Oscars 2007 Liveblog « Making the Movie

25Feb/070

Oscars 2007 Liveblog

LOOKING FOR THE NEW? Go to the Oscars 2008 Liveblog.

Welcome to the 3rd annual Making the Movie Oscars Liveblog, wherein I give a running commentary on the Academy Awards -- live. Why? Because you need ill-considered analysis from a self-appointed pundit, that's why.

Need to cram before the quiz? List of Nominees.

Want to re-live the last two years? 2006, 2005.

Go to the liveblog!Red Carpet Preshow

3:04 Just getting things set up. I have used an excellent program called w.bloggar for liveblogging in the past and with the new Blogger migration it stopped working. Thankfully, there are geeks out there like Santosh Mishra who can find an easy fix.
3:08 Caught Babel in the nick of time last night on DVD. Since this seems to be working, I'm going to go write up a review. See ya real soon.
3:49 Checking in on the red carpet show... some guy is critiquing Rachel Weisz's dress in such detail I start expecting him to describe individual threads. I'll be saving my detailed analysis for things that matter, like Best Animated Short.
3:50 My review of Babel is up. See the sidebar.
3:56 Inane chat with Will and Jada Pinkett Smith. She's dressed in gold, so the announcer makes a joke that Will will be taking home gold no matter what. Then she grabs the mic and says the joke herself, but not as succinctly. There would seem to be a lesson here... don't marry an actress?

4:23 My guests have begun to show up. Anything clever I type from here on out can safely be attributed to them.
4:27 Al Gore's appearance has escalated the security. Lots of stars want to be protected from having to talk to him.
4:33 Mark Wahlberg's arm candy is, accorting to my party goers, "a knockout."
4:34 The number of voting Academy members: 5,830. The number who see all the nominees: 12.
4:39 Kate Winslet gets good reviews, looking beautiful with a Veronica Lake/Kim Novak vibe.
4:42 Not too late to print out Oscar ballots (.pdf link) for your party. I'm doing it right now.
4:50 Adriana Barraza's accent provokes the comment, "Oh, I guess she wasn't acting."
4:51 Meryl Streep is wearing a black raincoat. The better to deflect her tears.
4:54 Abigail Breslin, Hollywood's moppet of choice.
4:55 Five minutes to go time... gotta pee.

5:00 And we begin...
5:02 I didn't see Happy Feet, so this animation is doubly lame.
5:04 Wait... I guess it's not starting now after all.
5:05 Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts go to barbecues, emphasis on the 'Barbie.'
5:06 Steve Carrell improvises a Second City history lesson.
5:08 The costume designer for The Devil Wore Prada and the stars are not wearing Prada. Ironic?
5:14 Cameron Diaz sporting a sporting a tan the color of rust.
5:17 Cate Blanchett will soon be portraying Bob Dylan... really.
5:19 Ryan Gosling smuggles his Canadian family across the border. Do I smell a sequel to Babel?
5:26 Bored with the Red Carpet show (like me)? Read this blog's reviews of the five Best Picture nominees:
-- Babel
-- Letters from Iwo Jima
-- The Departed
-- Little Miss Sunshine
-- The Queen

Liveblogging the 2007 Academy Awards

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5:30 Are we beginning for real now?
5:31 Errol Morris-esque intro. Looks beautiful in HD, I'll say that much.
5:33 Okay, it is Errol Morris.
5:35 The nominees give themselves a standing ovation.
5:36 A classy opening... not announcing Best Actor and Actress winners early... Ellen... yeah, the telecast this year going to get bad ratings.
5:37 Ellen going with the Austin Power look.
5:39 Her act is fine so far, much in keeping with her nervous brand of comedy.
5:40 Bald Jack Nicholson, the Oscar's Lex Luthor.
5:41 Al Gore joke gets a big response here and from Oscar crowd.
5:44 A Hallelujah chorus emerges to pump up the audience. Mostly seems to confuse Penelope Cruz.
5:45 Nicole Kidman is taller than Daniel Craig. And he's wearing lifts.
5:46 Art Direction goes to... Pan's Labyrinth -- yay!
5:48 Maggie Gyllenhall acknowledges wizards of technology. Snooze.
5:49 Wake up! Wake up! Interpretive dancers!
5:51 iPhone commercial - better than any Superbowl commercial.
5:53 Will Ferrell musical interlude. Jack Black enters, calls out Leo. John C. Reilly teaches them how to win an Oscar. I guarantee this song and dance number will be better than any of the nominated song performances.
5:56 Best Makeup goes to Pan's Labyrinth. 2/2 for Pan's, one of my faves. Poor guy shut down by the orchestra.
5:59 Abigail Breslin and Jaden Christopher Sawyer Billybob Smith announce Best Animated Short. No three-in-a-row for Pan's Labyrinth.

6:01 The Danish Poet wins, striking a blow against 3D animation.
6:02 Weird Tom Hanks joke from the Danish amazonian.
6:03 West Bank Story looks kinda hilarious... and it wins.
6:05 Ari Handel gives a very well-rehearsed speech.
6:06 Letters from Iwo Jima trailer for the folks in the middle states who haven't seen it, or slept through it.
6:11 Ellen introduces Bill Ross and his orchestra, the sound effects choir.
6:12 Someone needs to track a movie this way for reals yo.
6:15 Sound Editing goes to... Letters from Iwo Jima. Too bad they didn't get together with the editor and edit a half hour out of that movie.
6:17 Jessica Beal and James McAvoy introduce Sound Mixing. Winner: Dreamgirls. Look for Dreamgirls to pick up a lot of these smaller awards throughout the night. Many Academy members feel bad it didn't get nominated for Best Picture.
6:22 Best Supporting Actor goes to... Alan Arkin. Hmm, does Little Miss Sunshine have a chance to win Best Picture?
6:24 Arkin gives an unpracticed and halting speech, perhaps scrawled a few minutes ago.
6:25 Ellen interviews Marty. The banter actually doesn't seemed planned, which is fun.
6:26 Cue the interpretive dancers once more! It's like releasing the hounds, but more vicious.
6:29 Horrible Dove 'you-made-it' commercial. Well, they get what they pay for.

6:30 Just cut the songs out, I say. Or, barring that, cut out the songs by Randy Newman.
6:33 "Small Town" song. Ah, a nice coma-inducing shot of Americana.
6:34 Melissa Etheridge single-handedly reduces carbon-emissions via lowering the wattage of her power ballad.
6:36 Al Gore and Leo make Jerry Seinfeld yawn. A green Oscars? Oscars is planting tree for every word Al Gore says.
6:38 Al Gore demonstrates comic timing. Ask me what the most important thing is in comedy. 'What's the most important thing in com--' 'Global warming.'
6:39 JC Penney commercial: Give the gift that counts - a conflict diamond.
6:43 Ellen tells some dopey Gilligan droop. Cameron Diaz has her 'Dopey's droopy drawers' quip fall flat. Happy Feet wins Best Animated Film. George Miller gives a great speech.
6:45 Meanwhile, Cars director John Lasseter is slitting his throat with a knife that has accurate highlights.
6:46 Nice montage of movie writers. Ten pages too long. But a fine first draft.
6:50 Tom Hanks and Helen Mirren, lending her diction to the poor grammar of Borat's subtitle (For Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan), introduce Best Adapted Screenplay. Winner... William Monaghan, The Departed,. I hear he's a nutball, this should be good... it was. He manages to thank Peter O'Toole for Lawrence of Arabia's screenplay and get in a subtle dig at the Academy for barring half the movie's producers. Nice.
6:59 Ellen ventures into prop comedy. Emily Blunt and Anne Hathaway play off Meryl Streep.

7:01 Live costume models... hmm. Just like Beverly Hills' better boutiques.
7:04 Always fun to see costume designers. They always wear interesting clothes for some reason. No surprise Marie Antoinette won -- that movie was about clothes, not characters.
7:10 Another funny off-script interaction with a director, this time Clint Eastwood.
7:12 Best Cinematography - Guillermo Navarro for Pan's Labyrinth. That's an upset; Lubezki was predicted to win for Children of Men. But Navarro is well-deserving; I'm pleased.
7:20 Rehab Downey Jr. and Naomi Watts introduce Visual Effects. Winner is... Pirates of the Caribbean
7:24 Catherine Deneuve and Ken Watanabe introduce Most Unintelligible Film...
7:27 This montage of Best Foreign Films makes me certain that Best Foreign Film winners are actually better on average than Best Picture Winners. So many great films.

7:30 Best Foreign Language Film (i.e. Non-English Language Film) is... The Lives of Others. Gotta see this movie.
7:32 The crowd here is upset Pan's Labyrinth didn't win.
7:33 Another funny bit referencing Snakes on a Plane of all movies.
7:34 Best Supporting Actress announced by George Clooney. From the clips, it looks like the qualification for being nominated is runny mascara.
7:35 Jennifer Hudson, no surprise.
7:36 Hudson: "Look what God can do. I mean, if I can win... sheeeeiiiit! I have to thank God again, and oh, yeah, God bless."
7:42 Tiny Gael with a yummy Eva Green introduce Documentary Short... "The Blood Yanzhou District" or something like that wins. It is about AIDS in remote villages or whatever. This guy has good intonation for a mei gua ren.
7:45 Jerry Seinfeld with some lame material about how he likes to litter.
7:46 An Inconvenient Truth wins. The true hero, director Davis Guggenheim, speaks. Larry David drives a Prius, cut to him.
7:50 Clint strides on to the strains of Morricone, who he will give a Lifetime Achievement Award. Clint has some senior moments, but makes it to the montage.
7:56 Celine Dion serenades the bored Italian. I think the lyric I just heard was "as we softly please each other".

8:00 He just said a joke in Italian. I think.
8:01 Clint doesn't have any idea what he said, he just likes to translate things. Turns out Letters from Iwo Jima is really about a boy and his dog.
8:06 A be-corsetted Penelope Cruz and Huge Jackman give Best Original Score to... Gustavo Santaolalla for Babel and todos Latinos.
8:10 President Sid Ganis, former Micro Machines spokesman.
8:11 (Sid Ganis was played by Ian Holm.)
8:12 Best Original Screenplay is... Little Miss Sunshine, not one of my favorites to be honest. I don't like Michael Arendt's speech either, since he rolls over to directors, calling them the true authors. (Although with a script that, for most of it, only just rises above bad sit-com writing, maybe he's just passing some blame.)
8:20 J-Lo intros Dreamgirls's first song nominee. The crowd here notices weird wrinkles under her arms. So if you're not watching in HD, you're missing out folks.
8:22 Jennifer Hudson almost has a wardrobe malfunction.
8:24 Diva battle. My money's on the big girl.
8:25 Good, they didn't forget about Anika Noni Rose and the guy who played the brother. Whose name I've forgotten.
8:26 I would pay good money to see Sacha Baron Cohen to interrupt one of these songs.
8:27 Ah, now I see why the choir came out before. They were already paying them to be here, so they thought they'd get their money's worth.
8:28 "John Travolta and Queen Latifah are two Oscar nominated actors." Best joke of the night. Best Song is... Melissa Etheridge. The Dreamgirls nominees must've cancelled each other out.

8:30 This is rapidly becoming Al Gore's Oscars.
8:39 A Tribute to Michael Mann's train of thought. Good clips but in no particular order.
8:41 Kate Winslet cuts to the chase: Best Editor is Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese's longtime collaborator. A nice, very calm speech. Scorsese, in the audience, meanwhile, is verklempt.
8:45 Jodie Foster introduces This Year in Death.
8:52 Philip Seymour stumbles out to hand out Best Actress. And the winner is... Helen Mirren. No surprise.
8:56 People at the party are clapping at the end of her speech and they have no idea why.

9:01 Reece Witherspoon and her phallic chin introduce Best Actor nominees. Forrest Whitaker wins, duh.
9:06 Forrest Whitaker reveals his belief in reincarnation. Then sacrifices a chicken.
9:08 Big big applause for Marty Scorsese winning Best Director!
9:10 Marty is actually speaking slower than usual.
9:11 Big hugs from Jack Nicholson offstage. This puts The Departed on deck to win Best Picture.
9:14 Jack Nicholson: "And the Oscar goes to... The Departed. Since, I'm already onstage, I'll accept the award."
9:15 Producer gives a nice speech and remembers to thank the screenwriter.
9:16 In the words of Ellen Degeneres, 'Good night, folks.'

If anyone wants to stick around and discuss, I'm going to open up the comments now.

Other Oscar Livebloggers:
Printculture
Catwalk Queen
Edrants