Chris Rock tackles the controversy head on
So, the Oscars came and went last night, and for once there were at least a few big upsets in the actual categories, which made me do pretty horrible on my predictions, but whatever. Last year was my best ever, so it was bound to be followed by my worst.
SURPRISES
Mark Rylance beat out Stallone for Best Supporting Actor. That was a huge bummer. The snobby Oscars went for the elitist choice, although from the beginning it had originally been hard to believe Sylvester Stallone would be an Oscar winner, but I was fooled by all those standing ovations, I guess. Too bad.
That Sam Smith Bond song actually won, which was probably the worst win of the night, by far. It was especially embarrassing after that Lady Gaga number brought the house down and was so moving with the assault survivors onstage with her. Awkward silence followed that win in the press room, apparently.
Spotlight wins Best Picture and Best Screenplay only. No movie has done that since 1952, and shows you how close the race must have been. This is also the result of the preferential ballot kicking in, although it didn't end up going to the PGA's choice. For the first time ever in a split year, SAG was the one that decided. Interesting. I personally think Best Picture ought to win a few more things to go along with it, but I guess no one really votes that way anymore.
Mark Rylance beats out Stallone
The show itself was okay. Chris Rock came out and gave a searing monologue that addressed the controversy head on, but the later comedy bits fell flat, especially the Girl Scout thing. I thought it was kind of noteworthy that he didn't even pretend that this whole thing was about "people of color," and instead just made it exclusively about the fact that black actors weren't nominated. It should be about including all minorities, but this is the way things tend to get talked about, which is kind of unfortunate, in my opinion.
Cool that Mad Max got six wins last night- tying the original Star Wars as the movie to get the most wins without getting Picture or Director. George Miller should have won too. And where did that visual effects win for Ex Machina come from??? It broke that long record for a non-BP nominee winning the category, but it wasn't Star Wars that did it. That was totally unexpected as well, since the movie won zero precursors for that and was made on a tiny budget.
That's about all I got this year. I wasn't too invested in the outcome, since my favorite movies were never in the running for anything. Hopefully next year the Academy can improve on the diversity issues, so we don't have a third straight year of outrage, and I still maintain my issues with some of these awards even being on the telecast- the shorts are impossible to predict and the sound ones really should be combined into simply one "Best Sound" category. Agree? And that's a wrap for me on Oscars 2016.
Inarritu wins again
