Moviegoings

Well, I’m here and I’m ready to find out why they thought it was a good idea to let Jimmy Kimmel host again! Oh, they’re going retro. I’m a big sucker for that. But his opening monologue was way way too long.

Best Supporting Actor: Viola Davis is here to present the award. I’m hoping for a win for Sam Rockwell here, but I’d also be happy to see Willem Dafoe get this one. He was amazing in The Florida Project. Oh, and Richard Jenkins was also super-excellent. But Sam Rockwell is the winner. It’s his first, and he has done such great work, so consistently, for so long that I’m extremely excited about this.

Best Hair and Makeup: Gal Gadot and Armie Hammer are presenting this award. It should definitely go to Darkest Hour. No contest. And it does! Hooray. It’s a bit boring, but still nice, when it’s obvious and they get it right.

Best Costume Design: Eva Marie Saint is presenting this, and doing a great job of it. I assume Phantom Thread will win, but I’d rather it go to something like Shape of Water or even Beauty and the Beast. This is one of those where it’s boring because it’s too obvious. That movie was pure costume design bait. Of course it won. It’s certainly not undeserving, but . . . meh.

Best Documentary Feature: Greta Gerwig and Laura Dern are presenting. I don’t know anything about any of these, because I’m terrible. They look great! The winner is Icarus. I need to track this one down, and also the rest of them. There’s no excuse in the age of Netflix for me not to have seen more of these.

Taraji P. Henson introduces the song nominee from Mudbound, which is the movie I most should have seen this year, let alone the nominee I most should have seen, and the one I have the least excuse for not having seen. Ridiculous. So ashamed.

Back from the commercial break with a weird, shapeless montage celebrating “90 Years of Movies” or whatever . . . but mostly movies from the past 30 years or so, and including lots of movies that Oscar wanted nothing to do with, including Wonder Woman. Come on, guys.

Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing: Ansel Elgort and Eiza Gonzalez are looking pretty stiff. Both awards go to Dunkirk, which is not a big surprise. I’d have given this one to literally any of the other nominees. All are more deserving films.

Best Production Design: Lupita Nyong’o and Kumail Nanjiani are presenting. Very happy to see The Shape of Water win this, but I’d have been equally happy to see it go to Blade Runner 2049.

Eugenio Derbez (whose name I had to google) is out to stumble through announcing the song nominee from Coco, which I was hoping would win until I heard Gael Garcia Bernal butcher it. What happened there?

Best Foreign Film: Rita Moreno is presenting. I don’t know anything about these, either. The Square looks super-interesting. The award goes to A Fantastic Woman. I should track these down, too.

Best Supporting Actress: Mahershala Ali is presenting. The award goes to Allison Janney, another amazing actress who has consistently done great work for years without any Oscar attention. She was so great in I, Tonya. I would have been just as happy to see Laurie Metcalf win for Lady Bird, but this is not surprising or disappointing.

Best Animated Short and Best Animated Feature: Kelly Marie Tran, Oscar Isaac, Mark Hamill and BB-8 are presenting. Whoever wrote their jokes was real real bad. Ouch. The only one of these I’ve seen is Pixar’s “Lou.” The winner is “Dear Basketball” . . . Which is . . . surprising. And of course, Coco wins the second award. I haven’t seen some of the better-looking nominees, but it was a travesty and an embarassment that Boss Baby was even nominated. I’ll see The Breadwinner in the next few days, and I hope it’s as great as I expect, but not so great that I’m retroactively disappointed that it didn’t win.

Daniela Vega from Best Foreign Film winner A Fantastic Woman announces the song nominee from Call Me by Your Name. I really like this one.

Best Visual Effects: Tom Holland and … someone else present. I missed the name and can’t for the life of me figure out who she is. Oscar goes to Blade Runner 2049, very appropriately! I loved every movie in this category, but this was the most deserving.

Best Editing: Matthew McConaughey is presenting. Baby Driver for sure needs to win this. It’s very much time for Dunkirk to not get a technical award. But it does get it. Because of course. Dunkirk is basically a movie that is about film editing, even more than Phantom Thread is a movie that is about costume design.

Best Documentary Short Subject and Best Live-Action Short: Tiffany Haddish and Maya Rudolph are presenting, and they are killing it. I don’t know anything about this category or any of the nominees. I never pay attention to these at all because, again, I am terrible. But seriously, these two need to host next year.

Dave Chappelle is out to announce the song nominee from Marshall.

Ashley Judd, Salma Hayek, and Annabella Sciorra are here to talk about #MeToo and introduce a little segment about it. Powerful stuff.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Chadwick Boseman and Margot Robbie are presenting. I think Logan should win this. I think it should have been nominated for Best Picture. But it won’t because . . . Yeah, Call Me by Your Name wins. And having just seen it recently, I can’t be sad about that. Great screenplay, great film.

Best Original Screenplay: Nicole Kidman is announcing this category. This is maybe the strongest category of the night, so I won’t be sad no matter who wins. But I’m particularly happy that Get Out won this one! Awesome.

Wes Studi introduces a montage about military films.

Best Cinematography: Sandra Bullock comes out to present. Roger Deakins needs an Oscar, you guys. Seriously. What else are we even doing here? Yes! Yes! I almost don’t even care what else happens tonight. This has been so long in coming. I have been rooting for this to happen for so long. There have been 3 years in the last decade where he wasn’t nominated, and every other year I wanted him to win it. This is so, so long overdue.

Zendaya is introducing the song nominee from The Greatest Showman.

Best Original Score: Christopher Walken is announcing this one. I don’t have a strong feeling about this one, but I’m leaning towards Desplat for The Shape of Water. And he gets it!

Best Original Song: Lin-Manuel Miranda and Emily Blunt are presenting this award. I’ve changed my mind about this one multiple times while watching this award, but I’m currently leaning towards Sufjan Stevens. I don’t think he’ll win, though, and I’ll be fine with most of the others. The winner is “Remember Me” which was my pick at some point earlier. I’m fine with that. That’s 2 awards for Coco!

Jennifer Garner is introducing the In Memoriam montage, backed by a Tom Petty song being sung by Eddie Vedder.

Best Director: Emma Stone is presenting. I’m hoping for a Greta Gerwig win here. The Oscar goes to Guillermo del Toro. I can’t be sad about that, even though his output has been so uneven. I somehow forgot this was his first nomination as director. He should have been in the running for Pan’s Labyrinth ages ago.

Best Actor: Jane Fonda and Helen Mirren are presenting. This will surely go to Gary Oldman, right? A lot of strong contenders, and it’s not a sure thing, but come on . . . Yes! Another long overdue award. This has really been a night for recognizing people who have been long overlooked.

Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence and Jodie Foster are presenting, and ragging hard on Meryl Streep. I expect Frances McDormand to win this, and that wouldn’t be bad, but I’d so much rather see it go to Saoirse Ronan. And barring that, Margot Robbie. Frances McDormand does get it, though, as expected. She is really a great actress. And she is killing her speech! Wow. What a barn-burner to close things out before the final award. Fantastic.

Best Picture: Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway get a shot at redemption here. This award needs to go to Get Out or Lady Bird, but I don’t think it will. I won’t be happy if it goes somewhere else, but I can live with anything but Dunkirk. The winner is The Shape of Water! I did not see that coming. It’s middle-of-the-pack for me, but a fine film that I’m okay seeing win.

~ by Jared on March 4, 2018.

Posted in Miscellaneous