Crash and Burn

My Thoughts on Last Nights Academy Awards

The upset victory of popular favorite Crash, a film that wasn't even suppose to have been nominated, in the best picture category had this years Academy Awards ceremony ending like a Hollywood movie. Other then that however I found the evenings ceremonies to be have been rather dull. What follows is a list of some of my observations about the 78th annual Academy Awards:

• I did okay on the guessing this year, not great, being correct on 14 of the 24 categories. The ones I missed on were generally the categories I knew nothing about, though you can't really blame me on getting best song wrong, I mean who would have guessed "Its Hard Out Here for a Pimp" would have pulled an upset. On a similar note I find I have no problem with Brokeback Mountain winning best score, from what I heard of it at the ceremony I think it probably was the best score this year.
• Jon Stewart was a disappointment as host, I didn't find anything he said to be that funny, granted I did miss his opening monologe. It still seems however that Carson was the only talk show host who could effectively pull off hosting these awards, Lettermans hosting job about a decade ago was suppose to have been awful. Bring back Chris Rock.
• No one film stole the show this year with all 6 major awards being divided between 6 different films, nice change of pace from say the Return of the King juggernought of two years ago.
• Kongs dominance of technical awards is well understood, and I believe Geisha was deserving for its visual artistry.
  
• Only three nominated songs this year, a real disappointment.
• What was with all the montages this year, I mean I always look forward to the celebrity death sequence but what was the point of all of the others. The biography film montage was random, and the epics montage seemed to be the embodiment of everything this years awards were not. I do admit however to quite enjoying the film noir montage, complete with use of the always wonderful Lauras theme.