by rock solid nominees. I know this theory is pretty weak, but from my experience the years I enjoy The Oscars most is when something like Parasite sweeps the ceremony or this year with Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. Again, I have only been watching this show since 2018 so it’s very likely that it’s all just a coincidence, as otherwise I’m giving the Oscars too much credit. Though I must admit, I do enjoy convincing myself I am right.
We’ll start with the negatives for once as this list is rather short. Firstly, this is the first Oscars ceremony I’ve seen where Jimmy Kimmel is hosting and nothing describes his MCing better than lame. He is better than last year’s hosts who ranged from mediocre to downright awful, though they must share the same writing staff as a lot of the jokes making fun of the Oscars felt like something Amy Schumer would have said last year. Oh boy, The Oscars sure do love wasting time and can’t help, but go over 3 hours every single year! When will they learn? This joke is literally followed by an ad for The Oscars Museum. It’s lame self-aware humour when you’re still literally doing the thing you’re making fun of. They do this again when one of the Visual Effects artists is cut off by the music. These guys have been cutting non celebrities off with the music for the whole five years I have been watching the show, but 3 people must be a record high. Although Brendan Fraser and Michelle Yeoh’s speeches were both cutdown in the broadcast I watched because they went over time again with relevant stuff such as Jimmy Kimmel interviewing Nobel Peace Prize Winners on their thoughts on outdated celebrity drama. Most of the other criticisms I have with the presentation are very bog standard. It feels fake and condescending, these guys keep telling me they love movies but never actually show any of that love. They just always seem to be amazed that movies are actually filmed on cameras, or that some weirdo would actually go out to watch the Banshees of Inishirin.
Anyway, let’s talk awards that I disagree with. Let’s talk All Quiet on the Western Front for Original Score. Great movie, but they overdid it with that score. Besides this should have gone to Babylon or hell redo the whole show just so The Batman can get nominated for Score. I’m serious, that was my favourite score of the year. I love The Batman’s score just as much as Babylon’s. I am not just writing this because I was peeved The Batman also walked away with nothing like Babylon did, but also because of this stupid score pick!
The most divisive win this year was Jamie Lee Curtis in her supporting role for EEAAO, as she was easily the weakest out of the bunch. The obvious problem here is The Oscars were playing catchup as they never really nominate actors in comedic roles and if they had, Jamie Lee Curtis would have won years ago for her hilarious work in True Lies or A Fish Called Wanda, which does feature one of the rare times The Oscars did award someone for a comedic role. If they wanted another win for EEAAO they should have given it to Stephanie Hsu as she gave the overall better performance of the two. I feel similar with Brendan Fraser’s win as I think either Austin Butler or even Colin Farrell should have won. Although the parts of Brendan’s speech I heard were great so I can’t complain too much.
What I liked was just about everything else. I liked seeing Gulliermo win for Pinocchio, mainly because he gets it, animation does indeed deserve better. RRR’s win for Naatu Naatu is another deserved win for the ever so dull Original Song category. Top Gun: Maverick’s win for Sound and even Avatar for Visual Effects are more well-deserved wins. Finally, the big winner was Everything, Everywhere, All Once at Once taking home 7 out of the 11 awards it was nominated for. It won editing and Original Screenplay. Ke Huy Quan winning for Supporting Actor was so satisfying and his speech was awesome. This also carries over when the Daniels win for Directing and when Michelle Yeoh for Actress. Finally, EEAAO won Best Picture, which was a such a great finale that made it all worth it in the end. It’s so relieving that the movie I really wanted to see win was not be overshadowed by some idiot wanting to swap around the categories to honour some passing celebrity who has a 1 out of 5 shot of even winning; or by some dumb celebrity slapping another celebrity on stage because their ego was hurt. Those moments certainly make the night more memorable, but just not on the years the movies I love are on the chopping block please. Keep my theory alive Oscars.
That’s it folks. I have a review of The Last of Us coming up next so until then Blog Complainer, signing out.
