The Oscars 2011

The 83rd Academy Awards took place Sunday night. The British film The King's Speech was the big winner for Screenplay, Actor [Mr. Firth as I predicted], Director Hooper and Best Picture. Portman secured her place as Best Actress [as I predicted], Bale - Best Supporting Actor [as I predicted]. Melissa Leo dropped an F-Bomb during her acceptance speech for Best Supporting Actress so she should get a special award from Conan O'Brien for that if she graces his show.

Toy Story got the animated movie award [as I predicted] and Inception received 4 technical Oscars [I predicted at least one]. The Social Network and Alice in Wonderland also received awards and strangely one of the worst movies of the year, The Wolfman got an Oscar. I'd not consider the Make-up effects Oscar-worthy at all but the other movies in the category were nominated for making made people look war-torn or older so it wasn't a very competitive category.

As for the presenters, I was not very impressed with Franco or Hathaway. Franco seemed subdued, but I think anyone would next to Hathaway who seemed like she popped a few "uppers" before going on stage. She was giddy and giggly and went completely over the top with excitement. That said, the presenters showed great respect for their award-receiving peers. The opening sequence was a spectacularly produced montage of the Oscar hopeful movies with Hathaway and Franco superimposed seamlessly within the movies [and with special appearances by Alec Baldwin and Morgan Freeman]. They could have done with a lot more jokes for the remainder of the show however. It felt as if the writers abandoned the Oscars this year. It was evident from Billy Crystal's appearance that he brought his own materiel and had more puns in his brief time on stage than in all of Franco and Hathaway's performance over the whole 3 hours, but I guess they did their best with what they were given.

I wonder what we'll be fed next year?