“I’m here at the Academy Awards, otherwise known as the White People’s Choice Awards.”
With that, the 88th Annual Academy Awards, doomed forever to be known as “The Racist Oscars,” were off. Unafraid to address the very large, white elephant in the room, host Chris Rock proved right from the beginning he was exactly what the telecast needed.
He kicked off the show with a blistering monologue, addressing the #OscarsSoWhite controversy and the resulting boycott right off the bat.
“They’re not gonna cancel the Oscars because I quit ... and the last thing I need is to lose another job to Kevin Hart, okay?” Rock said.
Rock started strong, but things took a bit of a turn about halfway through with some ill-advised jokes about Asian child labor. Despite many complaints about beating a dead horse with the diversity jokes, I think they had to address it head on, which they definitely did.
I do, however, think that a certain level of respect towards other underrepresented groups should have been a must.
Keeping the conversation completely limited to black vs. white seems counterproductive when the ultimate call should have been for equal representation for all minorities. However, Rock was both funny and cutting, and I can’t imagine another host doing better in this particular year.
The rest of the night contained a lot of filler bits that really could have been cut in favor of a shorter runtime, which seemed endless at 212 minutes.
Even I can barely stay interested that long.
The order of awards was switched up this year, beginning with Best Original Screenplay for “Spotlight,” which took the first and last awards of the night and nothing in between.
Swede Alicia Vikander took Best Supporting Actress as the first acting winner of the night for the “The Danish Girl.”
The show then surprised us all by worshipping at the altar of George Miller as “Mad Max: Fury Road” took one technical award after another.
A24 indie ‘Ex Machina” shocked by winning Best Visual Effects, beating both “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and “Mad Max: Fury Road.”
Almost as surprising was Sylvester Stallone’s loss to Mark Rylance for Best Supporting Actor. Surprising, but totally deserved.
Somehow Sam Smith’s Bond theme “Writing’s On The Wall” beat Lady Gaga’s “Till It Happens To You” for Best Original song, which literally no one except Sam Smith was happy about.
He followed his win with an odd and totally incorrect comment about being the first openly gay Oscar winner. When corrected in the press room, he then was quick to assume he was the second. Nope, not that either.
Alejandro G. Iñárritu, as expected, took home his second consecutive Best Director award for “The Revenant,” becoming only the fourth director ever to do so. His win was followed by the two best bets of the night, Best Actress for Brie Larson and Best Actor for Leonardo DiCaprio.
Now that Leo has finally won, who will we complain about now until The Academy gives them an Oscar just to shut us up? Johnny Depp? Gary Oldman? Amy Adams? Just kidding about that last one, she’s already been winless more times than Leo and no one cares.
Finally, the last and most debated award of the night: Best Picture.
“Spotlight” won, thank God, and our faith in the world was restored — despite the fact it’s the first film in over 60 years to win Best Picture with only one other Oscar win.
All things considered, this year’s Academy Awards will be remembered for two things: Leo’s win and the #OscarsSoWhite controversy. Despite the lowest ratings in eight years, it was a pretty solid show and rewarded a deserving array of winners.
Honestly, as long as this means the end of the Leo versus Oscars memes, I’m a happy camper.
@Kate__Halliwell
