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Oscar 80 Post Game Recap

February 25th, 2008 by Scott Marks

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In spite of Robert Boyle’s speech, the 2008 Academy Awards came in ten minutes shy of it’s anticipated 210 minute running time. With the exception of Julie Christie’s surprising loss to Marion Cotillard, it was pretty much Oscar by numbers. Let’s take a moment to dismember this year’s low and high points.

  • Jon Stewart hosts a politically slanted cable comedy show and has no business presiding over the Oscars. Next year I want Mickey Rooney to host.
  • Wesley Snipes and Spike Lee looked like they were dressed for a day at the track.
  • The Dennis Hopper old age cracks served as a warm up for Robert Boyle.
  • It was great to see Charles Napier in a Diet Coke commercial.
  • This year’s clip reels were particularly dull. Put Chuck Workman out to stud.
  • Two best acceptance speeches of the night: Ratatouille’s Brad Bird reminiscing about a belligerent Junior High guidance counselor who gave him the perfect training to work in the film business and Tilda Swinton goofing on rubber-nippled George Clooney on the set of Michael Clayton.
  • Katherine Heigl looked stunning, but have you ever seen a more nervous presenter? I think that Colin Farrell slipped on a puddle she left.
  • It was an especially bad hair year for Oscar nominees and presenters. Amy Adams, Katherine Heigl and Kennedy clone Patrick Dempsey came off best. Tilda Swinton looked like she just stepped out of the shower while Cate Blanchett, Keri Russell, Ellen Page, Tom Hanks, Renee Zellwegger, John Travolta’s yarmulke cut and the gang stationed at the Al Faw Palace on Camp Victory in Baghdad all needed more time in the chair.
  • Norbit was robbed.
  • Three, count ‘em, three Bob Hope references.
  • What dosage of Paxil is Amy Adams on? God damn if that Happy Work Song wasn’t happy.
  • Jon Stewart gets the Ed Norton award for laughing at his own jokes.
  • Patrick Dempsey, Miley Cyrus and The Rock shouldn’t be allowed to watch the Academy Awards on TV let alone stand on the stage.
  • Is it my imagination or did the ceiling of the Kodak Theater look like an upside-down pinball machine?
  • From this day forward, it shall forever be referred to as “The Academy Award winning The Golden Compass.”
  • Worst cue card reader of the night: Jennifer Hudson. Miley Cyrus had a more naturalistic delivery.
  • Does Owen Wilson blow his nose with a pliers?
  • Even though Bee Movie wasn’t nominated, wasn’t Jerry Seinfeld a sport for prerecording that side-splitting bit?
  • Winners of Best Animated Short should not be allowed to bring their toys on stage when they accepting their awards. The guy looked like a retarded adult.
  • Was Alan Arkin speaking as the drug addled grandpappy in Little Miss Sunshine when he said, “The Golden Age of Cinema is very much alive?”
  • By Jon Stewart’s standards, 71-year-old Jack Nicholson is still the most fertile man in Hollywood.
  • Judging by their inarticulate best adapted screenplay acceptance speeches, it’s no wonder Joel and Ethan Coen’s No Country for Old Men is a word-for-word transformation of Cormack McCarthy’s novel.
  • Academy president Sid Gannis is a real house of fire, isn’t he? His “how to” video on Academy voting makes Night and Fog look like a masterpiece.
  • Stewart’s “the baby goes to” bit tanked,
  • Biggest intentional laugh: Jonah Hill coming back after presenting an award and saying, “Good evening, I’m Miss Halle Berry.” He didn’t fool me, though. Hill didn’t hit anyone on the drive over.
  • Christopher Rouse, best editing winner for The Bourne Ultimatum, is the son of Russell Rouse, the auteur behind THE OSCAR! Now do you understand?
  • From this day forward, it shall forever be referred to as “The three time Academy Award winning The Bourne Ultimatum. “
  • Nicole Kidman appears to be consulting The Joker’s plastic surgeon.
  • For awhile it looked as though he wouldn’t make it, but 98-year-old Robert Boyle delivered the speech of the night.
  • Keep those Sid Ganis cutaways coming!!!
  • Classiest moment of the night: Jon Stewart bringing Marketa Irglova back to finish her best original song acceptance speech.
  • Biggest unintentional laugh of the night: Clips of crybaby Spielberg winning his Schindler’s Oscar.
  • Just because Tom Hanks was in Saving Private Ryan shouldn’t automatically make him the liberal spokesman for America’s military.
  • Note to Diablo Cody — Wilma Flintstone wants her dress back. (Credit John Schultz!)
  • Jon Stewart introduced Him as simply, “The great Martin Scorsese.”
  • For those who have seen Swimming With Sharks, the Kevin Spacey character is allegedly based on Scott Rudin. This guy is supposed to be one of Tinsel Town’s most ruthless, egomaniacal a–holes which makes his saccharine reference to his life partner as “honey” a hundred times funnier.
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