But first let me take a second to applaud myself for my excellent predictions this year, as I guessed 16 of the 21 winners for the night, (barring the short film categories per usual), a record (76 %) on the blog, up from 7 right in 2014 and 13 right in 2015.
Excellent job!
- Thank you very much!
And now to the recap:
Host Chris Rock's (Top Five (2014)) anxiously awaited opening monologue went straight to the core of the debate this year, the months-long haggle over race and diversity and lack thereof in especially the acting nominations of the year, who are all filled out by white people. Rock surprised positively by attacking both the sanctimonious African-American talents (namely Will Smith, Jada Pinkett-Smith and Spike Lee), who have been very vocal about boycotting the Oscars over this, - while also establishing that Hollywood is racist, (but that it's 'Hollywood racist'), which Whoppi Goldberg (Eddie (1996)) helped wring laughs out of in some videos played on the screen.
Now to the winners:
Josh Singer and Tom McCarthy won Best Original Screenplay for Spotlight, and Charles Randolph and Adam McKay won Best Adapted Screenplay for The Big Short. Mad Max: Fury Road won a total of 6 technical awards: Best Costumes, Editing, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, Makeup and Hairstyling and Production Design. Inside Out won Best Animation, Amy won Best Documentary and Son of Saul won Best Foreign Film. The short film Oscars went to A Girl in the River: The Cost of Forgiveness (short doc.), Stutterer (live-action) and Bear Story (short animation), - and Louis C. K.'s (Trumbo (2015)) presentation of the documentary short nominees were probably the night's funniest, which have made many guess that C. K. might be a host option for the future.
Ennio Morricone won Best Score for The Hateful Eight, and Sam Smith won Best Song (Writing's on the Wall) for Spectre, and in his outrageously ignorant acceptance speech opined that he would dedicate his Oscar to the LGBT community, because he is the first openly gay man to win an Oscar. - Only there were openly gay Oscar winners in both 2015 and 2009, the screenwriters of Milk (2008) and The Imitation Game (2014), respectively.
Now to the surprising winners of the night: Ex Machina won for Best Visual Effects, Mark Rylance won Best Supporting Actor for Bridge of Spies, (Sylvester Stallone (Creed (2015)) thus getting severely snubbed) and Spotlight, delightfully, took Best Picture in front of favorite The Revenant.
That overly hyped film still went home a winner, as Emmanuel Lubezki won Best Cinematography, (his third year winning in a row, following Gravity (2013) and Birdman (2014)), and Best Actor for Leonardo DiCaprio, - winning, finally, on his 6th nomination, and dedicating his speech to his focus on climate change. - And Best Director for Alejandro González Iñáritu (Babel (2006)), winning for the second year in a row, after Birdman, something that hasn't happened since Joseph L. Mankiewicz's won for A Letter to Three Wives (1949) and All About Eve (1950). Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl (2015)) won Best Supporting Actress, and Brie Larson (Room (2015)) won Best Actress.
The show had three musical performances, (two of the Best Song nominees were outrageously cut out to trim the show marginally), from The Weeknd, Lady Gaga and Sam Smith. Ironically, the winning of the three, Smith delivered an astoundingly dull performance. Spike Lee and Gena Rowlands won honorary awards, and Debbie Reynolds won the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.
Rock was fun and his job of hosting has generally been praised and extremely well-received, but for me the night quickly felt extremely long to get through, despite the academy slashing acceptance speech lengths and putting a thank-you board in the bottom of the screen. The diversity issue took away the whole show for me, but to be fair the Oscars 2016 also revolved around rape victims, gays, the environment and probably several other issues that I've just forgotten by now. Film, a fun and glamorous night, stars and laughs seem to have been completely shushed out of the event, and I was dead-sick of it. The ratings, - the Oscars hit at an 8 year low! - suggest that I wasn't alone in growing increasingly infuriated and bored senseless by movie people lecturing the world on capital I Issues. The bullshit factor went through the roof, and paired with the fact that most of the categories' winners are more or less known in advance for us who follow the showbiz news, the 2016 ceremony was at least as bad of an experience as the 2015 Oscars. Whether I will even watch it next year is up in the air, - but I can say for sure that it will be a hard sell. Yo, I am tired of the Oscars!
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| Chris Rock, host of the 2016 Oscars |
Here's the list of Film Excess' predictions, favorites and the winners noted:
(The three short film categories are left out, because I do not have qualified opinions about them.)
Best Visual Effects
Ex Machina Winner
Mad Mad: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant Star Wars: The Force Awakens Film Excess favorite
Best Film Editing
The Big Short Film Excess favorite
Mad Max: Fury Road Winner
The Revenant
Spotlight
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Best Costume Design
Carol
Cinderella
The Danish Girl
Mad Max: Fury Road Film Excess favorite Winner
The Revenant
Best Makeup and Hairstyling
The 100 Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared Film Excess favorite
Mad Max: Fury Road Winner
The Revenant
Best Cinematography
Carol (Ed Lachman)
The Hateful Eight (Robert Richardson)
Mad Max: Fury Road (John Seale)
The Revenant (Emmanuel Lubezki) Winner
Sicario (Roger Deakins) Film Excess favorite
Best Production Design
Bridge of Spies
The Danish Girl
Mad Max: Fury Road Film Excess favorite Winner
The Martian
The Revenant
Best Sound Mixing
Bridge of Spies
Mad Max: Fury Road Winner
The Martian
The Revenant
Star Wars: The Force Awakens Film Excess favorite
Best Sound Editing
Mad Max: Fury Road Film Excess favorite Winner
The Martian
The Revenant
Sicario
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Best Original Song
Earned It - Fifty Shades of Grey
Manta Ray - Racing Extinction
Simple Song # 3 - Youth
Til It Happens to You - The Hunting Ground
Writing's on the Wall - Spectre Film Excess favorite Winner
Best Original Score
Bridge of Spies (Thomas Newman)
Carol (Carter Burwell)
The Hateful Eight (Ennio Morricone) Film Excess favorite Winner
Sicario (Jóhann Jóhannsson)
Star Wars: The Force Awakens (John Williams)
Best Documentary
Amy Winner
Cartel Land
The Look of Silence Film Excess favorite
What Happened, Miss Simone?
Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom
Best Foreign Language Film
Embrace of the Serpent - Ciro Guerra, Colombia
Mustang - Deniz Gamze Ergüven, France
Son of Saul - László Nemes, Hungary Winner
Theeb - Naji Abu Nowar, Jordan
A War - Tobias Lindholm, Denmark Film Excess favorite
Best Animated Feature
Anomalisa
Boy & the World
Inside Out Film Excess favorite Winner
Shaun the Sheep Movie
When Marnie Was There
Best Adapted Screenplay
The Big Short (Adam McKay, Charles Randolph) Film Excess favorite Winner
Brooklyn (Nick Hornby)
Carol (Phyllis Nagy)
The Martian (Drew Goddard)
Room (Emma Donoghue)
Best Original Screenplay
Bridge of Spies (Matt Charman, Joel & Ethan Coen)
Ex Machina (Alex Garland)
Inside Out (Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve, Josh Cooley, Ronnie Del Carmen) Film Excess favorite
Spotlight (Tom McCarthy, Josh Singer) Winner
Straight Outta Compton (Jonathan Herman, Andrea Berloff, S. Leigh Savidge, Alan Wenkus)
Best Supporting Actress
Jennifer Jason Leigh - The Hateful Eight
Rooney Mara - Carol
Rachel McAdams - Spotlight
Alicia Vikander - The Danish Girl Film Excess favorite Winner
Kate Winslet - Steve Jobs
Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale - The Big Short
Tom Hardy - The Revenant
Mark Ruffalo - Spotlight
Mark Rylance - Bridge of Spies Winner
Sylvester Stallone - Creed Film Excess favorite
Best Actress
Cate Blanchett - Carol
Brie Larson - Room Winner
Jennifer Lawrence - Joy
Charlotte Rampling - 45 Years
Saoirse Ronan - Brooklyn Film Excess favorite
Best Actor
Bryan Cranston - Trumbo
Matt Damon - The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio - The Revenant Winner
Michael Fassbender - Steve Jobs
Eddie Redmayne - The Danish Girl Film Excess favorite
Best Director
Adam McKay - The Big Short Film Excess favorite
George Miller - Mad Max: Fury Road
Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárritu - The Revenant Winner
Lenny Abrahamson - Room
Tom McCarthy - Spotlight
Best Picture
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn Film Excess favorite
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight Winner
Related posts:
Oscars 2016 - Predictions and Film Excess' favorites
The day after the day after ... the Oscars 2015
Oscars 2015: Prognosis and Film Excess' favorites
The day after ... the Oscars 2014
Oscars 2014: Prognosis and Film Excess' favorites
What did you think of the 2016 Oscars?
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