The statues are all distributed, the corks are all popped, and now it is time to talk about the 82nd Academy Awards in the past tense. We’ll get to who won, but first off I’d like to talk about who lost: the viewing audience. This has to be one of the worst awards broadcasts in recent memory. Overlong and underwhelming, the only thing interesting in the show was actually finding out who won, which is weird because that often takes a backseat to the rest of the spectacle.

Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin were charming, albeit neutered, hosts. They farmed the opening number out to Neil Patrick Harris, which was predictably fine, but it seemed like a complete redux of his bouts as Tony and Emmy host. On paper it sounds poignant, but in practice it felt stale. I long for the days when Billy Crystal would superimpose himself into the top nominated films. I can understand the new hosts wanting to move forward with an original spin, only this felt like a step backwards.

I’m not going to dissect the interpretive dance number, or “Oscars 2: Electric Boogaloo,” as I like to call it.

I always tune in for the interstitial montages. There were really only two this year besides the traditional “In Memoriam.” The first was a John Hughes tribute, which was accompanied by a flock of the kids he made icons gathered on stage. The montage itself was probably the best part of the evening, capturing the essence of Mr. Hughes’ momentous career. It didn’t, however, dig any deeper than that, which is a shame. Back when Errol Morris was making these things there was a sense of storytelling to the montages. Even further back, Chuck Workman used to raise these clip-ups to another artistic level completely. Ah, the good ol’ days. The other big montage was a celebration of horror films. This was not nearly as successful as the John Hughes piece. Whoever made it relied far to heavily on clips from The Shining to get them out of creative ruts. Nonetheless, it was a fairly decent primer on horror films, but I’m sure fanboys and fangirls out there will protest.

It turns out spending time showing us all ten Best Picture nominees wasn’t all that much of a time-suck. The real gouge-your-eyes out moment came later in the night, when the awards for Best Actor and Actress were given out. Each nominee was treated to a celebrity pal toasting their careers and performances. Considering actors, and really all nominees, are supposedly being graded on a specific performance and not the breadth of their careers, the mini-retrospective monologues came off more obnoxious than celebratory. And let’s face it, four of the nominees are going to lose, so let’s move things along and get to the meat.

As for that meat: it’s a strange world where Sandra Bullock wins an Oscar for a mediocre performance in an even more mediocre film. All I can imagine is that the rest of the actresses up for the honor split the vote so severely that the safest bet, the middle of the road one, got the most votes. Mo’Nique was completely deserving of the Best Supporting Actress honor. Her speech featured a nice shout out to Hattie McDaniel, and this time it made a lot more sense than when George Clooney invoked the actresses name in 2006. Jeff Bridges looked like the happiest kid in the room, and Christoph Waltz still scares me after Inglourious Basterds.

While some were a bit put off by Sandy Powell’s acceptance speech when she won for Best Costume Design for The Young Victoria, I thought it was one of the most refreshing moments of the evening. She praised the costume designers who make non-period pieces, essentially imploring the Academy to vote in their favor more often. This has long been a sticking point of mine: the more frill and lace a film has the better chance it has of winning costume design. Modern pieces require a careful hand as well, so she’s right; the Academy should rethink who they give this award to.

I had Quentin Tarantino pegged for Best Original Screenplay, mostly because I think Inglourious Basterds lives up to the award’s title so well. Mark Boal brought us The Hurt Locker so the award is certainly well-deserved, however I have a feeling it will be the kiss of death for him. I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for the next mind-blowing Boal penned script. Precious: Based on the Novel “Push” by Sapphire is certainly an innovative adaptation, plus its written lineage is right there it it’s ridiculously long title. Congrats to Geoffrey Fletcher, on that note.

I’m skipping a lot, I know. They’re threatening to play me off…

Finally, we now live in a world where a woman has won an Oscar for Best Director. Fourth time’s a charm. This truly was a momentous occasion. Ms. Bigelow did a phenomenal job with a very difficult film. Unlike a multi-(hundred)-million dollar spectacle like Avatar or a coming of middle-age piece like Up in the Air, The Hurt Locker is a loose cannon. It could have gone horribly wrong in another’s hands. There is very little story to the film, no relatable antagonists, and the driving theme of modern masculinity trickles out instead of bombarding the audience. The only thing that could wrangle such an unstable project is the steady hand of a powerful director. It is a cinematic achievement and deserving of all the honors it racked up last night. Congratulations to all.

So there you have it: perhaps the worst Oscars in over a decade. They went for glitzy but they landed on chintzy. It was long, it was boring, but dammit, I’ll be back next year to tune in for another show, hoping against hope that the broadcast will return to its former glory.

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I’ve been mostly quiet on the subject of the Oscars this year. Instead of throw my hat into the race, I’d like to offer up what I’ve noticed of the ways my friends and colleagues have approached the subject. After all, it is basically the Super Bowl of film events. So insane has the madness surrounding the Oscars become, that there is an entire swath of calendar, getting longer and longer every year, known as “Awards Season”. In the end, I encounter a few interesting characters in real life and on the web every year surrounding the Oscar madness. Here’s a peek at who they are.

The Predictors

Nostradamus know-it-alls. Pontificators. Armchair zen-masters of all things AMPAS. Sure, in the past week the web was rife with tipsters helping you fill out an office pool, but the truth is that there is that you can rev up the prediction machine as early as you like. I have trouble believing that the whispers of Sandra Bullock’s nomination were driven by seasoned journalists and critics. More likely it was clever marketeers trying to nudge Academy voters. But let’s pretend news outlets and bloggers started the early talk on their own. The whisper became a shout, and would you look at that: Ms. Bullock is considered the front runner in a race with the likes of Helen Mirren and Meryl Streep. Although I never reviewed it, I did see The Blind Side and all I can say is that it’s a topsy turvy world where she gets in a nod in a category with only 5 slots.

The Beancounters

I played this game a few weeks back with my Oscar Infographic. Much like Major League Baseball’s sabremetricians (look it up), an army of analysts has popped up around the Oscars. On Friday, the New York Times featured an analysis of 75 years worth of data, predicting the winners based on what awards they have garnered throughout the awards season. This is basically the equivalent of political polling, determining how people will eventually cast their ballot based on prior evidence. The truth remains that members of the Academy will vote however they please. It’s tough to think so black and white about something as subjective as cinema, which is why I never go for this stuff. I think this year’s nominees turn most logic on its side anyway when the frontrunner for Best Picture, Avatar, has been seen by over 3000 times more people than the second runner up, The Hurt Locker.

The Newsmakers

This year is interesting because there is some actual news to report in advance of the Awards broadcast. When Nicolas Chartier was caught e-mailing Academy members asking for Hurt Locker votes, the so-called blogosphere turned the whole event into primetime news. The producer is now barred from attending the event for breaking Academy rules by directly soliciting votes. The plot is thickened by the fact that after The Hurt Locker was nominated for Best Picture, Mr. Chartier had to petition AMPAS to be considered an eligible recipient of a statue should the film win, since tradition has mandated only three producers can ever receive the statue for any top film. What a great story! Except that it has very little to do with movies. I wouldn’t blame you if you fell asleep during my little explanation because it really is such a footnote. Personally, my favorite non-movie related Oscar tale happened in 2000, when 52 statuettes were stolen from a loading dock in a suburb of Los Angeles, only to show up two weeks later in a trash can. Come on, that’s way more interesting than some guy rooting for his film via e-mail.

The Bandwagoners

You’ve picked a film, and you roll with it. I can jibe with that. After all, I always root for my baseball team even when the odds are severely against them. However, you’ve got to come out of the reverie for a little bit if you expect to have a decent discussion about the awards playing field. This tends to get pretty silly in the technical categories, where most people have no idea what criteria are actually being considered and perhaps just pull the lever for their favorite film. Do you know the difference between Sound Mixing and Sound Editing? If not, you’ll probably still fight to the death that Inglourious Basterds is going to take both if that’s your first love this season. Cheers to you, but maybe dig a bit deeper to figure out what you’re cheering for.

The Too-Cool-for-School Awards Nihilists

“There is no respect for artistry…” “The Oscars are just a marketing ploy to push DVD sales…” “If they respected the best films they’d nominate Jim Jarmusch for…” blah blah blah. I hear this all the time. The truth is that our entire industry, top to bottom and side to side, would not function as well as it does without the Oscars. Think about it: without the Oscars there would not be the bounty of awards shows for every facet of filmmaking, including the Independent Spirit Awards. And if you think those are just as dumb, then there will never be any convincing you of any jury-based rewards system for cinema. If you’re fine with that, then shut up and don’t tell me who should be nominated for Oscars because you don’t believe in awards, remember? Every single accolade in this business suffers from the same kind of silliness and politicking that the Oscars do, it just looks different. If you think a Palme D’Or or a Golden Lion or a BAFTA holds more weight than an Oscar, that’s fine. You should just recognize that getting those awards requires one to play the same kind of game.

Related posts:

1. 82nd Academy Award Nominees Graphically Explained
2. Breakdown: 82nd Academy Awards
3. Guide to the 2010 Oscar Nominees UPDATED

Click the image to view full size:

That’s a lot to take in at once. No matter how much data we can look at, from a film’s gross to Academy voters’ tendencies, the truth is that most voters work hard to inform themselves and make the decisions they feel are right in their hearts. We’ve got a whole month of speculation ahead of us, but feel free to leave your gut reactions in the comments. Happy Awards Season.

Click here to download the massive, printable version of this graphic. Feel free to plaster the web with this thing, just don’t forget to mention your friends at the candler blog.

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But I’m not not fifteen anymore. Nor am I jaded, befuddled or disappointed. Snark and derision have no place here; let us appraise what these two big wins at the Golden Globes mean.

If you’ve been keeping up with the candler blog, you know Sunrise found Avatar a bit racist, but nonetheless revolutionary from a technological/technical standpoint. And if you’ve been reading us since the summer, you know that The Hangover was completely lost on me, which made me feel like a pariah in cinephilic circles. For my money, The Hurt Locker should have taken the Drama statue (and Kathryn Bigelow for director) while the Comedy award should have gone to Julie & Julia, which was one of the more intriguing films last year. So what happened?

The Golden Globes are doled out by members of the press, and Avatar and The Hangover provided some wonderful fodder for off-screen squawking this year. In other words, they were the bread and butter of journalists of all walks. Take Todd Phillips, for example. Legend has it he risked his career by not casting a single “name” in his film while assuming much of the financial burden as a producer of the film. Literally, if the film tanked, we wouldn’t see much of him in Hollywood for at least a decade. And then there’s James Cameron’s 3D epic, for which the director invented a camera that brought the film’s budget to half a billion dollars. If that weren’t enough, he promoted the opening of 3D equipped auditoriums across the nation, leading the next evolution of trickery that will get butts in seats at the cineplex. So yeah, both of these films have enduring offscreen narratives. But does that make them worthy of our accolades.

Sure it does! The real surprise here is The Hangover, which purposefully doesn’t have a respectable bone in its body. It is a gross-out buddy comedy that digs deep into the darkest corners of our collective psyche. I didn’t like it, but I can appreciate that the HFPA was so wowed by a comedy that they offer up its highest honor. Mr. Field has somehow reached the heights that Bobby and Peter Farrelly have only dreamed of: to be respected as a filmmaker first and a comedy filmmaker second. It’s going to be hard to follow up this film. After all, Mr. Field is probably going to make a lot more shlocky comedies that won’t gain the respect of anyone, but at least he has a Globe in his treasure chest to push him forward.

Avatar is the obvious favorite for every award under the sun, which is a bummer because it makes me wonder if the people voting on this actually watched the whole movie. It’s a fine film no doubt, but its greatest achievements have nothing to do what what actually happens between the film’s opening and closing credits. 3D is here to stay, again, and this time around it is all due to the hype behind Mr. Cameron’s film. The release had been pushed back so many times in an effort to equip more theaters with the technology, which in essence has helped the tech flourish. Also, he matured the motion capture aspect of the film so well that it isn’t even part of the discussion anymore as it is, say, when Robert Zemeckis goes out to make a film.

It is an unquestionable fact: there are movies before Avatar and there are movies after. Again, technologically, the film moves us forward. Unfortunately, the story doesn’t quite live up to the method by which it is conveyed. But isn’t it enough that we have been moved? Isn’t it enough that the tech is here because of this film. If you ask me: no. But I can fully respect the HFPA for honoring such an achievement.

So there you have it. The awards make sense, even when the films don’t. Now, onto the Oscars and all the trash-talk that comes with them.

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