2013 Oscar Re-cap!

 Oscar Re-cap!

 

     I had planned to live blog this year's Academy Awards on Sunday night but decided not to. The reason? It would have looked something like this...

8:30 - I can't believe Seth MacFarlane is hosting this year. He is a complete idiot. There are hundreds of people I'd rather see host the Oscars.

8:31 - What a moron. Why do people think he's funny?

8:32 - That was tasteless.

8:33 - Totally unfunny.

8:35 - Who gave him the idea that he could sing?

8:36 - This guy is a talentless hack! Worst Oscar host ever!

     That would have gone on for more than three hours, so I decided to spare you that. Instead, I'm going to give you a category by category recap of the 85th annual Academy Awards. I make predictions every year and this year I was pretty confident going into the ceremony. As it turns out, I was right. I got 15 right and 9 wrong, which I believe is one of my best efforts ever.

     Here we go. First, the nine I missed:

1&2) I missed both Sound Mixing and Sound Editing. In my defense, there is no way to accurately predict these categories. Did you hear that movie? I did. Those sound guys sure did a good job. I heard the whole thing! I always pick the same movie for both and chose Skyfall this year. Wrong twice over. Mixing went to Les Miserables and Editing went to Zero Dark Thirty.

3) Documentary (Short) - You can't pick this. Ever. Nobody sees these films. I chose a documentary I have never seen titled Mondays at Racine and a movie I had never seen titled Inocente won. Go figure.

4) Original Score - For those of you that aren't into movies, that means music. I went with Lincoln and the Oscar went to....Life of Pi. I was not upset by this since both had great musical scores. I just picked incorrectly.

5) Costume Design - This should be easy to predict. All you need to do is pick the movie that takes place a long time ago. As long as nobody is wearing Hollister, you may have a winner! I picked Les Miserables. How can that miss? French Revolution costumes! I tell you how....it's called Anna Karenina. Google it!

6) Original Screenplay - I knew I was going to miss this one. I picked Moonrise Kingdom because I wanted it to win. I saw it and liked it very much. The winner was Django Unchained which annoyed me because I think Quentin Tarantino has jumped the shark.

7) Animated Feature Film - I totally screwed this one up. I picked Wreck-It Ralph. I should have known better. I blame Hannah for this one since she saw Brave and rated it an unconvincing "Okay." She has since told me that someone near her was talking during the entire thing that ruined her movie going experience.

8) Supporting Actor - All five nominees are former Academy Awards winners, so this was almost impossible to pick. My first choice was Phillip Seymour Hoffman. My second choice was Alan Arkin. My third choice was Tommy Lee Jones. My fourth choice was Robert DeNiro. Christoph Waltz won. Oh well.

9) Director - As Luke Wilson yells not once, but twice, in Anchorman, "I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING!" I thought Steven Spielberg was a lock for Lincoln. I knew Argo would win Best Picture and the director of that film, Ben Affleck, wasn't even nominated. Second best film in the bunch was Lincoln, so I went with Spielberg. The winner was Ang Lee for Life of Pi, and I'm okay with that.

     And here are the 15 I got right:

1) Short Film (Live Action) - Curfew. Total guess. Never saw any of the nominees. Nobody did.

2) Short Film (Animated) - Paperman. See comment above.

3) Visual Effects - Life of Pi. If you saw this film, you would agree that this was a lock.

4) Cinematography - Life of Pi. See comment above.

5) Film Editing - Argo. This film was extremely tense and suspenseful. Most of the time, the editor is to thank for that.  Good stuff.

6) Production Design - Lincoln. This category basically awards the people that put the sets together and make the background look realistic. When I saw Lincoln, I felt like I was in 1865. When I left the movie and went to the parking lot, I looked for my horse and buggy.

7) Makeup & Hairstyling - Les Miserables. The only reason I got this right is that there were only two other nominees in this category and I knew neither one was any good.

8) Documentary - Searching for Sugar Man. I have to admit that the only reason I got this is because I read something about it and the review said it was a very good film. Can't take credit for this.

9) Original Song - Skyfall. In case you didn't know, Skyfall is a James Bond movie. In case you didn't know, the title songs from Bond movies are very big deals. There have been 23 Bond movies and there are many classic title songs from these movies. The first time I heard Adele sing Skyfall, I put it in the top five all-time Bond songs. This one was a no-brainer.

10) Adapted Screenplay - Argo. I picked it for Best Picture, so I had to pick it here.

11) Foreign Film - Amour. This was the only foreign film nominated for Best Picture, so this one was easy.

12) Supporting Actress - Anne Hathaway for Les Miserables. I haven't seen this film yet, but I've seen a lot of clips of this performance. There were other worthy nominees, but I dare you to say any of those performances are better than Miss Hathaway's.

13) Actress - Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook. I have to admit that I love Jennifer Lawrence. I was one of the few people who knew who Ms. Lawrence was when she was cast as Katniss Everdeen. She is a major talent who can do drama, comedy, and action. This will NOT be her last Best Actress Oscar.

14) Actor - Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln. If you saw this film, this was easy. This man is an amazing actor. In my opinion, he is one of the best actors in film history.

15) Picture - Argo. I saw five of the nine films nominated for Best Picture and I really thought this was the best one. It's already in my DVD collection.

     Oh, and Seth MacFarlane is still a talentless hack.