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Welcome to Cinematical's official liveblogging of the 79th Annual Academy Awards (which is currently being aired live on ABC)! 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 ...

Yes! The dance troupe returns ... for some more rolling shadow-dancing. Okay, that's it for me. Enjoy the rest of the night; Monika is next up to bat. Go Sunshine!

Best Supporting Actor: Alan Arkin. I'm sorry, but Rachel Weisz looks stunning. Damn you Darren! Damn you! She's nervous, but who cares? She's dazzling. Alan Arkin wins! Do push-ups! Do push-ups! And the Academy gets one right. I love it -- he reads his speech like he's toasting a couple at a wedding. Mazel Tov, Alan. You deserve this one.

Best Sound Mixing: Dreamgirls. Jessica Biel and James McAvoy (in his sexy Scottish accent) present the award. Oh, just throw a pint at someone in the audience already! And Dreamgirls (nominated for 8 awards tonight) takes home their first. Thanks Bill Condon! You didn't get nominated for best picture, but it's okay -- your movie made me want to dance. And dance hard!

Best Sound Editing: Letters from Iwo Jima. Steve Carell and Greg Kinnear show up ... and Steve makes a silly sexually-related sound editing joke. (Wasn't it better when they mixed these awards in somewhere in the middle?) Will this be the only award for Letters? Is this Clint's token award? This guy reads his speech like a fourth-grade book report. It's okay dude, the kids won't laugh at you. (I will, though.)

A salute to sound and cinema? Man, I'm getting the shaft in this first hour. Everyone is whistling. Thank God I'm not sober; this is actually pretty entertaining for some reason.

Best Live Action Short: West Bank Story. And the kids get to stay on for one more; Christopher Jada Mohammed Scorsese Smith makes a short joke. Classic! West Bank Story wins. I love these little voice-overs while the nominees walk up to snatch their award. I think this dude jumped out of a helicopter while he was filming, and blew something up. That's what I heard, at least ...

Best Animated Short: The Danish Poet. Oohh, the kids get to do one. How cute? Abigail Breslin and Christopher Will Smith Jada Pinkett Something or Other look adorable on stage together. Where will they be (and who will they be doing) ten years from now? That's what Ryan Seacrest wants to know. The Danish Poet wins. And all I want is for Christopher Jayden Pinkett Wahlberg to drop-kick someone.

Best Achievement in Make-Up: Pan's Labyrinth. After the greatest awards intro ever, Pan's Labyrinth takes home its second award of the night. Take that Click! We're definitely off to a good start -- get these snore awards out of the way, and let the good stuff take over.

Ha, I love the afro Will Ferrell is sporting! He's singing a song about how the Oscars screw comedies each and every year. Jack Black pops up; this could be good. "Leo, do you think you can date supermodels and win awards?" Best. Line. Ever. See, now why couldn't they just have these two guys host? John C. Reilly cuts in! Man, screw the awards -- I want these guys to sing all night. "I'm going to lose 40 pounds to play Ralph Nader." This is (and will be) the best part of the night.

Maggie G. looks good! And yet they give her the throwaway scientific awards category. Man, the Oscars kicked things off in a lame way this year, huh? Where's the juice? Where's the spark? And what's up with the rolling shadow-dancing?

Odds and ends from Thursday:

• If there ever were a Hollywood All-Star Game, then the cast of Wong Kar Wai's upcoming English-language debut, My Blueberry Nights, would certainly cut it as one of the teams involved. Just the other day, we told you how Natalie Portman was on board the project. Well, now comes word that Ed Harris has officially joined the cast along with the strong possibility that Kevin Spacey is not far behind him. Am I the only one who finds it fascinating that, with all the talent involved in this picture, Norah Jones, of all people, is taking on the lead role?
• Okay, I officially take back every nasty thing I've ever said about Eva Mendes. Does she look stunning in that picture above or what? Try. To. Keep. Focus. Breathe. Production Weekly reports that Mendes has signed on to star in the indie feature, Live! Don't you just love movie titles that come with exclamation points at the end, as if to say, "This movie is not just going to suck -- it's going to suck!" Pic will revolve around the head of programming (Mendes) for a network that decides to produce a reality show which would shell out $5 million to the person who doesn't die during a game of Russian Roulette. Sounds fascinating!
• Even though Cars is being released in just a couple weeks, Pixar is wasting no time promoting their next film, Ratatouille (or, "Let's see how many kids can actually pronounce this one.") A teaser trailer has popped up online and, although it's in French, the good folks over at AICN already have a handy translation guide to go along with it. Supposedly, this will be the same teaser that will play before Cars, only it will come in English with a side order of "Okay, we know Cars is going to suck -- but we promise we'll make it up to you with the next one." [Thanks to multiple tipsters for this one.]