Here are some of my thoughts about this year's Oscar broadcast...

1. The Host - I thought Jon Stewart did a descent job for a first time host. I liked how the show started with the bits of the previous hosts, but then the first part of his monologue was pretty flat and I felt he was losing the audience. He did get better though and I laughed several times, especially when he started to engage and address actual folks in the crowd. I bet he comes back again.

2. Best Song - So lemme get this straight... you're telling me that out of ALL the movies made last year that these were the three BEST songs - and there were only three? Not sure I get that... and to top it off Three 6 Mafia wins for "It's Hard Out Here For A Pimp"??? Are you kidding me? And btw, I actually like the song. "Hustle & Flow" was one of the actual movies I saw, but is it really the BEST SONG OF THE YEAR?? No, absolutely not. To be honest I liked "Whoop That Trick" better from that movie, but it wasn't best song caliber either. What we have is a bunch of older (mostly white) people trying to be "dope" or "cool" or "hip" to the "kids" and get them interested in the Oscars. I think it backfired and made the Best Song category kind of a joke. Nothing against Three 6 Mafia - they did definitely liven up the show and their song was good- but it and their acceptance speech would have been much better at the MTV Video Awards.

3. The Host (again) - And I loved Jon Stewart's note of Martin Scorsese ZERO OSCARS and Three 6 Mafia ONE. I think that says it all.

4. Music - This year was the first time I noticed them start the "get off the stage music" right as the award winner got on stage. I did notice they did not do it on all the categories though. Best Actor, Actress, etc. didn't get that treatment. Not sure I liked that. Felt kinda rude. Now, I'm not in favor of long winded acceptance speeches either, but hey, this is the Oscars and they shouldn't cue the music off the top. The show went it's usual 3 1/2 hours anyway...

5. Lauren Bacall - Man, she was unbelievably beautiful when she was young. She kind of reminded me of Scarlett Johansson now. Sometimes I think it's better for us (the audience) to remember these great actors as they were - young. Well, maybe that's not right, but at least we shouldn't see them stumble their way through an intro that they can't see on the teleprompter. I felt very sorry for her. I've worked with teleprompters many times and know they can make those fonts bigger and they should do that in the future. That was embarrassing.

6. Best Picture - I was rather surprised with this. And obviously Jack Nicholson was along with just about everyone else in the Kodak Theater (except maybe the cast and crew of "Crash"). I didn't see either "Crash" of "Brokeback" so I can't comment on them, but I can say I find it very odd in many Oscar years where the Best Director does not win for his movie. Ang Lee of course won Best Director, but then "Crash" won Best Picture. Seems odd to me. I understand how this can happen I guess, but it just seems weird. I know this has happened many times recently like to Ridley Scott (the opposite though, he didn't win but "Gladiator" did) and to others. It's kind of like the Academy wants to award both films and decides to divide up the pie.

Overall I thought the show was okay. There were some interesting moments. I guess the two "big surprises" were for Best Song and Best Picture. Pretty much everything else went as predicted.

Now I guess I just have to wait until the all the Oscar nominated films come out on DVD or cable (or on the Internet) because as I've mentioned - I haven't really seen any of them and I'm NOT taking their "advice" and seeing them on the big screen in some dark theater with total strangers and all their cell phones ringing and kids throwing popcorn and the sound is too loud and the image is out of focus and then the movie ends up sucking anyway after I've spent $50 bucks on the evening out. I'd rather sit at home and watch bad movies there.

-Blake

Do you like this article? Share It!