BlueChair wrote:But how many of the acting nominees could you really classify as "stars"? Certainly Brad, Angelina, Meryl, Sean, etc. But what about Richard Jenkins, Frank Langella, Viola Davis, Taraji P. Henson, Melissa Leo, etc.... all extremely talented actors (not stars) who probably didn't stand a chance in the first place, but deserved their moment. It was long, sure, but the Oscars are always long.
Perhaps, but those are the little speeches I was least taken with. Adrien Brody's bit on Richard Jenkins was especially poor, which surprised me - basically "You've been in a lot of films."
It's nice to see them try to do something different with the Oscars, but here are some more reasonable suggestions:
-Can the short film categories, or at least present them at a separate ceremony. Regrettably, few, if any, people have seen these films. Or if you are going to include them, add some sort of showcase evening on ABC when people can view them. You might also consider doing this for minor categories like sound editing and visual effects. Yes, I know these people are important and worthy of their recognition. But does anyone outside of the industry and their immediate families care?
-Cut the musical medley number. After finding out that Baz Luhrmann was responsible for that monstrosity on Sunday I never want to see any of his films.
-No song performances. Its inevitably bad. Peter Gabriel has it right - if you can't do justice to the songs then why bother? Besides, it's not the Grammys. You're supposed to be celebrating film.
-Shorter awards intros (get rid of the 5 previous winners nonsense), but with an actual clip from the each performance/film - something lasting longer than 10 seconds. I got no sense on Sunday of what made any of these performances/films special, because they never showed me. Of course, I had seen a few of them already, but for others I was totally in the dark. What made Sean Penn so great in
Milk? I have no idea. During the entirety of the Oscar ceremony, were we shown a film clip any longer than 10 seconds? If so, I can't remember it. I don't think the people who put the show together have any real appreciation for cinema.