Skip to main content

What another lovely day.

Oscar Winners 2016


 So said costume designer Jenny (Beaven), quite a declaration since she presumably had to sit through the entire three-and-a-half-hour ceremony.

By most accounts, Chris Rock acquitted himself reasonably well, defusing the controversy over the whiteness of the nominations with some well-aimed quips, from the introductory “Well, I’m here at the Academy Awards. Otherwise known as The White People’s Choice Awards” to his reason for not boycotting the show (“I didn’t want to lose another role to Kevin Hart”) to the widespread indifference to Mrs Will Smith’s non-show (“Jada boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rhiana’s panties… I wasn’t invited”; a risqué one, that) to drawing comparison to the ‘60s, when there were real things to protest, with African Americans “too busy being raped and lynched to care about Best Documentary Foreign Short”. Then there was his suggestion that the in memorium would be dedicated to “black people shot by the cops on their way to the movies”. I particularly liked the response to his straw polling footage of African American audiences outside a cinema. When an interviewee’s favourite white movie of the year was revealed as “By the Sea with Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie”, Rock quipped “Wow. Even they wouldn’t say that”.

As for the trivial matter of the victors themselves, there were a few upsets, but in the case of Spotlight, an early frontrunner, the thing about making (relatively) early predictions is that like Carly Simon, sometimes they’re coming around again; The Revenant had only become a serious tip over the last month. As expected, Fury Road went home with the most awards (half a dozen), and I did indeed come up with better guesses than in 2015 (I got about 60% right this time, as opposed to only half then). So I guess I’ll just keep on guessing.

Best Picture
Winner: Spotlight
I guessed: Spotlight

It’s quite heartening to see a film take the top award with only one other win (Original Screenplay). This is the first time it’s happened since 1952 (The Greatest Show on Earth); conversely it’s relatively rare that a near sweep feels deserved. Spotlight’s a solid, respectable choice for the top prize, far preferable to the overhyped The Revenant. As to whether Pope Francis will rise to Tom McCarthy’s challenge “to protect children and restore faith”, I wonder how many priests would be left standing if he actually did clean papal house.

Best Director
Winner: Alejandro González Iñárritu Again (The Revenant)
I guessed: George Miller (Fury Road)

My biggest case of wishful thinking was Miller being recognised. It was indeed Iñárritu again, the first back-to-back director win since the ‘40s (John Ford and Joseph L Mankiewicz took them at opposite ends of the decade). There’s no doubting Iñárritu’s filmmaking achievement, so one can’t really feel anyone was unfairly slighted, it’s just a shame he didn’t make a better movie.

Best Actor
Winner: Leonard DiCaprio (The Revenant)
I guessed: Leonard DiCaprio (The Revenant)

Well that was a no-brainer. Leo goes home happy, fifth time lucky, 22 years after he first missed out on an acting Oscar. Which, given how Pacino was known for being forever snubbed, is a significant stretch (it was only 20 for Al). Leo informed us that climate change is real, so he didn’t waste his time on the podium.

Best Actress
Winner: Brie Larson (Room)
I guessed: Brie Larson (Room)

Another no-brainer.

Best Supporting Actor
Winner: Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies)
I guessed: Sylvester Stallone (Creed)

This was the real upset. I was rooting for Rylance to win, so I’m happy, but it’s interesting to see the way the Academy is or isn’t touched by nostalgia or career-achievement awards. Perhaps the weight of Stallone’s actorly transgressions were deemed unforgivable when it came to the crunch. It’s this kind of twist that at least evidences occasional life in a ceremony coming at the end of an all-played-out awards season.

Best Supporting Actress
Winner: Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl)
I guessed: Rooney Mara (Carol)

I was foolhardy here, as the smart money was always on Vikander. But then, it was always on Stallone too.  

Best Adapted Screenplay
Winner: Adam McKay and Charles Randolph (The Big Short)
I guessed: Adam McKay and Charles Randolph (The Big Short)

It had been Spotlight and The Big Short all the way through the season, so it wasn’t seriously going to change at this point. I’m a bit confused by McKay’s invitation to the Academy that they “Don’t vote for candidates that take money from big banks, or oil, or weirdo billionaires”. So… Does that leave anyone, then? Unless he was being ironic. He had just thanked Paramount, after all.

Best Original Screenplay
Winner: Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer (Spotlight)
I guessed: Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer (Spotlight)

Similarly earnest sentiments were expressed by McCarthy, stressing the importance of the dying discipline of investigative journalism; Spotlight was made “for all the journalists who have and continue to hold the powerful accountable”. Which doesn’t mean there’s going to be an Oscars-nourished exposé of Hollywood corruption any time soon.

Best Animated Feature
Winner: Inside Out
I guessed: Inside Out

Pixar’s eighth animated feature win, although their non-noms have become more common in recent years.

Best Documentary Feature
Winner: Amy
I guessed: Amy

Some suggested Cartel Land might stage a late in the game supplanting, but like Animated Feature, and Foreign Language Film, there was never much doubt here.

Best Foreign Language Film
Winner: Son of Saul
I guessed: Son of Saul

See Documentary Feature above.

Best Cinematography
Winner: Emmanuel Lubezki (The Revenant)
I guessed: Emmanuel Lubezki (The Revenant)

Lubezki makes history with three back-to-back cinematography wins. And you can’t argue with his quality of work on the picture, easily its most impressive aspect.


Best Costume Design
Winner: Jenny Beavan (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Sandy Powell (Cinderella)

While I rooted for Fury Road, I expected Cinders to go to the ball.

Best Documentary Short
Winner: A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness
I guessed: Last Day of Freedom

I was split on A Girl in the River or Last Day of Freedom being most likely; I picked wrong.

Best Film Editing
Winner: Margaret Sixel (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Margaret Sixel (Mad Max: Fury Road)

Highly deserved, and contributing to the most awards Australia has garnered from the Academy (besting Braveheart and Babe)

Best Make-up and Hairstyling
Winner: Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega and Damian Martin (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Lesley Vanderwalt, Elka Wardega and Damian Martin (Mad Max: Fury Road)

Again, richly deserved.

Best Original Score
Winner: Ennio Morricone (The Hateful Eight)
I guessed: Ennio Morricone (The Hateful Eight)

Morricone has delivered better unsung work, but this award is about half a century overdue, so the standing ovation was definitely warranted.

Best Original Song
Winner: Writing’s On The Wall (Spectre)
I guessed: Til It Happens To You (The Hunting Ground)

WTF? Did anyone really thing the Spectre song was good? Or even half decent? The most baffling award of the evening.

Best Production Design
Winner: Colin Gibson and Lisa Thompson (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Colin Gibson and Lisa Thompson (Mad Max: Fury Road)

More lovely prizes for lovely Fury Road.

Best Animated Short
Winner: Bear Story
I guessed: World of Tomorrow

They picked the cosy choice rather than the audacious one, as per the Animated Feature category.

Best Live Action Short
Winner: Stutterer
I’d like to win: Ave Maria

Well, I was right when I noted “There’s a tendency in this category to go for light-hearted winners”. I just singled out the wrong light-hearted winner.

Best Sound Editing
Winner: Mark A Mangini and David Whie (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Mark A Mangini and David Whie (Mad Max: Fury Road)

Best Sound Mixing
Winner: Chris Jenkins, Gregg Rudloff and Ben Osmo (Mad Max: Fury Road)
I guessed: Chris Jenkins, Gregg Rudloff and Ben Osmo (Mad Max: Fury Road)

Best Visual Effects
Winner: Andrew Whitehurst, Paul Norris, Mark Ardington and Sarah Bennett (Ex Machina)
I guessed: Andrew Jackson, Dan Oliver, Andy Williams and Tom Wood (Mad Max: Fury Road)


C3P0, R2-D2 BB8 may have presented it but, like Supporting Actor and Best Song, Visual Effects confounded popular opinion. Ex Machina went the reverse route of the more in-your-face spectacle of Fury Road and Star Wars, and on this occasion seamless surprisingly paid off.


Labels:

Comments

Post a comment

Popular posts from this blog

We live in a twilight world.

Tenet (2020)
(SPOILERS) I’ve endured a fair few confusingly-executed action sequences in movies – more than enough, actually – but I don’t think I’ve previously had the odd experience of being on the edge of my seat during one while simultaneously failing to understand its objectives and how those objectives are being attempted. Which happened a few times during Tenet. If I stroll over to the Wiki page and read the plot synopsis, it is fairly explicable (fairly) but as a first dive into this Christopher Nolan film, I frequently found it, if not impenetrable, then most definitely opaque.
Post a comment
Read more

She was addicted to Tums for a while.

Marriage Story (2019)
(SPOILERS) I don’t tend to fall heavily for Noah Baumbach fare. He’s undoubtedly a distinctive voice – even if his collaborations with Wes Anderson are the least of that director’s efforts – but his devotion to an exclusive, rarefied New York bubble becomes ever more off-putting with each new project. And ever more identifiable as being a lesser chronicler of the city’s privileged quirks than his now disinherited forbear Woody Allen, who at his peak mastered a balancing act between the insightful, hilarious and self-effacing. Marriage Story finds Baumbach going yet again where Woody went before, this time brushing up against the director’s Ingmar Bergman fixation.
Post a comment
Read more

You can’t climb a ladder, no. But you can skip like a goat into a bar.

Juno and the Paycock (1930)
(SPOILERS) Hitchcock’s second sound feature. Such was the lustre of this technological advance that a wordy play was picked. By Sean O’Casey, upon whom Hitchcock based the prophet of doom at the end of The Birds. Juno and the Paycock, set in 1922 during the Irish Civil War, begins as a broad comedy of domestic manners, but by the end has descended into full-blown Greek (or Catholic) tragedy. As such, it’s an uneven but still watchable affair, even if Hitch does nothing to disguise its stage origins.
Post a comment
Read more

Anything can happen in Little Storping. Anything at all.

The Avengers 2.22: Murdersville
Brian Clemens' witty take on village life gone bad is one of the highlights of the fifth season. Inspired by Bad Day at Black Rock, one wonders how much Murdersville's premise of unsettling impulses lurking beneath an idyllic surface were set to influence both Straw Dogs and The Wicker Mana few years later (one could also suggest it premeditates the brand of backwoods horrors soon to be found in American cinema from the likes of Wes Craven and Tobe Hooper).
Post a comment
Read more

The protocol actually says that most Tersies will say this has to be a dream.

Jupiter Ascending (2015)
(SPOILERS) The Wachowski siblings’ wildly patchy career continues apace. They bespoiled a great thing with The Matrix sequels (I liked the first, not the second), misfired with Speed Racer (bubble-gum visuals aside, hijinks and comedy ain’t their forte) and recently delivered the Marmite Sense8 for Netflix (I was somewhere in between on it). Their only slam-dunk since The Matrix put them on the movie map is Cloud Atlas, and even that’s a case of rising above its limitations (mostly prosthetic-based). Jupiter Ascending, their latest cinema outing and first stab at space opera, elevates their lesser works by default, however. It manages to be tone deaf in all the areas that count, and sadly fetches up at the bottom of their filmography pile.

This is a case where the roundly damning verdicts have sadly been largely on the ball. What’s most baffling about the picture is that, after a reasonably engaging set-up, it determinedly bores the pants off you. I haven’t enco…
Post a comment
Read more

James Bond. You appear with the tedious inevitability of an unloved season.

Moonraker (1979)
Depending upon your disposition, and quite possibly age, Moonraker is either the Bond film that finally jumped the shark or the one that is most gloriously redolent of Roger Moore’s knowing take on the character. Many Bond aficionados will no doubt utter its name with thinly disguised contempt, just as they will extol with gravity how Timothy Dalton represented a masterful return to the core values of the series. If you regard For Your Eyes Only as a refreshing return to basics after the excesses of the previous two entries, and particularly the space opera grandstanding of this one, it’s probably fair to say you don’t much like Roger Moore’s take on Bond.

Post a comment
Read more

Twenty dwarves took turns doing handstands on the carpet.

Bugsy (1991)
(SPOILERS) Bugsy is very much a Warren Beatty vanity project (aren’t they all, even the ones that don’t seem that way on the surface?), to the extent of his playing a title character a decade and a half younger than him. As such, it makes sense that producer Warren’s choice of director wouldn’t be inclined to overshadow star Warren, but the effect is to end up with a movie that, for all its considerable merits (including a script from James Toback chock full of incident), never really feels quite focussed, that it’s destined to lead anywhere, even if we know where it’s going.
Post a comment
Read more

He tasks me. He tasks me, and I shall have him.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
(1982)
(SPOILERS) I don’t love Star Trek, but I do love Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. That probably isn’t just me, but a common refrain of many a non-devotee of the series. Although, it used to apply to The Voyage Home (the funny one, with the whales, the Star Trek even the target audience for Three Men and a Baby could enjoy). Unfortunately, its high regard has also become the desperate, self-destructive, song-and-verse, be-all-and-end-all of the overlords of the franchise itself, in whichever iteration, it seems. This is understandable to an extent, as Khan is that rare movie sequel made to transcendent effect on almost every level, and one that stands the test of time every bit as well (better, even) as when it was first unveiled.
Post a comment
Read more

My dear, sweet brother Numsie!

The Golden Child (1986)
Post-Beverly Hills Cop, Eddie Murphy could have filmed himself washing the dishes and it would have been a huge hit. Which might not have been a bad idea, since he chose to make this misconceived stinker.
Post a comment
Read more

When I barked, I was enormous.

Dean Spanley (2008)
(SPOILERS) There is such a profusion of average, respectable – but immaculately made – British period drama held up for instant adulation, it’s hardly surprising that, when something truly worthy of acclaim comes along, it should be singularly ignored. To be fair, Dean Spanleywas well liked by critics upon its release, but its subsequent impact has proved disappointingly slight. Based on Lord Dunsany’s 1939 novella, My Talks with Dean Spanley, our narrator relates how the titular Dean’s imbibification of a moderate quantity of Imperial Tokay (“too syrupy”, is the conclusion reached by both members of the Fisk family regarding this Hungarian wine) precludes his recollection of a past life as a dog. 

Inevitably, reviews pounced on the chance to reference Dean Spanley as a literal shaggy dog story, so I shall get that out of the way now. While the phrase is more than fitting, it serves to underrepresent how affecting the picture is when it has cause to be, as does any re…
Post a comment
Read more