Oscar Liveblogging: First Hour Down, Two More to Go ....

by Monika Bartyzel Feb 25th 2007 // 10:33PM

Filed under: Awards, Oscar Watch

Welcome to Cinematical's official liveblogging of the 79th Annual Academy Awards! Erik will be your host for the first hour; Monika will bat second and Kim will clean things up. Who will win? Who will lose? Who will get stuck in the bathroom? Let's find out ...

Catherine Deneuve is looking lovely, and she is joined by Ken Watanabe to present the funny talk, aka foreign language film. First, we get a history in these films, with a nice little montage. Chances of most of the viewing audience having not seen most, if not any of these films? Or, maybe not foreign film.. They left the stage. Instead, Clive Owen and Cate Blanchett, looking hotter than almost everyone on the planet, are presenting the award. I would be completely distracted if not for...

Best Foreign Language Film: The Lives of Others. I always, always pick the losers. I am happy beyond words that Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck grabbed the prize, over other great films. However, the Academy are jerks for not letting him speak. It was a great film. Kudos to the Oscars for recognizing that!!

Best Visual Effects: Pirates of the Caribbean, Dead Man's Chest. Naomi Watts is looking more like her old self, lest bony. That makes me happy. And YES! Robert Downey Jr. is making fun of his drug days. How can you not love someone who makes lovely fun of their risque days? Pirates steals the top prize! It makes sense, and I still can't get over that wheel scene.

Best Cinematography: Pan's Labyrinth, Guillermo Navarro. Gwyneth Paltrow is a great match tonight for cinematography. She's looking excellent. This is tough call, but Pan's gets another! Navarro gets music over his award speech, and I'm mourning the lack of Children of Men love.

These shadow people are amazing. The Little Miss Sunshine bus was damned impressive!

Jean Hersholt* Award: Sherry Lansing. Shoot from a low angle, it's Tom Cruise! He's presenting this award for Sherry Lansing -- the first female president of a major film studio (originally 20th Century Fox). The whole affair has that feel-good music and sound to it, but really, can't these creative people come up with other ways to give props to amazing people? The kitschy, cliche tone takes away from the person's achievements. Her acceptance speech is one hell of a well-written script. Could she have had Botox? Her face is quite, still for such an award.

Best Costume Design: Marie Antoinette. It's interesting that best costume design gets announced by two women in questionable frocks. But Meryl Streep's necklace might be worse, but she slipped into character seamlessly. We've got live-action examples of the outfits, it's a bit more interesting than the sketches they usually show...but not too much. I'm amused at watching these women for Prada try to out-act Streep. Marie Antoinette has nabbed the Best Costume award. Milena Canonero is looking very distinguished in her tux. Who was the last woman to actually wear a classic tux at awards
And now.. Academy award winning screenwriter - Ben Affleck! I just love the sound of that. It's hard to remember, but he was going somewhere before his first group of Bennifer days. The Affleck pie is getting topped off by writers on-screen. It's a pretty good collection of clips. I know what my next movie fest will be.

Best Adapted Screenplay: The Departed. Helen Mirren is so beautiful, and Tom Hanks is over-talking again. There's just something about Mirren doing a voice-over for Borat that gives the film a whole new feel. Tom isn't as good at the script reading, but it's hard to compete with the Queen. And the Oscar goes to.. The Departed?? What on earth just happened here?! Children of Men has been robbed. There's a nod to Peter O'Toole, a quivering voice (possible drugged?) and I'm just disappointed.

Best Animated Feature: Happy Feet -- While my friend counts the layers of makeup, I'm still mesmerized by Cameron Diaz's large earrings. Now here are the very short list since Luc Besson's half live-action ))) messed things up. Out of the "dynamically dimensional" nominees, the award goes to... Happy Feet! Abigail Breslin looks a little more awake now. Henry Miller looks pretty dapper in his tux. (I refuse to make the obvious joke.) At least his acceptance speech is nice and brief.
Now that Erik has covered most of the little-interest awards, we've got clips of The Departed with lots of voice-overs. And then, the song for Cars. I, personally, could do without Randy Newman, but I don't mind the James Taylor. (And at least this isn't a really tacky, goofy feel-good song. I feel like I'm riding in my mom's car, listening to her 272 JT tapes.

And now we've got Melissa Etheridge. Her song is good and all, but I prefer Ryan Seacrest singing Come to my Window for Rinko Kikuchi. Why do two slow songs back to back? At least we're learning handy globe-saving tips, or at least those in the audience are, half of ours are cut by the camera movements.

Thrice and Vice! What rhyming. Now it is time for Gore and DiCaprio. Leo suggests that Gore should announce something. Unfortunately, no presidential declarations for us, but we've got lots more info to do our part. Jerry Seinfeld looks less than titillated. Awh, DiCaprio tries again. Gore pulls out a paper... Gore's presidential declaration was cut off by those Academy bastards!

*Thanks to Saki for the correction!

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