'Hurt Locker' Brings The Pain To 'Avatar'

The 82nd Annual Academy Awards happened tonight.  The beginning was incredibly awkward, with the ten nominees for Best Actor and Actress lined up on stage, trying not to fidget as they were announced and the roles they were nominated for listed.  It looked a bit like a beauty pageant where everyone knows the winner has already been determined.

Next up was Neil Patrick Harris, finally squashing all those "straight" rumors with a musical number performed while dressed in an insanely flashy tuxedo.  Finally, after all that, hosts Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin were introduced, flying down from the heavens to grace us with a good old fashioned vaudeville act throughout the night.

The first award presented was Best Supporting Actor, given by Penelope Cruz to Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds. Waltz gave a speech that started with "uberbingo" and then led into a gracious thank you to Basterds director Quentin Tarantino.  Waltz did something very few people do after winning an Oscar, giving a speech that was almost like reading a storybook about how the film came to be, and how he came to have his part in it. "I was introduced to Quentin Tarantino, who was putting together an expedition that was equipped by Harvey Weinstein and Lawrence Bender and David Linde"

The next award, presented by Steve Carell and Cameron Diaz, was for Best Animated Feature Film, going, unsurprisingly, to Pixar's Up.  Director Pete Docter gave a pretty standard thank you speech.

Amanda Seyfried and Miley Cyrus gave the award for Best Original Song, which went to The Weary Kind from Crazy Heart, written by Ryan Bingham and T-Bone Burnett.  Ryan Bingham gave us the night's first groaner of a speech moment, "I'd like to thank my wife Anna, I love you more than rainbows, baby."

Best Original Screenplay was presented by Tina Fey and Robert Downey, Jr. to Mark Boal for The Hurt Locker, the first of six Oscars for the film during the evening.  Aside from mentioning his recently deceased father, Boal gave a pretty standard Oscar speech.

Molly Ringwald and Matthew Broderick beamed in from the 80s to introduce a eulogy to their mutual career starter, John Hughes.  The brief clip segment showed how Hughes touched the lives of just about every child of the 80s, with films like Ferris Bueller's Day Off and The Breakfast Club.  After the segment, the stage was filled with actors whose careers were started by Hughes, each telling a small story about how he touched their lives or how his films connected with their target audiences.  A fitting tribute for a man never actually nominated for an Academy Award.

Carey Mulligan and Zoe Saldana then came out to present the award for Best Animated Short Film, presenting it to Logorama.  The producer, Nicolas Schmerkin, had a great line, "It took, like, six years to make this 16 minutes, so I hope to come back here with a long feature film, in about 36 years."  

Mulligan and Saldana then stuck around to present Best Documentary (Short Subject), with it going to Music by Prudence.  Creators Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett looked star struck (if not more than a little drunk) before being played off.  A short snippet of said speech, "Oh my god. This is amazing. Two years ago when I got on an airplane and went to Zimbabwe, I never imagined in my wildest dreams that I'd end up here."

Finally, the same two presenters gave the Best Live Action Short Film Oscar to The New Tenants. Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson looked nervous as they gave a pretty standard "thank you list of people" speech.  Only one of the two winners was allowed to speak, as the cruel Oscar producers fired up the band again.

Ben Stiller then came out, in full Na'vi make-up, to present the award for best make-up. It went to the crew for Star Trek, the only picture in the line-up anyone has seen.  They thanked the Academy, J.J. Abrams, Bad Robot and Paramount Pictures...everyone they should.

Jake Gyllenhal and Rachel McAdams presented the award for Best Adapted Screenplay.  Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire overcame the competition to take its first award for the evening.  Writer Geoffrey Fletcher gave the best speech someone who's speechless can give, "I don't know what to say. This is for everybody who works on a dream every day. Precious boys and girls everywhere. All the cast and crew, anyone who's kept believing in me. My two brothers, supported me in every way. My role models, my heroes, Buddy and Todd. My mother, Bettye, angel of my world. My father, Alphonse, who spent so much time with us and taught us everything. I'm sorry I'm drawing a blank right now, but I thank everyone."

Queen Latifah then introduced the clips from The Governors Awards, a way to keep lesser "honorary" awards off the main Oscar stage and move the show along at a faster clip (yeah, right).

Robin Williams ran on stage and interrupted Roger Corman and Lauren Bacall's standing ovation to present the award for Best Supporting Actress, with it going to Mo'nique for Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire.  Mo'nique's win was no surprise to anyone, including her, so she came prepared with a thorough, but mercifully brief, speech, covering Oprah Winfrey and everyone else she needed to.

Well known Amazon Sigourney Weaver took the stage to present the award for Best Art Direction, with it going to Rick Carter, Robert Stromberg and Kim Sinclair from Avatar. The crew came up and thanked James Cameron, and a bunch of other people.

Tom Ford and Sarah Jessica Parker then came out, dressed in designer duds, of course, to present the award for Best Costume Design.  The Oscar was presented to the designer for The Young Victoria, Sandy Powell.  Acknowledging that this was her third Oscar, and the surprise had worn off a bit, her speech included the phrase, "I'd like to dedicate this one to the costume designers that don't do movies about dead monarchs or glittery musicals. The designers that do the contemporary films and the low-budget ones actually don't get as recognized as they should do, and they work as hard."

Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner then came out to awkwardly introduce a tribute to horror films.  We finally got to see Freddy Krueger at the Oscars.  He was there with Chucky, Jason and the leprechaun from Leprechaun.  For some reason, Twilight is included with the horror films.  Only thing scary about that is people paying to watch it.

Zac Efron and Anna Kendrick kept the young theme going, presenting the award for Best Sound Editing to Paul N.J. Ottosson for The Hurt Locker.  I couldn't really pay attention to his speech, because he looked like zombie Christopher Walken.  He said something about "Twenty-three years ago, I... sold everything I had to come and be part of what you guys do over here."  Kendrick and Efron stuck around to present another trophy to Ottosson along with Ray Beckett for Best Sound Mixing, also for The Hurt Locker.

Elizabeth Banks then came out to talk about the Academy's Scientific and Technical Awards, another group of people not important enough for the main stage.

Sandra Bullock was tasked with presenting the award for Best Cinematography to Mauro Fiore for Avatar.  An odd choice on the surface, but if you look at how the world of Avatar was created, the award does make sense. Fiore also thanked James Cameron and some other people.

Demi Moore then came out of hiding to introduce the annual legacy segment, looking back at all the Hollywood players who passed away in the prior year, or at least the ones not fortunate enough to be John Hughes.  Apparently Farrah Fawcett didn't warrant a mention.

Jennifer Lopez and Sam Worthington attempted to break the melancholy mood from looking at clips of Patrick Swayze and Brittany Murphy to introduce a bizarre dance troupe and present the award for Best Original Score to Michael Giacchino for Up.  Giacchino did the classic Oscar speech where his parents let him play with a camera, and that's why he was standing there. He then told kids to get out there and be creative.

Gerard Butler and Bradley Cooper presented the award for Best Visual Effects to the crew from Avatar.  They thanked James Cameron, and a bunch of other people.  Andrew Jones didn't get to speak, but I'm sure we'll hear about what it was like on the VFX Podcast.

Matt Damon presented the award for Best Documentary Feature to The Cove, a documentary about dolphin slaughter in Japan.  Fisher Stevens and Louie Psihoyos gave a great, short speech, before being cut off because of a big sign asking people to text in support of ending the dolphin killing.  The Oscars don't like politics, even when they're directly related to the political film they just gave an award to (just ask Michael Moore).

Tyler Perry presented the award for Best Film Editing to Bob Murawski and Chris Innis for The Hurt Locker.  They thanked Kathryn Bigelow, and a whole lot of other people, in a short, but quickly spoken speech.  The show was running long, and the fear of the band was palpable.

Pedro Almodovar and Quentin Tarantino then presented Best Foreign Language Film to The Secret In Their Eyes (El Secreto de Sus Ojos) from Argentina.  The quickly spoken, accented speech by Juan José Campanella included a nod to the Academy for not considering Na'vi a foreign language.

Finally, coming into the home stretch of a long Oscar show, Best Actor was introduced, with a short segment about each nominee by Michelle Pfeiffer, Colin Farrel, Vera Farmiga, Julianne Moore and Tim Robbins.  The award was presented by Kate Winslet to Jeff Bridges for Crazy Heart.  After a standing ovation from the live audience, Bridges sauntered on stage and graciously thanked a long line of collaborators, starting with his deceased mother and father.  "Thank you, Mom and Dad, for turning me on to such a groovy profession. Oh, my dad and my mom, they loved show biz so much. I remember my mom, getting all of us kids to entertain at her parties. You know, my dad sitting me on his bed and teaching me all of the basics of acting for a role in Sea Hunt."

Best Actress was introduced by Michael Sheen, Peter Sarsgaard, Oprah Winfrey, Forest Whittaker and Stanley Tucci, using the same method as the Best Actor prize. The Oscar was presented clumsily by Sean Penn to Sandra Bullock for The Blind Side, meaning she is the first person to ever earn a Razzie and an Oscar in the same weekend (and she personally accepted both).  "Did I really earn this, or did I just wear you all down", began her acceptance speech.  She also took time to acknowledge the other nominees, "Gabby, I love you so much. You are exquisite. You are beyond words to me. Carey, your grace and your elegance and your beauty and your talent makes me sick. Helen, I feel like we are family through family and I don't have the words to express just what I think of you. And Meryl, you know what I think of you and you are such a good kisser."

For the penultimate award, Best Director, Barbara Streisand gave the Oscar to Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker, making her the first woman to ever win the prize. An obviously grateful and somewhat shaken Bigelow thanked the soldiers battling around the world, and a laundry list of her collaborators on the film.  "There's no other way to describe it, it's the moment of a lifetime."

Finally, in a show that ran about 45 minutes long, Tom Hanks came out to present Best Picture to the big winner of the evening, The Hurt Locker, thus giving the Oscars a new lowest-grossing Best Picture winner of all time.  Based on the numbers, you probably haven't seen The Hurt Locker, but you should; it's fantastic,  and Hollywood agrees.