The (s)Wheat Spot!

Obligatory Oscar-Night Blog

I'll make it quick, but I'd be remiss not to include at least a little something about the Oscars. They're over now, and I must ask -- Is the outro music not the theme from Terminator 2? Wow.

Firstly, I think that Million Dollar Baby deserved every Oscar it won, but Clint Eastwood did not deserve best actor, which he didn't win. Jamie Foxx had way too much hype to be vulnerable to defeat. Sadly, I haven't seen Ray, so I have to go by hype, not his actual performance.

Now, a couple of problems I had:
1.) Adam Duritz looks like Sideshow Bob from the Simpsons. Period.


I can't believe the guys in the band let that slide. I would have shaved him in his sleep the night before. Problem with that is that they all seemed to have very little taste themselves. Makes sense, they haven't put out a consistent album in 5 years, and they're writing ready-to-order songs for Animated Features, which I think is the music biz equivalent of selling your children into slavery.

2.) Beyonce. Who made that programming snafu? She was this close to trying to take the best actress award away from Hillary Swank in a boxing match, she was on the show so much.



3.) Was anyone not getting up and going to the bathroom during the Antonio Banderas/Santana butchering of that Spanish song? I don't even like that song, and I felt bad for the songwriter. Did Beyonce's vocal coach not have the time to teach her a Spanish accent?

High Points?
1.) Charlie Kaufman looked exactly like I imagined him, and he's only slightly less neurotic than Nic Cage played him in Adaptation. And, I must say that he had a little Cohen moment when he started counting down the time on the teleprompter. Brilliant.

2.) Was it just me, or did you lose it when Chris Rock went into the Theater and interviewed regular people? It's easy to forget that there are people out there that think that Alien vs. Predator or Chronicles of Riddick (!) were the greatest films of the year. (Although I almost lost it when the guy who lacked the decency to keep from gushing about Riddick seemed to be able to muster enough refinement to specify between liking Vin Diesel's work and liking Vin Diesel as a person. Thanks for the clarification, guy - I wouldn't want to get that one mixed up either. What would my friends think?) [side note, my roommate Matt just informed me that he thought Riddick was good, and he "enjoyed it thoroughly". 'Nuff said.]

I guess that, all-in-all,, this Oscar night was really pretty good. Leo went home empty-handed again, so we may not see him again for five more years, for whatever that's worth. Chris Rock brought the goods, complete with a "Yo!" to Brooklyn at the end. And more than anything else, the whole thing was over pretty quickly. It helps to get a play-by-play from Amy, via text message all night long.

Let me know your Oscar thoughts! Any funny moments I forgot to mention? Any disappointments? Lemme know.

posted by paul @ 8:43 PM