Oscars

Oscars: Still Useful or Not?

What a shame. Has there been a more disappointing Oscar ceremony than the 82nd Academy Awards? To start off, there were no great surprises as “The Hurt Locker” nabbed six awards and dominated the monolithic “Avatar”. Indeed, a female director (Kathryn Bigelow) finally won the Academy’s top prize, but even that had been spoiled by her near sweep of many of the run-up awards, especially the Director’s Guild of America, which nearly guarantees victory. One could easily be forgiven for forgetting, however, that “The Hurt Locker” was the biggest winning movie of the night as most of the jokes seem to refer to “Avatar” which cast a large shadow over the ceremony.
Jeff Bridges (“Crazy Heart”) and Sandra Bullock (“The Blind Side”) each won their respective lead acting awards as did Christophe Waltz (“Inglourious Basterds”) and Mo’Nique (“Precious”) which were also no surprise.
What was a surprise at this year’s Academy Awards was the sheer lack of star power. A few of the usual war-horses: Tom Hanks, Barbra Streisand, were trotted out but where were the big stars? Yes, George Clooney and Meryl Streep were there and nearly omnipresent but they were nominated. There were no signs of megastars such as Clint Eastwood, Tom Cruise or Nicole Kidman and what is an award show without a number of camera pans to the darkly bespectacled leering visage of Jack Nicholson? Instead, the viewers and the audience were treated to the renowned thespians Miley Cyrus and Taylor Lautner. In what kind of world, would Taylor Lautner ever be able to make his own trip up to that podium? This could be just a bit premature as only a year ago, many would have said the same about this year’s Best Actress.
A particularly egregious oversight was in the tributes that were included within the Oscar ceremony. The Academy Awards could see fit to include stars who had worked with the nominees before, however, tenuously, to give cloying, self-congraulating praise that was given more time than the actual candidates’ speeches. Interesting. Also interesting was the fact that the producers could see fit to include a seemingly interminable, though lovely, interpretative dance instead of performing the nominated songs. It didn’t seem to particularly cut time out of the ceremony. Another grievous error was in the embarrassment of granting Lauren Bacall and Roger Corman honorary Oscars but then allowing them, only to awkwardly stand and wave. Lauren Bacall has more husky gravitas in a sneeze than a thousand Miley Cyrus’ combined. Also, yes, John Hughes’ movies are quite beloved by a certain generation and he was a good director but was the extended tribute to him really necessary? “His children” standing on the stage was a visual and aesthetic catastrophe, especially when (and not to denigrate Mr. Hughes) but geniuses of the cinema such as the director Eric Rohmer or the writer Horton Foote were relegated to a difficult to see montage. Also, while James Taylor covering the Beatles during this, may have been a cute touch for Beatlemaniacs who remember that Taylor received his start when George Harrison and Paul McCartney signed him to Apple Records, it really added nothing to the montage.
Lastly, let us not forget the hosts, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin. This was particular disappointing as Martin had twice hosted the Oscars before in 2001 and 2003. Frankly, this combination was a failure. Baldwin had no sense of comic timing and their routine stank of stale vaudeville. Two hosts was clearly a failed experiment and this award show shows that the Academy clearly has to go back to the drawing board if they are to make the Awards both classy and hip.