Boring. I heard the word come out of my wife’s mouth at least a half-dozen times during the 79th annual Academy Awards ceremony (and, as I’m writing this, we’re not even done with the show.)
And, after more than 210 minutes, I tend to agree with her. While there have been some noticeable differences in this year’s telecast as compared to those of years past, there have been too many lulls, too many tributes, too much filler.
Let’s take a look at the good (the emphasis on meaningful speeches), the bad (who thought that it would be a good idea to read the most boring parts of scripts to illustrate the importance of a good script?), and the ugly (Nicole Kidman):
THE GOOD
- Lucas, Spielberg, and Coppola doing shtick prior to announcing the winners of the Best Directing Oscar; Scorsese winning the Oscar; and Spielberg saying "Mazel Tov."
- The theatre troupe Pilobolus contorting their bodies magnificently.
- The decision to group the performance of the Dreamgirls songs.
- The class exhibited by Supporting Actress winner Jennifer Hudson in not bitchslapping Simon Cowell, who famously said that she wasn’t talented enough to win American Idol. Guess she’ll have to make due with the Oscar. Also, the fact that Hudson’s dress won the battle of the boob. Her right breast was a wardrobe malfunction waiting to happen. Her designer deserved an Oscar for Best Breast Support.
- Jack Nicholson, still crazy after all these years. The Kojak look makes him look even more badass, if that’s even possible.
- Ellen DeGeneres proved that her easygoing style translates nicely to the big stage.
- Al Gore’s (non-) announcement that was drowned out by the band.
- Turning the costume design into a live showcase.
- The live sound effects orchestra. The sounds that they were making in time with the film was pretty cool.
- The Ennio Morricone montage. A great musician finally gets his due.
- Letting the kids read the animation nominations. Sure Jayden Smith got a bit ahead of himself, but who cares? It was an inspired idea.
THE BAD
- Reading drama-free lines of nominated scripts to prove the importance of good writing and disproving the importance of a good script in the process.
- The live sound effects orchestra. We get the point that sound effects are important. At the same time, you don’t need to bring the show to a screeching halt to prove that point.
- The montages: I remember the foreign films montage, which was unnecessary. There was another one early on whose content I cannot remember at this point. And if you can’t remember it, it shouldn’t have taken up valuable time.
- Celine Dion brought nothing to the Morricone tribute.
- Jennifer Lopez. She would have ended up in the Good column, because she was wearing a beautiful dress, but then she opened her mouth and Jenny from the block showed up.
- Did every woman have to wear a gray dress? Helen Mirren was the only one able to pull it off, and that’s likely because she was showing some excellent cleavage.
- Al Gore has gained so much weight that the carbon monoxide emissions from his head now produce more greenhouse gasses than Norway does.
- There has to be a better way to honor the film industry folks who passed away in the last year than the loud/quiet/loud montage. The death popularity contest is just creepy.
- Clint Eastwood stumbling and bumbling his way through the Morricone tribute and then saying that he shouldn’t have forgotten his glasses.
THE UGLY
- It might seem like we’re beating Nicole Kidman up, but if you look at her, it looks like someone already beat us to it. Or, as my wife said, she could probably play Death at this point. She wouldn’t even need makeup.
- Is Tom Cruise an alien? He never seems to age. He scares us. Not as much as Nicole Kidman does, but he scares us.
- Penelope Cruz is a beautiful woman, and it hurts us to say this, but the bottom half of her dress looked like a hairy octopus had devoured her legs.
- Kirsten Dunst needs to get into rehab, stat. And take Reese Witherspoon with you. The Oscars are about elegance, not trailer trash.
- Have we mentioned Nicole Kidman? If someone made a horror movie in which a figure with Kidman’s face popped out of dark corners every few minutes, the pic would gross $100 million in a few weeks.
What did we miss? Tell us in the comments.
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