Oscars in Rewind: Falling Slowly Provides Best Oscar Moment
Filed under: Awards, Oscar Watch, Trailers and Clips
A lot of people will be talking about Marion Cotillard today, whose teary-eyed acceptance speech was just beyond cute. But I feel the night's greatest moment came in two parts -- first when Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova performed Falling Slowly (from the movie Once) on stage, and then when both accepted the Oscar for best song. In a very cool moment, Irglova was cut off at the mic before she could thank anyone, and so after the commercial break Jon Stewart brought her back on stage to finish what she was about to say.
Talk about two kids who deserved a break. This song, from a film that was made for roughly $100,000, beat out Disney and their -- what? -- 13 Enchanted nominations. Was it me, or did each of those Enchanted songs sound exactly the same? This time, however, the Oscar went to the little guy (and girl). You could totally tell that there was a ton of love behind that song -- and even though it was obvious Hansard and Irglova were nervous at the beginning, they finished it off in spectacular fashion. Above, check out their performance at the Oscars, then head after the jump to see both acceptance speeches.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-25-2008 @ 1:16PM
The Addict said...
They deserved it. As I just said on the Slashfilm boards, this was the year for me falling in love with women that aren't my girlfriend - Ellen Page and Marketa Irglova. If I could only decide which one is more awesome.
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2-25-2008 @ 1:40PM
cory said...
I've been listening to the frames for a while now, and I'm really happy Glenn got this award. He deserves it!
Congrats!
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2-25-2008 @ 1:57PM
Christian Toto said...
Great comment, Addict ...
Maybe now "Once" will get the breakout success it so richly deserves, although it will do so via DVD sales/rentals. I shouted with joy when "Falling Slowly" was announced as the winner .... and I'm a grown man!
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2-25-2008 @ 2:05PM
Froggie said...
Me too Christian - I jumped off the couch, pumped my fist in the air and yelled when they were announced as the winners. And I'm 38.
Kind of annoyed with myself in reading Erik's post - I turned off my TV when they went to commercial right after Glen's speech, so I didn't see Marketa get to come back out.
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2-25-2008 @ 2:51PM
MCW said...
Everytime I see someone get cut off when they try and speak on the Academy Awards, it reaffirms why I hate the Academy. They spend all year preparing for a crappy show, and then they cut off every acceptance speech when person #2 tries to speak. If I was Marketa, I would've given the camera the finger, ha!
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2-25-2008 @ 2:54PM
mish said...
It reminded me of when three6mafia won for "Its hard out there for a pimp." Juicy J started out all nervous and then they ended the song in spectacular fashion.
Just jokes people...just jokes...
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2-25-2008 @ 3:19PM
David said...
What ticked me off about the staging of the song was how it ended -- not on the singers, but on a shot of 115-year-old Bill Conti conducting the unnecessary orchestra. Did you also notice how many times the last lines of someone's acceptance speech were covered by a shot of someone else in the audience?
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2-25-2008 @ 3:19PM
DAVID F said...
It was the best moment of the evening. Truly worthy and well-deserved. These guys are the real deal. Congrats to them and kudos to Stewart for geing a gentleman!
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2-25-2008 @ 4:50PM
AJ said...
...Yeah this was expected. It bothers me when people are like 'zomg the little film won' and it's just like yeah when wasn't it going to win?
Like some lady on ABC when they were doing should/will win was like [asking the movie guy] "Will superstars Johnny Depp or Michael Clayton win the big prize? or will veteran Tommy Lee Jones sweep it out from under them" and the movie guy just stared at her like she should've been institutionalized (mainly because she should have been)
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2-25-2008 @ 6:08PM
Nathan said...
This song is still not as good as Miss Misery by Elliott Smith, still think he was robbed. His song evoked more emotion in me than Celine Dion ever will.
At least it went to someone other than a big crappy Disney number.
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2-25-2008 @ 10:15PM
LPL said...
Absolutely the best moment of Oscar night. I loved this movie and the song was beautiful. I'm just so glad they won and beat out Disney...the little guys did it! I'm proud that the academy noticed this little film about love and music.
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2-26-2008 @ 11:16AM
Isorski said...
I am really excited that they won. I posted a review of Hansard and Irglova's recent concert in Portland, a Once movie review and also a bit about the Oscars on my blog. You’ll just have to scroll down on the right side and click on the “Glen Hansard” label to find all of it. http://isorski.blogspot.com/
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2-26-2008 @ 10:33PM
John T said...
It's a shame the Academy only seems to know how to shoot itself in the foot. Lowest-rated telecast ever, and within how many hours they have the finest moment of the broadcast swept off of Youtube? Just to make sure that no one sees it? I'd forgotten that they ended the performance with that extended shot of the geezer in the pit instead of those two incredible artists. More evidence that the Academy doesn't understand the first thing about entertainment. It seems so ill-prepared for the 21st century, and deserving of every bit of lost revenue from the internet.
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