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Thing is, I don't really care whether the Oscar show is good or not. I've never had a problem with the traditional format. It's fine. What makes the shows are the nominated movies and talent -- and the vested interest viewers have in seeing who might win.

But nothing about the show worked last night. We (mostly) knew the winners beforehand. While HJ proved his talent in the numbers he appeared in, he really wasn't much of a host -- he appeared once an hour to do a routine. There was no emcee to glue the show together (it's a good thing when the host makes jokes as the show goes on that refer to things we've just seen). Plus, the musical numbers were terrible -- it was Rob Lowe/Snow White over and over. The show was more about celebrating Hollywood's talent than it was about celebrating THE MOVIES. I was literally groaning out loud for much of the show.

Last word on the subject.

David, I agree with almost everything you say here. My only disagreement, a minor one: I actually enjoyed the song-and-dance tribute to musicals. Really. And I thought Beyonce was pretty darn terrific.

Simone Signoret died in 1985.

It was a great, fantastic awards show, I had fun watching it. I loved the new format this year, much better than previous Oscar ceremonies. Hugh Jackman delivered a GREAT show and he's also nice to look at.

I'm so tired of people bashing the Oscars? Don't liek it? Fine. Don't watch it, shut up and let me enjoy the show.

Sorry... meant Jeanne Moreau... though she never won an Oscar... so a correction is coming...

Deaf: "I'm so tired of people bashing the Oscars. Don't like it? Fine. Don't watch it, shut up and let me enjoy the show."

My sentiments exactly.

BTW: Is "Brown Trash" kinda-sorta equivalent to "White Trash"?

I was not a fan of last night's show, but really that's neither here nor there. No one asked me my opinion before and don't expect them to next year either.

That said, I found In Memoriam to be hugely disrespectful. I was difficult to read the names of the people being honored. The zooming of the camera was distracting. I see no reason to change what worked very well before.

That you liked it, David, surprises me.

I don't disagree that the swooping camera was a problem, not just in that section, but all evening.

The director is a holdover... and not the right guy for a more sophisticated production.

With due respect, Mutiny... I think you are a very talented guy... and your aesthetic and The Oscars match up about as well as The Holocaust and Italian physical comedy.

Life is Beautiful seemed to do all right...

The problem with the Oscars, in general, isn't the form of the show itself.

The problem is the dynamics of the Oscars, as they now exist: The studios aren't interested in making Oscar movies anymore, so most of the nominated movies are smaller and therefore don't have much public interest, and on top of that, the avalanche of critics groups and websites and precursor awards largely determines who's going to win ahead of time, taking all of the excitement out of the evening.

As I said, what makes the Oscars great isn't the production -- it's the emotional investment of the audience in who's nominated and who's going to win.

What's the point of "last word on the subject" when, in fact, there are going to be hundreds more?

Mutiny: "As I said, what makes the Oscars great isn't the production -- it's the emotional investment of the audience in who's nominated and who's going to win."

But if emtoional impact is so important, wouldn't that make an even stronger case for using the winners-presenting-nominees format? Seriously: Wouldn't most viewers prefer star-powered human interaction over clips?

Having a singer in front of the screen during the In Memorium is not a director's problem. It's a bad idea. That's why the applause was so scattershot. Even the audience couldn't connect. This is the result of too much bad reality music tv.

Yeah, but Joe, to me that was like running over a puppy. It's blatant heart-stringing. You know?

The actors are there to win awards for specific performances. But we never actually saw those performances. Just treacly testimonials. It's fine if you have the other actors introducing the nominees -- but keep it brief and show the work that's actually being rewarded.

My feelings are summed up like this: The Oscars are about the awards themselves, not the production of the show. If the awards and contests are interesting, then the show will be interesting. That's really it.

Mutiny: We never see the performances. All we see is a few seconds, out of context. Maybe that's why I prefer the new format.

I came very close to loving the show last night, partly because the winners *were* so easily anticipated that it became more about everything else for me. I loved the presentation with 5 past winners, I loved the behind-the-scenes look, I even liked Hugh Jackman. I look forward to the Oscar show each year because I am a fan of film and a fan of actors/directors, etc. who are also fans of film. Having worked in the industry for the last 18 years (after growing up wanting nothing else for a career) I can honestly say I am all too often disappointed by people taking for granted how lucky they are to be employed in this industry.

When I see genuine joy at winning an Oscar, as we did from Cruz, it reminds me of how lucky I am personally to be a part of the community, doing something I love. The fact that I will never set foot on that stage doesn't matter. I'm a part of it, and watching these types of shows reminds me (and others, I hope) that even though it's not brain surgery, it *is* important work we all do.

Having said all that gobbilty-gook, I wish that Stiller would have taken a poke at Bale as well by tweaking a light while he was off poking at Phoenix. I wish the Memorial segment had been more TV friendly, since viewers weren't able to really enjoy the images being presented. Beyonce should never, ever be on my TV again, especially not in an over-reaching musical number (weakest part of the broadcast). I thought Will Smith did an excellent job moving through the categories he presented.

I hope they keep the basics of the format and work on the direction for next year.

Then maybe the answer is to show more of the filmmaking process. Show an EPK-style montage for each nominee -- complete with movie clips, behind-the-scenes footage, soundbites from other people working on the picture, etc.

They could make really nice short-form videos that really display the work that's being rewarded.

Mutiny: Sorry, but that will never happen. Not even if you limit it to just the 20 acting nominees and five director nominees. If you do it right, it will take up too much time. If you do it wrong, you stink up the joint.

Yeah... Dunno.

To me, having past Oscar winners giving current nominees testimonials in front of a giant live audience is like Cindy Crawford telling Bar Rafaeli she's beautiful. You know? It's like underlining the obvious.

Couldn't Mirren have spoken about Streep's performance? Not that I had much of a problem with Sophia...

Joanne Woodward's still around, too. and under the circumstances, her appearance in any context would've been a magic moment (assuming she were up for it).

Well, to me, reinforces a sense of community and continuity. To me, it's sort of like watching Jack Nicholson acting opposite Boris Karloff in The Raven (or, if you prefer, opposite John Huston in Chinatown), and then turning around and watching Nicholson opposite Tom Cruise in A Few Good Men -- and knowing that, sooner or later, we're going to watch Cruise pass the baton on to someone else. My teacher learned from his teacher, who learned from his teacher, who learned from his teacher, and on and on, back to the mouth of the Prophet. Or something like that.

Yeah, but I think things like that are better left for private moments. When you do it in front of a billion people it's narcissistic. That's my opinion anyway.

The Oscars are like the Super Bowl. Viewers don't really care about the graphics or camera angles. If you have two teams playing a great game, then you have a great Super Bowl. Likewise, if you have great Oscar category contests, then you'll have an involving show.

The five-former-winners-giving-speeches format was a disaster from a mass audience perspective, for one simple reason: Most people do not worship actors. While industry insiders reacted to the appearance of the five former winners with the intended hero worship...

"Oh my God! Goldie Hawn, Whoopi Goldberg, and Anjelica Huston are on the same stage at the same time!!!!"

"Oh my God! Cuba Gooding Jr is telling us the secrets to great acting!!!"

...most middle Americans watching TV simply see an extra twenty speeches in an already speech-filled show.

Clips are much better. They put some substance behind the award. The Academy claims to know how to separate great actors from good ones, and they get to back it up by showing a small sample of what they mean. In the best cases, it makes the argument perfectly. It would have been tough for anyone to watch Javier Bardem's "Friendo" scene in last year's show and then deny his performance was great.

And regardless of your reaction to the format, I really don't see your argument, Dave, that they can keep it up for future shows. There simply aren't that many living Oscar winners. And many of them will have too much dignity to want to participate. Even by the end of this year's show, we were already trying to predict which former winners would be desperate enough to agree to it. My wife before the Best Actor presentation: "You know Adrien Brody's going to be one of them." Can you imagine in two or three years when they have to scrape even further toward the bottom of the barrel than Brody?

Mutiny is right, and these TEAMS were not exciting. Turning everything into a ridiculous freakin musical does not make it the FIRST OSCAR SHOW FOR THE MODERN ERA either. No David; that would be the 2000 ceremony. The Oscars have yet to catch up to the MODERNEST of that event.

I also hate to break it to you, but musicals are not hip. I love a good musical, but they are not MIA. They are not freakin Deerhoof. They are antiquated, and do not resonated with a lot of people today. Turning the show into a musical appealed to your demographic. It's a shame though, that your demo is not the demo the advertisers want.

No reactions to the Bennett Miller piece?

I have no idea who he is, but it was fun to try to spot everyone (Buck Henry _and_ Brett Ratner? That's just inspired).

Two questions: is that Tom Savini between :27 and :40? AWESOME.

And when did Graydon Carter's head get so... er... round?

Okay, three: "Children need Africans." I misheard that, right?

I sincerely doubt Beyonce was singing live at any point during her appearance on the telecast. Her voice sounded processed and perfect. Jackman's sounded breathy but sturdy. Given all the movement they were doing, Beyonce had no wobble whatsoever. I also thought A.R. Rahman was pre-recorded during the start of "O Saya." But when he hit a few notes that sounded like bleating geese, it was clear he was back live.

"It's a shame though, that your demo is not the demo the advertisers want."

Welcome to your readership, David. At least, your readership until they find somebody younger to read. Good luck.

The Luhrmann number made my head hurt. Maybe it's because I'm a little bit ADHD. But for the love of God, stay on something for more than 10 seconds! The best music moment by far was the In Memorium segment. Sometimes, we need reminding how much Queen Latifah can belt out a jazz standard. Too bad they couldn't just take the damn monitor graphic and be happy with that. I didn't like the actors talking about the nominees, but it's mostly a preference thing. I love when they show the "craft" of everything. I like to see editing choices for Best Editing, portions of the screenplay for screenwriting, and pieces of acting for acting. I know it's "out of context," but so's everything else that shows a small bit of the craft, but I like seeing what's being awarded and it's great if it's done right. I could see the actors thing working, but the emotion wasn't there for me and it only seemed DeNiro rose above to the occasion.

Everything else was okay. The opening number was fine, Hugh did his best with the material he was given, and it had moments. My two issues for the show as a whole were that there was a long dead zone in the middle and the people who were supposed to be entertaining and funny weren't and were upstaged by the people who weren't supposed to be. Janusz Kaminski STOLE the Apatow segment while Jack Black swung and missed almost every time. Maybe a good start, but one of the best? Eh.

I wrote this elsewhere and it's basically what David is saying:

"This is my theory about the people bitching about the ceremony.

They don't actually want a ceremony. Well, they do, but only so they can talk about them. They don't actually care about them and no matter what they do some people will just not be happy.

First people don't want a comedian and then they do. First they think the presentation of categories is stale and they don't show enough of the clip and then they think they tinkered with it too much. They don't want musical numbers - omg embarrassing and lame - but if there weren't any they'd complain that it was just too boring. They don't like montages but get rid of them and they'd complain because there's nothing to break up the awards all of which are boring and monotonous because "nobody cares about the sound editing".

etc.

Basically they want to get rid of everything except the major awards and then if they did that they'd say "i wanted something different!" aaaagh! People are so frustrating."

And I stand by that. And while I agree with Mutiny is general, it's hardly the Academy's fault that so many award shows have popped up and ruined all the fun. Although I'm sure even 30 years ago it would've been clear that Slumdog was going to win even, as it once was was, only the high tier award shows around.

I agree with (almost) everything Dave said. I don't agree about In Memoriam, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that maybe it was better in the actual theatre. In regards to what Christian said, I actually wish they didn't applause until the end. It's always so awkward as the further into the piece it gets the less clapping their is and that makes it even sadder.

I did really like the actors presentation bit. I love the clips, but it's not like they "make people want to see the movie". Generally they choose bad clips anyway. And it really did feel communal. The Oscars are almost mythical in their stature so by all accounts they really should be different and bigger. Having the likes of Sophia Loren and Nicole Kidman onstage is bigger than getting whoever has a movie coming out soon (although, delightfully, Loren and Kidman do have a movie out in November together). And just as Dave and Joe said, it'll be great to see what combos they can come up with in the future (if they keep it). I was actually already thinking about next year's categories. Kate standing up there with... Meryl Streep? Jodie Foster? Susan Sarandon? Emma Thompson? Kathy Bates? Jessica Lange? Charlize Theron? Cher? Sally Field? Faye Dunaway? Jane Fonda? Diane Keaton? Liza Minnelli? Glenda Jackson? I really could go on and on. All they really need to do is figure better pairings. Anthony Hopkins would've been great Frank Langella, but instead they chose Michael Douglas who then basically said that Hopkins' Nixon performance was nothing compared to Langella's. Strange.

IO, MIA wouldn't have performed even if they had the entire song length as she just gave birth last week and probably didn't too much feel like being on stage.

so sorry this was so long!

Oh, and also: Stop getting Spielberg to announce either Best Picture of Best Director. What about Oliver Stone or James Cameron or Clint Eastwood or William Freidkin. There are so many possibilities.

And, again, that's why I liked the actors presentation. It was truly great to see all those people on stage together. Much rather than than another montage of best actress winners or best director winners or... you get the picture.

ack SORRY! That just reminded me of when they had Spielberg/Coppola/Lucas presenting to Scorsese a couple of years back. Wasn't that great (except for Lucas)? That's the sorta stuff you don't get at other award shows!

Kamel: Seriously, how are things for you and yours Down Under now after the fire? Hope all is well for you, mate.

K: Lucas directed a movie that changed the world like the other two guys. So he has a right to be up there as much as his two friends. You hater ;)

I also would have no problem with the "WE SAY YOUR NAME" presentation of the acting awards. If it were not so poorly executed.

The entire show was poorly executed. If it were not the freakin direction. It was the PRESENTING THE NOMINEES. Before they presented the NOMINEES bit of business that needed some work. The presenters either seemed bored, or they involved this era's most glamourous actress in a weird bit of business mocking a great actour. So, yeah, it needs some work.

It was not the end of the world, but it was not the bee's knees either.

K-STEW FUCKING RULES.

BOW DOWN.

I think some of the presenters were just so confused about having to read so much off the teleprompter. Who was mocking who? And yeah, I don't think people are denying it needs fine tuning, but you can't expect things to be perfect first go around.

Lex, is it classed as bowing if it's actually more of a headbutt and in stead of feeling regal you end up rolling around in pain?

Oh, by the way, what movie trailers were aired? Since there was such a big thing made about it and all. We got Wolverine, that was it.

The biggest problem with the In Memoriam segment is that they apparently couldn't be bothered to find an actual image of Kon Ichikawa and showed a completely different person instead. Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy.

"The Boo Birds are out on the Oscar show last night.

And really… they couldn’t be more wrong....it’s the Oscars, stupid."

That's a disappointingly condescending argument.

The only thing you said that I agree with was that it was poorly directed. It really was.

I have honestly enjoyed pretty much every oscar show that I've seen (maybe 20 or so?) to this one, including David Letterman's show. For the record, I am one of those who prefer having a comedian to musical numbers, but that really wasn't the deciding factor here. It was pretty much everything else. Especially the format changes. I thought the fake fawning of past winners over the nominees was cringe-inducing.

I think it's only the 2nd oscar show I've ever given up on and just watched something else. I've seen bits and pieces of what I missed, and I'm glad I gave up. I can appreciate that you liked it, but I didn't. For me it was a terrible show.

'I thought the fake fawning of past winners over the nominees was cringe-inducing'

again, i heard that. this would seem to be the biggest bone of contention re: this year's ceremony.

'Plenty of people on the blog have been complaining about the show on the basis of who won and who was or was not nominated. Fine… not the issue for me.'

i've been ruminating over this year's show, and i wonder, how can this not be an issue, dp? the nominees have a huge impact on the ceremony, not only in regards to giving the viewing audience something to root for, but in so far as how the nominees are inextricable threads in the tapestry of the ceremony, impacting tone and design, the emotional impact of the speeches, etc. weirdly, this year's nominees probably had the least impact on any ceremony i can remember, as we didn't see a great deal of them, which isn't a a good thing, or a positive direction for future shows, imho.

harking back to that bonza 2000 oscar telecast that just worked, it was a tasty cocktail of terrific hosting, a wide range of nominated films in all categories in terms of tone and innovation (matrix year), great nominated perfs, good songs, good presenters, some genuine surprises and upsets, some touching speeches (caine springs to mind), good energy, it had it all. this year's was perfectly fine, but i didn't really feel it, and a lot of people i've talked to feel the same way. 'yeah, it was ok, you know...', that's about it.

wow, that's gotta be a record for the unintentional repeated use of the word 'impact' in one paragraph

"...instead they chose Michael Douglas who then basically said that Hopkins' Nixon performance was nothing compared to Langella's."

Douglas put down Hopkins? What did he say, exactly?

last paragraph, frankb (i came across this article earlier while sampling some international reaction to the show, there's probably something far more word-for-word out there but you can get the gist of douglas's remark from this):

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090224.AOSCAR24/TPStory/TPEntertainment/Television/

Mucho obligato, Ms. Roboto!

no problemo, frankbootherino

But Leah, so many people's issues are that they're "predictable" (the winners, I mean) but... the Academy can't do anything about that. Maybe we should complain about all the ridiculous monotonous and pointless critics groups and awards bodies that don't have any independent voice, but merely prattle off whatever names they think the Academy will life as a means of becoming a "notable predictor" or whatever.

K: the Academy has rewarded 3 films that could be considered comedies (Annie Hall, Rain Men, and Daisy) and all of 2 big Summer films (Gladiator and Gump) in the last 32 years. If you look at the list. It's clear the Academy has a certain type of film that gets it's goat, and they continue to reward it year after year.

If they just mixed up their formula. If they possibly stepped out side of their box more than 5 times in the last 27 years. Okay... throw in Return of the King and you have 6 times in 32 years. Where a different kind of film has won the Oscar. That's a horrible percentage.

They just need to mix it up a bit more. If they could figure this out. If they could mix it up in such a way, that would guarantee something outside of their wheelhouse winning their most prestigious award. I still foolishly believe, that would change things.

Until they change the perception about who they are. The year-end list and everything else that go with them. Will not change who the Academy is, and who they are remains a snooty bunch of voters as a group.

Why should the Academy mix things up if they feellike they're putting up the best films of the year? Why nominate a movie they don't care for? Besides, to rig the results, as you wish, would require some kind of huge system of rigging the vote, as thousands of people are voting for these movies. How do you get all of them to vote for X-Men 3? Bribes?

I should add your list is crap anyway former IO...if you're knocking the Academy for not awarding crowd pleasers, then you should not just count comedies and summer films. How about The Departed (crime drama, a REAL one not starring a guy in a rubber suit), Chicago (musical), Shakespeare in Love (comedy love story), Titanic (biggest hit film EVER MADE), Braveheart (big summer action movie like you were complaining weren't given any due), Silence of the Lambs (horror movie).

Should I keep going? That's just to the 90s. That's not a bunch of esoteric films.

the Academy awards picks crowd pleasers all the time...and big dense pictures often.

but every once in awhile a nice dark and violent surprise comes along. Like No Country for Old Men.

Why are you telling that to me when I mentioned nothing at all related to what you wrote?

And here here to what Perm said. Hasn't the Academy always been criticised for bowing to populist titles/people? Julia Roberts over Ellen Burstyn is one example that people continue to bring up.

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