Oscar Follow Up

The agony and the ecstasy!

I did not do as well as I would have liked this year, getting only 17 out of 24 correct on my Oscar predictions.  You might be thinking HA! "only" 17 out of 24, but you must know that I am quite competitive, even with myself, and I wanted to at least tie, if not do better than I did last year. (18 out of 24 in 2011.)

I had a premonition that the evening might not go my way when the first award up, did not go to who I thought would receive it.

In some areas, I did better than I ever have!  I usually get categories like costume design and editing correct and never ever choose the winner in places like live action short.

In a sense, I could be proud that my "could wins" in a few instances made the cut, but for some reason even that doesn't make me very happy today.

At least the evening was enjoyable in the sense we didn't have a lousy host!  I thought Billy Crystal was a hoot (even though I think he was expecting more from the crowd at times) and I really loved the way they celebrated film this year.  Everything from the set, to the candid interviews they did with actors about going to and being apart of films, that fabulous Cirque du Soleil performance and even the beautiful montage honoring the departed - it was a classy year and I liked it.

Ok, let's take a second to go over my near misses and a couple of "what the heck!?" moments.

First up- costume design, cinematography and visual effects.

I picked Hugo for costume design because Sandy Powell has won 3 Oscars before, for Shakespeare in Love, The Aviator and The Young Victoria.  Mark Bridges, costume designer for The Artist has never been nominated before.  Now, he did win the BAFTA, and that should have been my clue to put him first and Hugo second.  But I went with a previous winner over a newbie.

I also think that subconsciously I picked Hugo because I was stacking it in the "technical" categories all night.  Art direction and costume design go together in my mind and then the sound categories, etc.  IF I had been thinking clearly all the way through that "technical" thought, I should have included cinematography AND visual effects to my tally for Hugo.  I really thought The Tree of Life would garner it's only award though for the really beautiful way it was filmed and then I also thought that Planet of the Apes would get the visual effects award for it's outstanding visual effects!  One critic blogged that Hugo would take visual effects because the Academy members usually don't have a clue what it takes to do the types of things they did in Apes and would award Hugo the trophy just because it was the favorite and they liked it.  Apparently he was correct.

Film editing is next and this one made me yell "what!?" from my seat on the couch.  The Social Network won this last year.  They same guys won again this year for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.  It not only surprised ME, it surprised THEM!  They had no idea what to say.  This is the first time in 11 years that the Oscar has not gone to the Eddie winner.

When Undefeated won for best documentary feature and they announced it was produced, or whatever, by The Weinstein Co. I looked at my husband and told him to remind to pick all the films produced by, bought by, funded by, distributed by, etc. from The Weinstein Co. as my winners next year.  They run the most aggressive campaigns for their films and ARE winners.  Example: The Artist... best picture winner... The Weinstein Co.

I picked the BAFTA winner for animated feature, my "could win" won.

The most disappointing win for the night was Meryl Streep.  I didn't even mark my ballot in the wrong when she went up on stage.  I was that bummed.  She might be one of the greatest actresses ever, but she was rude and appeared ungracious in her acceptance speech.  Streep will more than likely be nominated again and could possibly win... again.  She's white and there are infinitely more roles for her to pick and choose from, that could be contenders, than possible future Oscar nominated roles for Viola Davis, a lovely and from all appearances, gracious woman of color.  The only thing I appreciated about Streep's speech was that she thanked her husband first.  So many people thank their spouses last and when you start doing that, it's not really a wonder why so many Hollywood marriages break up.  (Streep and her husband, artist Don Gummer, have been married for 33 years.)  Oh and by the way, Meryl Streep... The Iron Lady... distributed by The Weinstein Co... best actress winner.

So there you have it.  Until next year, when we meet again.