The 2015 Academy Awards have come and gone.
This year saw one of the most concise and well produced ceremonies in recent memory. Coming in at just over three and a half hours, it was no easy haul but, compared to years where the show pushed four hours or longer, this year felt downright breezy. Gone were the lame song and dance numbers that plagued many of the more recent ceremonies (well, except for a pointless Lady Gaga Sound of Music tribute, but more on that in a bit) and overlong speeches. The academy seems to have taken the criticisms levied against it over the last decade to heart and produced a show that was both entertaining and quick moving.
There’s not enough praise in the world that can be heaped upon this year’s host, Neil Patrick Harris. After earning his award show host wings with the Tony’s, Harris brought a level of class and humor that hasn’t been seen since the 90’s. Oh, sure, Ellen DeGeneres was fun last year, but she lacked a certain panache, don’t you think? And we won’t even get into the James Franco/Anne Hathaway debacle of 2011.
Harris had an old school charm about him and he recognized the role of the host was to entertain without stealing the show. He proved his capability right off the bat. His opening joke about celebrating the “best and whitest” of the industry was a clever knock against the academy for the complete and utter whitewashing of this year’s nominations. His monologue then led into a fantastic opening number in which he celebrated the power of film while being appropriately irreverent of the whole process. Indeed, this Hollywood circle jerk is one of the most ridiculous aspects of American culture, even if it is in honor of one of the finest artistic mediums of the modern day. Harris perfectly skewered and honored the ceremony with his opening song which rivaled, surpassed even, the best of Billy Crystal’s numbers of years gone by.
If Neil Patrick Harris was the big winner of the evening (and, outside of the nominees, he totally was) then Sean Penn was the biggest loser for his ill-advised green card joke at Alejandro G. Inarritu’s expense during the presentation of Best Picture. Penn, you’ve proven yourself time and time again of being a humorless bastard; whether it was missing the joke of Team America or angrily mocking Chris Rock for making a Jude Law joke during the 2005 Academy Awards, it’s become perfectly clear that you have absolutely no idea how humor works. I’m sure the joke sounded funny in your head, but to the rest of us it came off as insensitive and condescending.
Just the opposite, however, was John Travolta, who played well off of the “Adele Dazeem” fiasco of last year as he presented the award for best song with Idina Menzel. “Please welcome to the stage my very dear friend Glom Gazingo,” Menzel said, welcoming Travolta to the stage. Travolta has been nothing but apologetic since his faux pas last year, and this moment proved to be one of the funniest of this year’s ceremonies.
As to the nominees? Birdman was this year’s big winner, taking home four of its nine nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Cinematography, and Best Screenplay. None of this was any shock. Birdman was a remarkable cinematic achievement and easily one of the best movies of the last decade.
Upset of the evening goes to Eddie Redmayne for his performance in The Theory of Everything. Redmayne was, no doubt, fantastic in this film about the life and times of physicist Stephen Hawking but, honestly, Michael Keaton gave the performance of a lifetime in Birdman. It’s never easy to postulate about what compels academy members to vote the way they do, but Keaton wasn’t just robbed, he was mugged at gunpoint and left for dead in the alleyway. Good for you though, Eddie. Good for you.
Best Actress rightfully went to Julianne Moore for her powerful performance in Still Alice, about a woman suffering from Alzheimer’s. Moore is truly one of the finest actresses of our generation. This was Moore’s fifth nomination and first win and, despite the hefty competition against her, I can think of no one more deserving of the award than her.
Speaking of actresses, Patricia Arquette pulled out a win for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the Richard Linklater family drama Boyhood. Arquette is one for one on Oscar Nominations and she really showed her chops in this role. While I’m sure a lot of people were probably annoyed by her grandstanding at the podium, I was happy to see her use her time to promote awareness of feminism during her speech, reminding the world that women in this country still make about 75% of what men do for performing the same job. While I was admittedly upset that Emma Stone didn’t win for her performance as Keaton’s daughter in Birdman, Arquette was too good to be upset about.
The best speech of the night, however, has to go to JK Simmons. Winning for his shocking and frightening performance in Whiplash, Simmons reminded us all of the importance of family and of mothers especially as he spoke of his wife and children. I’m not sure there was a dry eye in America when he told everyone to call their mothers. Not text. Not email. But call. You’ll hear from me tomorrow, mama, I promise.
Graham Moore took home the Best Adapted Screenplay award for The Imitation Game, the Benedict Cumberbatch starring biopic about computer godfather Alan Turing. Honestly, this award wasn’t at all shocking or impressive. The Imitation Game was a fine movie, but it was clear cut Oscar bait and it did its job well enough. Moore did a great job adapting the Turing biography Alan Turing: The Enigma but it didn’t really have that much by way of competition did it? I suppose PT Anderson was sort of robbed for Inherent Vice but I imagine he’s probably used to that by now. Way to play it safe, guys. Good job.
As always, the Best Song category was full of boring music. Except, of course, from the only real choice for the winner “Glory” by John Legend and Common. This track was a moving and powerful homage to the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and was absolutely the only good song to be nominated. (I don’t even want to hear about “Everything Is Awesome” from The Lego Movie. In fact, I would be content if we never spoke of The Lego Movie in any context ever again.) Legend and Common are two of the best musicians working in hip-hop and R&B today and any other nominee winning would have been tragic and unjust.
What really blew my mind though was the decision to include Lady Gaga’s Sound of Music medley before the Best Song award was given. This shouldn’t be seen as knock against her performance by any means. Lady Gaga has done nothing but prove herself to be a remarkable vocalist and this only solidified that fact. However, the performance itself was a bit pointless and boring. Sure, Julie Andrews presented the award, but considering the fact that the main criticism of this ceremony every year is the length, I’m baffled as to why this was included. It slowed things down and absolutely served no purpose. It was one of the most masturbatory Oscar bits I’ve ever seen and the whole show would have been better without it. (Still, I’m now convinced Lady Gaga should take her talents to Broadway, so I guess it wasn’t a total bust.)
As to Best Score? Honestly, the academy’s snubbing of Birdman’s jazz-drum soundtrack based on an outdated rule totally nullified the credibility of this category and possibly even the academy itself. The Birdman score was more than just another score, it was a character unto itself, totally and completely important to the film at all levels. Alexandre Desplat, your work on The Grand Budapest Hotel was, indeed, remarkable but I hope you know that the only reason you won was thanks to the academy’s misguided blacklisting of Antonio Sanchez’s remarkable work. Enjoy your statue.
All things considered, this was one of the best Oscar shows in recent memory. Harris proved to be an incredible host full of charm and humor and everything we want out of an Academy Awards emcee. Given the stumbles and falls the show has had over the last decade, it would absolutely behoove the academy to keep Harris in mind for future ceremonies. I wouldn’t be surprised if this Tony winner wins an Emmy for his Oscar performance. In fact, it would be a shame if he didn’t.
A full list of winners and nominees can be found here.
One Response
This reads like a poorly written college project. Your review is bad and you should feel bad. See, memes are fun.