Happy Oscar Sunday everybody!
Well, this is my attempt at live bloggin’… so this post will be updated from time to time. I’ve actually just turned on my TV but I’ve been on Twitter the last hour during the Red Carpet festivities. Not everyone dresses well, but I’m not gonna dwell on the negatives. Here are five I think looked absolutely stunning… Charlize Theron’s doesn’t really need a great dress to look like a goddess.
As for the Best Dressed Gent and Couple, how about oh-so-dapper Suraj Sharma of Life of Pi and Hollywood’s Golden Couple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner? They both look elegant but without the repulsive smugness of Brangelina.
Time listed here is in US Central Time.
7:30 pm – Seth MacFarlane arrives as host. He actually has a nice, deep voice [no I haven’t watched TED nor Family Guy for that matter] so I’ve never heard him in anything before.
Best Bits in the first 10 min:
MacFarlane: The “quest to make Tommy Lee Jones laugh” has succeeded already… [and Tommy Lee actually laughed!!]
Nice jab there about Ben Affleck being snubbed by the Oscar…
I know it’s not exactly family friendly but I’ve got to admit I laughed during the ‘I Saw Your Boobs’ skit, I’m sure Kate Winslet is wincing uncontrollably at the end of that song.
Not sure what’s with Capt. Kirk being the co-host in a very musical Oscar. But hey, I’m just glad Channing Tatum was NOT doing one of his Magic Mike routine!
Now… on to the Awards!
7:51 pm –Best Supporting Actors
Woo hoo!! Christoph Waltz won for Django Unchained! Really, doesn’t seem like anyone has a chance when he’s nominated… twice in a row already. TWO Oscars in the last five years and ten years ago he was in an Austrian soap opera, not bad Mr. Waltz! His acceptance speech was humble and sweet, too, LOVE him!
7:58 pm – Best Animated Short Film
What’s with Paul Rudd and Melissa McCarthy?? That was so awkward… Not surprised at all that Paperman won. So Disney’s crew got a box seats at the Oscars?? Well it’s televised on ABC after all.
8:00 pm – Best Animated Feature Film
Well-deserved win for BRAVE. Kudos to Brenda Chapman for becoming the first female winning director of animation!
8:05 pm – The Avengers assemble!
Well there are only five of them… where in the world is THOR?? Not impressed with the five Avengers gang though, they seem awkward and really Jeremy Renner, you suck at comedy!
Best Cinematography and Visual Effects
8:10 pm – WOW, Life of Pi won for both Best Cinematography and Best Visual Effects. I think both are well-deserved as the movie is stunning. But… I was kinda rooting for Roger Deakins to win this for Skyfall. Alas, he remains the Susan Lucci of the Oscars with 10 nominations total now.
Best Costume Design
8:18 pm – Anna Karenina won for Best Costume Design. Jacqueline Durran frequently worked with Joe Wright and her design for Atonement was gorgeous as well.
Best Makeup and Hairstyling
8:19 pm – Glad it didn’t go to Hitchcock which I don’t think deserved the nom, Anthony Hopkins makeup was actually distracting. Les Miserables won in this category! And yeah, whoever made Hugh Jackman look ugly deserved it!
8:21 pm – No Bond actors reunion but we’ve got Halle Berry, who’s one of the worst Bond girls, to introduce the Bond Tribute??!
Fortunately after the Bond movies montage…
Finally! Dame Shirley Bassey!!! NOW there’s a proper Bond TRIBUTE! #Goldfinger #Bond50 #Oscars2013
— FlixChatter (@FlixChatter) February 25, 2013
The 76-year old Dame definitely deserves a standing ovation, wow what a performance! Appropriately she wore gold when she sang her most popular Bond song Goldfinger!
Aside from Adele and Dame Bassey singing, it’s a very meh Bond tribute though… such a bummer for a Bond fan like me.
Best Live Action Short Film
8:32 pm – Jamie Foxx and the stunning Kerry Washington presenting the award and Curfew won. Never seen any of the films nominated so no comment on this one I’m afraid.
Best Documentary Subject
8:35 pm – Inocente won. Again, not familiar with this category, but congrats to Sean and Andrea Fine.
8:38 pm – Dapper Liam Neeson comes out to present the batch of Best Picture nominees. They played Schindler’s List theme… What, no Taken theme available tonight??
8:42 pm – Though snubbed, Ben Affleck is still a good sport by showing up to present the award for…
Best Documentary Feature
8:44 pm – … and the Oscar goes to: Searching for Sugarman. I REALLY want to see this!!
Heh, getting sick of that Jaws theme ushering the winners to hurry up with their speech. I wonder how Spielberg feels about his Jaws theme song being used in such an annoying way!
8:49 pm – Two lovely ladies Jennifer Garner and Jessica Chastain presenting the award for …
Best Foreign Language Film
8:50 pm – Amour wins. So basically no Best Picture trophy for Mr. Haneke. Takes the suspense away when the Academy nominate the same film in both categories!!
8:54 pm – Appropriately enough, John Travolta comes out to introduce the musical numbers… but why are we going back in time?? I mean Chicago? Dreamgirls?? [scratching head]
Still, Catherine Zeta Jones looked ah-mazing though in that All That Jazz number. Someone should check if Michael Douglas is hyperventilating in his seat!
Then Jennifer Hudson sang one of the themes from Dreamgirls. Yeah ok, that girl CAN sing!
9:02 pm – Les Miserables cast singing on stage singing One More Day… oh boy, holy goosebumps!!
9:09 pm – Capt Kirk er… Chris Pine and Zoe Saldana presenting … something, I spaced out a bit, sorry.
9:10 pm – Mark Wahlberg & that teddy bear from TED present Best Sound Mixing. I know some people are excited for this but I’m not one of them. The winner: Les Miserables.
9:14 pm – Best Sound Editing award [someone ought to tell me the main difference between these two categories]. The Oscar goes to: Zero Dark Thirty… and Skyfall. I didn’t know they could have a tie at the Academy Awards??
9:18 pm – That Sound of Music joke had me in stitches! Mr. Christopher Plummer seems amused, too. Oh how I used to have such a huge crush on Captain Von Trapp
Best Supporting Actress
9:22 pm – One of the first non-surprise of the night. The Oscar goes to: Anne Hathaway for Les Miserables. I haven’t even seen the film yet but I think she deserved it… I love how she genuinely thanked her husband in her speech, “Far and away the greatest moment in my life was when you walked into it.” He mouthed back ‘I love you’ when she said it on stage. Awwwwww…
9:32 pm – Lovely Sandra Bullock presenting the awards for …
Best Film Editing
… and the Oscar goes to: ARGO!! First Oscar win for William Goldenberg. With a last name like that, he’s destined for an Oscar, no? In any case, well-deserved award surely and I think ARGO was a great film largely due to his work.
9:34 pm – Time for Adele and that gorgeous Skyfall theme. This song better win, ok Academy!! I was still hoping Daniel Craig would’ve burst out of the backdrop or that all the Bond actors would come out from the disguise of being her backup singers!! Yeah, I’m hopeless 😀
9:45 pm – Nicole Kidman… what are you doing to your face, girl? You are beautiful before all that Botox!! She introduced the next batch of Best Picture nominees.
9:49 pm – Harry Potter and Bella Swan presenting… [yawn] Seriously who’s the moron who invites Kristen Stewart… ugh! The less said about her the better.
Best Production Design
… goes to Lincoln!
9:58 pm – Scruffy George Clooney introduced the emotional In Memoriam tribute. We lost so many great people this past year… Celeste Holm, Nora Ephron, Ernest Borgnine…
Now, I’m not too fond of Barbra Streisand‘s singing but her The Way We Were seems appropriate for this segment.
10:07 pm – A jab at Rex Reed! Ahah, good one Seth! I can’t stand that critic.
10:08 pm – It’s the year of reunion at the Oscars! The cast of Chicago reunited to present…
Best Musical Score
I love that Life of Pi theme but I’m rooting for Thomas Newman for Skyfall. And the Oscar goes to: Mychael Dana for Life of Pi! I guess I’m not too upset as that first theme played at the start of the film really moved me…
Now for this one however… I’d be soooo upset if Skyfall did not win!!
10:15 pm – Before I find out though, we’ve got Norah Jones singing the nominated-theme from TED. I think Seth himself could also sing that pretty well.
Finally…
Skyfall WON Best Original Song. Wahoo!!!
Ok so it doesn’t exactly made up for the disappointment of the meh Bond tribute, but still, I’m quite happy with the Skyfall win. Adele was so nervous on stage, it’s kind of endearing.
10:22 pm – Charlize Theron and Dustin Hoffman [or as Seth called it… most random Oscar-winning couple] presents the award for…
Best Adapted Screenplay
… goes to Chris Terrio for ARGO! Terrio mentioned how Ben Affleck won Best Screenplay Oscar in 1997 for Good Will Hunting, and now his film brought him his own screenwriting Oscar!
Best Original Screenplay
… Quentin Tarantino won his second Oscar for Django Unchained (he won his first screenplay Oscar for Pulp Fiction). I like QT’s speech and giving a moving appreciation to the actors for bringing his script to life.
10:33 pm – Hollywood legends, as Seth called them… Michael Douglas and Jane Fonda presenting the most up-in-the-air category
Best Director
… goes to Ang Lee for Life of Pi. I’m not extremely wowed by the film but I always like Ang Lee winning because he’s so humble and sweet. This is Mr. Lee’s second directing Oscar after Brokeback Mountain. Sense & Sensiblity is one of my all time favorite film… he could’ve easily won for directing that one as well.
10:40 pm – Jean Dujardin being his oh-so-adorable self presenting the award for…
Best Actress
… and the Oscar goes to: Jennifer Lawrence!! I predicted Jessica Chastain to win this thing but I’m not upset at all that Jennifer won. She seemed genuinely surprised and her speech is endearing, she even remembered a family member’s birthday.
I like her. She really is a force to be reckoned with in Silver Linings Playbook… and everything else I’ve seen her in.
10:45 pm – and now… to the least surprising category of the night.
Best Actor
Who else do you think would win in THIS category? Daniel Day Lewis of course. Even Meryl Streep didn’t bother opening the envelope!
Lewis’ speech is surprisingly hilarious. With Meryl’s red lipstick all over his face, he cracked jokes about playing Margaret Thatcher and that Meryl was Spielberg’s first choice for playing Lincoln. Ahah!
10:52 pm – Jack Nicholson being his kooky self. And now we’ve got America’s First Lady to introduce Best Picture?? Conspiracy theories, anyone?? Anyway, Michelle Obama, Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts must be shopping for their metallic gowns together.
10:57 pm – Finally it’s time for:
Best Picture
… goes to ARGO!!! Yes!! This is the third film that I rooted for three years in a row (2010 – The King’s Speech and 2011 – The Artist), and they’ve all ended up winning Best Picture!
I quite like Ben Affleck’s speech. He doesn’t even seem bitter about being snubbed for Best Director. But hey, so far it’s been quite a blessing in disguise as he’s won practically every other directing award… and now his film won Best Picture. This is a big year for Affleck. Man, what a comeback!!
…
Well, that’s my first Live Bloggin’ at the Oscars!
There’s not a lot of surprises this year in terms of winners, well apart from the tie in the Best Sound Editing category. I wonder how many times that happens.
I’m just gonna keep the highlights short to just three:
- Fave Musical Segment: Les Miserables (yes even with Russell Crowe singing, I thought it was great!)
- Fave Win: Tie between Skyfall for Best Song and ARGO for Best Picture
- Fave Speech: Daniel Day Lewis’ surprisingly hilarious speech. His win might not be surprising at all, but his speech certainly was a pleasant surprise. I tell you, he not only knows a thing or two about acting, the bloke sure knows how to give a speech!
…
Well, what did you think of the Oscars this year? What’s your favorite (or biggest gripes) of the night?
FLIXCHATTER FILM BLOG 
You must be loving this 50 year tribute to Bond!!
Not really. I mean they’ve got one of the worst Bond girls to present it, come on!! I do love Dame Shirley Bassey singing though.
She sang that wonderfully, nice to see her getting a standing ovation.
Indeed! One of the highlights of Oscars this year. Still bummed not seeing all the Bond actors on stage though 😦
Yeah that would have been a real treat.
Totally agree on the rubbish tribute. A few clips and one song? Not very impressive. Adele doing a great job though.
Yeah, both Dame Bassey and Adele are the highlights of the Bond “tribute.” Overall it’s very disappointing though.
Loved Affleck’s speech. The Bond tribute was such a disappointment. Oh, and about the sound Oscars, I actually just learned this a couple of days ago: sound mixing is for the sounds captured on set or on location and sound editing are the ones added in post-production.
Yeah that was a good speech but nobody topped DDL’s speech tho. Yep the Bond tribute is super lame!! Hey thanks for clarifying about the sound awards, makes sense to me now 😃
Hi, Ruth and company:
I opted for three episodes of Michal Mann’s ‘Crime Story’ from 1986. One of which had a young Gary Sinise as the director and guest star. I then visited Nikki Finke’s ‘Dateline Hollywood’ and followed her live snarking of the festivities. Which many, many agreed were very tacky and could have been far better.
Very pleased with ‘Brave”s winning Best Animated Picture.Though, I cannot understand why Michelle Obama had to show up for the Best Picture introduction.
Thank you Jack! That’s exactly what I thought, who needs Michelle Obama at the Oscars? Yes, her new bangs are adorable, but especially with the show running late she was the last person we needed to see or hear from.
Amen on the First Lady. I thought it was lame, but it only confirms my dread about this administration 😞
So you’d rather go to Finke rather than me Jack? I’m crushed 😉 Well i guess i’m not too good at bring snarky, i thought it was all right, i had some good laughs. Yeah glad Brave won, it was well-deserved.
Mea culpa, Ruth!
Hope all are coping well with their post Awards information hangovers.
I was not aware of your live blogging exercise until after the festivities were over and I needed someplace to opine and vent. Ms. Finke’s Tweets were nowhere near as numerous as last year. Though many, many of those who commented on her live blog thread share the same sentiments as we here.
Great stuff. I’m hoping to catch up with the ceremony properly this evening as it took place overnight here in the UK.
Thanks Dan. Hope you enjoy it. I had such a low expectations on Serh but i thought he was pretty good.
Nice live blog, it’s like I was there 😀
Glad to hear! Are u gonna watch it later on?
Nah, I already know the score haha 😀
Ahah, I hear ya Tim.
Sorry to hear that the Bond tribute was lame, I thought there were going to do something big for it considering it’s the BIGGEST and most successful movie franchise in history of the cinemas. But then again it’s the Oscars, so I’m not surprised by it.
Nice work on the live updating, now I know who won and didn’t have to sit through the most boring show ever, lol.
Yeah it’s do disappointing! I thought they’d hv something more festive than just showing the montage from the Bond bluray set!! Plus having one of the WORST Bond girls to introduce it, ugh!
Streisand sung that song not only because it was appropriate, but because Marvin Hamlisch, the famed composer that wrote it, passed away this year. I’m sure you’re aware, but the post didnt say. I thought that was a great call, and a classy moment,.
All in all, not a lot of surprises, which is probably a good thing, but it left all the entertaining up to the hosts and the presenters and they only managed an… ok job.
Oh boy I totally missed that Marvin Hamlisch had written that song, so yeah it was more than appropriate. I actually teared up a bit during Barb’s singing. Overall i thought it was decent n Seth was better than i thought (again my expectation was very low), but it felt too much like the Tony’s to me, they should focus of FILM not musicals!!
I haven’t seen this many screw ups during ceremony before….it’s obvious their hyped Bond Tribute collapsed and they put this whole thing together in a matter of days maybe, the luck of reactions shots tells me most of the A listers hated MacFarlane as I did and that musical tribute…what a waste of time. Well, at least Waltz won.
“…their hyped Bond Tribute collapse” Yep, it collapsed BIG time! Such a disaster, I mean I understand it might be tough to get all the Bond actors together but THIS was what they came up with?? At least Adele’s performance was ace and I’m glad Skyfall won Best Song. As for Seth, well I’m not exactly a fan but I had such a low expectations of him I ended up not being too disappointed. All the musical stuff makes this ceremony looks like the Tony’s!
Nice post Ruth. If I had seen this last night I may have stayed up and read it instead. I went to bed as soon as De Niro didnt win. Glad Jessica Lawrence won, having literally just watched and reviewed Silver Linings, I was behind on that party but wow, what a film and performance! 🙂
Sorry to hear DeNiro didn’t win Tyson, but hey he’s got a few Oscars already, no? I do think his performance was well-deserving of a nom. Yeah, I was happy Jennifer won too. She is a phenomenal actress.
It was nice just to see him recognised again 🙂
And he might get one again. He just needs to stay away from movies like Rocky & Bullwinkle! 😀
I had friends over for a Oscar party, which made the ceremony much more fun 😉
As for the Avengers thing, i’m surprised they didn’t get Scarlett. I mean considering she is the only female avenger i figured they would have tired to include her. I learned sound guys love having wacky hair, and every actress is now sporting a pixie cut.
I really enjoyed Adeles performance, and i kind of fanboyed when Kidman came on…although that might have been because me and my friends were watching the Paperboy before the ceremony. Also Joaquin Phoenix needs to get over himself. When the camera panned to him when they said his name it looked like his dog just died or something. I’m over him angsting about getting nominated.
Oooh, an Oscar party! How fun! Yeah, both the Bond and Avengers tributes were both lame aren’t they? No Thor nor Black Widow, what’s with that?
Glad to hear you enjoyed Adele. I was happy it won Best Song. I didn’t notice Joaquin but that’s perhaps a good thing! I only saw he was rolling his eyes or something, heck why did he even come since he said he thought award season was stupid.
And what makes it more annoying to me is that people attacked Kristen for not being appreciative enough..but then Phoinex gives the Oscars a eyeroll and no one says anything
Kristen not appreciative enough?? For what? I didn’t care for her as she has zero charisma as a presenter, well as an actress too for that matter.
Great job, Ruth! Thrilled about Argo and Skyfall winning too, and I liked most of the winners. Oh, and I enjoyed the Les Miserables musical number too! 🙂
Thanks Josh! Glad to hear we’re happy about the same things. I know people are gonna start hatin’ on ARGO ’cause it won but for me it’s actually the third time in a row I’m actually happy with the Best Picture winner!
You should watch Searching for Sugar Man, Ruth! It’s one of my favorite films of last year 🙂 and by the way, I might be wrong but I believe that Jennifer Lawrence was saying Happy Birthday to Emanuelle Riva who was having her 86th birthday that night. She’s 1 year older than the Oscar itself haha
I sure will Fariz! WOW, I didn’t know Riva had a birthday that night. Amazing that she was older than the Oscars, ahah. Seth actually said in his monologue that Riva was 9 when the whole thing started, well he’s not too far off!
Wow doing Live Blogging, that’s great, Ruth! I didn’t watch it. No cable around, even a sneak peek in my work place. I’ve been reading live tweets all along. I couldn’t help but laugh reading everyone’s response about K-Stew. Was rooting for Life of Pi, such a shame about the huge protes for Ang Lee.
Yeah it’s my first time doing it. I did it w/ the Globes a few years back but I didn’t even watch it this year, so I figure I’d do it for the Oscars. Well K-Stew is just a big bunch of nerves, not sure who’s the bozo who invited her to present! What’s the protest over Ang Lee? I thought he deserved the win for Best Director, though I was rooting for ARGO all the way for Best Picture.
Wow! What a spectacular live blog. Ok I checked this several times on my PC but it never updated. I just checked it on my mobile phone and now I can see it all. Awesome job!
Thanks Keith. It’s quite exhausting though, I don’t think I’ll be doing it again next year. I’d rather just focus on the highlights instead. I had a few laughs though, overall it was ok apart from the disappointing ‘tributes!’
It was a really well done live blog. If I may ask how did you do it? Did you just update your original post as the Oscars went along?
Yeah, I just started with the Red Carpet stuff and then I updated my post every 5-10 min or so. I only got bathroom and water breaks during commercial and long segments like In Memoriam, ahah. The thing is, it’s hard to insert commentaries like I did on the recap last year as you had to keep up with the event itself. So my commentary is pretty slight this year.
Hey Ruth, cool to see you live blogging! I was at an Oscar party so I missed out on the updates (including Twitter, which seemed to be blowing up). I was wondering what you thought of the Bond tribute — pretty underwhelming overall, eh? Nice to see Bassey rock the Goldfinger theme though. She’s still got it.
Hey Ruth! Thank you for the live blogging post of the Oscars! Two biggest disappointments for me would have to be Ben being snubbed in the best director category, and the tribute to Bond. Bassey’s performance was definitely memorable, but the montage could’ve been so much better! Lets see who makes it to the Oscar’s next year!
Thanks Raul, glad you enjoyed it. Yeah, the montage was sooo lame, I can’t believe the Academy dropped the ball after all the hype surrounding the Bond tribute 😦
Yeah, I’m sure the awards talk would begin in no time, but right now I’m kind of done with that. Not interested in all that until towards the end of the year 🙂
I expected a whole lot more for the 50yr tribute to Bond. Don’t get me wrong, Dame Shirley Bassey was AWESOME! but that vid montage…they prob put that together the night before, and Adele’s song was better in the movie than it was live (sorry, but it was).
Not a single Bond actor on stage at all.
I liked the ceremony though overall. and goosebumps for me too with the Les Mis part!
Yeah, I think we’ve all agreed that the Bond *tribute* was lackluster at best. If it weren’t for Dame Bassey making it classy, it would’ve been a total bust. I agree Adele’s song was not as good live, but still it’s a GREAT song and the win was well-deserved! I was worried for a minute that Life of Pi would win that too!
I actually enjoyed the ceremony overall too, that Les Miz one was great. I almost teared but didn’t, I almost always cry when I heard that song ‘I Dream a Dream’!!
Very impressed at your coverage of the Oscars live. You did a great job. I mostly limited myself to tweeting as it happened.
Daniel-Day Lewis did a fine job with his speech, especially considering how lost for words he had been in some of the previous awards shows.
Congrats on the coverage Ruth! Well you know my opining on the Oscars. I was really prepared not to watch the ceremony but then I remembered that Downton Abbey had finished last week. Besides I wanted to see Adele perform.
Wowsers some of their faces in the audience at the ‘saw your boobs’ song were priceless!