The 2009 Academy Awards Show

[BookGoddess]

I was sure there would be a thread opened. Am I the only one who watched the Oscars last night?

I love Hugh Jackman and I thought he gave it his all but I'm really not a big fan of musical numbers. :

The new format of having five previous winners in the category euologize (that's what it felt like) the nominees was interesting. Some managed it well but others came off like they didn't know what to say. I missed the tradition of the previous year's winner presenting to the new winner.

Tina Fey and Steve Martin were funny.

I didn't think Sophia Loren looked her best.

So what did you think of the ceremony last night?

[queenjane]

I thought sophia loren looked pretty good for someone turning 75 yrs old this year.

I liked the way they gave out the acting awards...it was more like a tribute to all the nominees rather than just boom, the winner is...so i thought it was nice. Although it was a little weird that all of the actresses were saying such nice, personal things about their nominee, and then nicole kidman basically just talked about angelina jolie's movie role. Hers seemed somewhat impersonable. I wonder if they wrote the words themselves or were given what to say, or what.

I thought all the dresses were beautiful (except miley cyrus'...ugh...what was she thinking)....Penelope Cruz looked stunning. In the preshow she said her dress was vintage, 60 yrs old, she fell in love with it 8 yrs ago and tracked it down recently for the Oscars.

I called Sean Penn winning over Mickey Rourke, and he had a cool speech. The guy who won for writing "Milk" had a very moving speech. I was rooting for "Slumdog Millionaire" for everything it was up for,and was glad to see it take home some big prizes.

I'm not a huge Hugh Jackman fan, but i thought he did a good job. It was less uncomfortable than when they have comedians doing it, it was just a nice entertaining show...i liked his opening number with the "cheapo" set/props and Anne Hathaway joining him onstage was cute. I kinda was checking my email during the whole beyonce number, which i thought was kind of weird and out of place (then the high school musical kids showed up?? it was just weird to me)...was she lip synching? Her sound was all weird (geez...can i use the word "weird" one more time??!! ).

So, mostly i thought it was a pretty good job, and the set/stage was really beautiful too. I havent seen any of the movies up for awards, not even Wall-E. But i still love to watch the show.


Katherine

[ChristyH]

I thought Hugh Jackman did a great job considering he's not a comedian and that's usually what they go for. I liked his opening number but not the later musical number.

I felt a twinge of pity for Jennifer Anniston when she was up there with Jack Black knowing that she was just a few feet from Brad and Angelina, I think that's the first time they've been in a room together publicly and I felt awkward for her.

Tina Fey and Steve Martin were so funny

Hated the way they gave the best actor and actresses with the 5 older winners, just didn't like that format at all!

All in all I thought it was a pretty good show, but I thought they were going to try and pare it down a little but it still ran just as long.

[EviesMom]

Felt shorter than usual to me, and I didn't notice so much of the orchestra playing people off and them saying "don't play me off, I'm not done!" which is always annoying. Then again, we started late via Tivo and fast forwarded anyone's acceptance speech DH and didn't want to hear, so we might have missed it.

I liked it overall. I always cringe at some of the comedians jokes that just get too insulting. I though Hugh did a fantastic job at being positive, energetic, and funny but not insulting. They need some nicer comics when they go back to that IMO.

Didn't seem like folks rattled on and on and on with a list of names that no one else but the award winner has ever heard of or cares about. DH and I usually comment that should one of us ever win such an award (not likely!) let's just say "my family, friends, and business associates, you know how special you are to me, and I'm not going to say each of your names, you know who you are." Then say something more interesting, compelling, and important. Which it seemed like most of the winners did. There were some lovely stories about shampoo bottle ambitions, etc.

The titles were nice too (graphic design and TV production people, what can I say). The dresses were generally gorgeous, though Goldie Hawn looked like she was wearing a sundress that was slowly slipping. It's kinda her style though. I loved Ann Hathaway's dress.

I loved the individual commentary from past winners to nominees. I thought that was great, although it's been criticized in some newspapers. DH missed having snippets from the films.

One criticism was that there were very very few non straight scenes in the "romance" montage. Just 2 very short ones from Milk, and not the best from that film really IMO. I don't need to see the vampire kids making out over and over and have that called romance. Maybe I'm too old for the target audience there though. Penn didn't thank Harvey Milk either, but did thank Cleve Jones. I don't think Milk would have minded though.

I dunno, I liked it more than I often do.

[artgoddess]

I thought it was the best Oscars show in a lot of years. Loved Hugh Jackman, and I liked the new format for presenting awards to the actors.

The only let down for me was the montage of people who died in the past year. After having someone like Byonce with her amazing voice sing, listening to Queen Latifa, who I love as a person, but she's not as good a singer, was a let down. They also made it difficult to see who was in the slide show because of the way the camera was filming the screen at the awards show. I have a big 50" TV too, and I wondered if some people could even read the names who have smaller screens.

But everything else, I thought was just great.

[galincognito]

i totally agree about the montage to those who passed away; that's the part i look forward to the most and it was awful! i don't need to see the whole stage, just show me the screen!