The 79th Annual Academy Awards

It's Oscar Night. In HD. We have TV by Sony, a pizza in the oven, 50/50 handles the soda needs, and cashews from Emerald, just in case. Plus, I'm doing laundry, in case this gets dull.

8:30 We're looking live at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. Hey, it's "that announcer guy from the movies" handling voiceovers with some other lady. We have a montage of nominees from all categories in front of a white screen. "No, I've failed seven times, THIS will be my eighth." Gives a nice platform for what would be considered the minor awards to shine a bit.

8:35 All the nominees get to stand and be recognized. I thought that was kinda cool.

8:36 Ellen comes out. OK, she did that a while ago. Looks like white shoes and a red velvet suit. The international crowd gets some dap. She goes with a rather timid monologue about how big of a night this is for the nominees, make or break, if you will. She takes a jab at some of the nominees, including Peter O'Toole. Al Gore on camera, probably not the last time. Steve Carell sighting. Ellen's best line, "If there were no Blacks, Jews, or gays, there would be no Oscars. Or anyone named Oscar."

8:44 Some Gospel choir helps celebrate Oscar. Ugh.




















8:45 Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman, who looks stunning in red. Zero chemistry here, BTW. "Pan's Labyrinth" wins. Didn't see it. The winners appear to be seated in the lobby.

8:48 Maggie Gyllenhaal talks about the SciTech Oscars. I check on the pizza. Not done yet. These SciTech winners get shorter shrift with each passing year.

8:51 The Apple iPhone ad. Many movie people are saying, "Hello." My favorite: Jeff Bridges from the bowling alley in "The Big Lebowski". The Dude!











8:53 Will Farrell sings a song about comedians at the Oscars. How they never win, even though the movies make money, etc. Jack Black helps out. I am on the floor. They start calling out the nominees, I believe Black threatens to hit Peter O'Toole with his Nickelodeon Award. They decide not to mess with Mark Wahlberg. John C. Reilly comes out from the audience to lend a hand.

8:57 The boys present the Makeup Award. The winner, "Pan's Labyrinth". Didn't see it. Second award winner to get cut off at the mike.

8:59 Pizza's done. Ellen backstage: "Dame Judi Dench is not here. She's having "knee surgery"...on her eyes."

9:00 Abigail Breslin and son of Will Smith present animation awards. Animated Short is "The Danish Poet". Didn't see it. The winner beats the speech clock by a hair. Best Live Action Short goes to "West Bank Story". Jack is in the audience and he looks like Mr. Freeze.

9:04 I am officially bored. Usually a Supporting Award is already done.

9:12 A "Sound Effects Choir". This is really stupid. To quote Jimmy Johnson: "Duh-umb."

9:14 Best Sound Editing is given out by Steve Carrell and Greg Kinnear. Carell: "Sound editing is a lot like sex...it's best done alone, late at night, surrounded by electronic gadgets." "Letters From Iwo Jima" is your winner. Lots of war sounds. And look out for that flamethrower. Ouch!




















9:17 Jessica Beil, oooh baby. The guy from "Last King of Scotland" as support. Another sound award, this one in sound mixing. "Dreamgirls" wins. Is that fair? I mean it's a musical.





















9:20 Rachel Weisz gives out the Supporting Actor award. She's pretty. Alan Arkin is your winner. The first one for a heroin snorting Grandpa. Is that a Best Picture omen? I dunno. I'm just happy a major award has been bestowed. This has been pretty dull, kids, thus far.

9:25 Ellen drops off a manuscript to Martin Scorsese, just in case. OK, sorry for this lame description, but bad interpretive dance on my TV right now, depicting some movie.

9:30 Channeling the Grammys, it's Randy Newman and JT with a song from "Cars". JT looks demonic to me. Melissa Etheridge is up next with her "An Inconvenient Truth" song. Lots of political messages on the screen out back.





















9:36 It's Leo and Al Gore. Leo sets him up so he can talk about the "Climate Crisis". The Oscars are green this year. Envelopes recyclable? Gowns by Woody Harrelson? Am not sure what that means. Leo cannot verbally fellate the ex-VP anymore. It's sickening. Gore gets cut off by the orchestra as he's about to make a "major announcement". Now, I'm all for global warming or I should say the recognition of such, but does anyone trust the weather data instruments from the 1800's. Really? Just a thought.

9:45 "Academy Award-winning screenwriter" Ben Affleck introduces a clip about how writers are depicted in the movies. He cannot be more full of himself.

9:49 Tom Hanks and Helen Mirren are here for Best Adapted Screenplay. Borat at the rodeo? BTW, could not Borat be on to liven up these proceedings. He should do Foreign Film. The winner is "The Departed". "Valium does work."

9:55 Chris Connelly has some sort of homemade Tim Russert board in the form of a horse race. Who comes up with this crap? Hey, it's the Wes Anderson AMEX ad, which is better than any of the stuff I've seen, thus far.

9:59 Ellen shows up with an Oscar fanny pack apparatus. Not funny.

















10:00 OK, I dig Emily Blunt. She goes on stage with Anne Hathaway to intro the Costume Design award. They stay in character from "The Devil Wears Prada". They have live displays of the costumes. This is stupid. They should have snuck some of the stars out there in their costumes. "Marie Antoinette" is your winner. Didn't see it. The winner takes a long time to get on stage.

10:05 Tom Cruise presents the Humanitarian Award to Sherry Lansing. Lansing does lots of charity work and gets a standing O. But not for too long. Seems to me there may be many in the audience who hate her. I forgot she was married to Billy Friedkin. 90 minutes in and we better pep this baby up.

10:11 Ellen gets Spielberg to take a pic of her and Clint. Clint is jealous he did not get a screenplay.

10:12 Gwynnie gets the "Let's follow her out from backstage to the mike" treatment to present the Cinematography award. "Pan's Labyrinth" is your winner. Did I mention I have not seen this?

10:20 I just about kill my knee as I'm typing this. Naomi Watts and Robert Downey, Jr., who makes a nice reference to his drug use. Their award was Visual Effects. "Pirates of the Caribbean" is your winner.

10:23 Catherine Denueve and Ken Watanabe intro a montage of Foreign Language Film winners. She is still getting it done. It's amazing how few of these I've seen, maybe because you have to read them.

10:29 Seriously, I should have drank during this. Cate Blanchett and some guy I should know, present the Foreign Language Film. It goes to Germany for "Nurburgring Nights: The Story of Franz Bobby". No, it goes to "The Lives of Others". The winner speaks pretty good English, too.

10:32 Stupid dance troupe.

10:33 George Clooney! This means major awards. Jennifer Hudson wins Supporting Actress and acts like it's such a surprise. God with many shoutouts. The "speech" blows. You'd think her handlers would get her to prepare something by now.

10:39 I direct my venom toward the Vista "Wow!" ads. Piffle.

10:42 Two people I do not know (where are the Americans?) present Short Subject Doc. Looks Asian. Nope, did not see it.

10:44 It's Jerry Seinfeld! Clearly auditioning for the 2008 role as host, because he actually told a joke. Well, he reprised one from his tour about throwing your trash out at the cinema. It's the Outstanding Doc Feature. BTW, how did "Wordplay" not make it? Shocking, the Al Gore movie wins. Hey, this isn't the Golden Globes, the director brings everyone on stage and has Gore say a few words. Larry David's wife up there too, as producer.

10:50 Clint is on stage for the Lifetime Achievement Award to Ennio Morricone. He was nominated for some movies I haven't seen in a while, "The Mission" and "Bugsy". Hey, he also did "The Untouchables". Oh Christ, Celine Dion sings a world premiere of "I Knew I Loved You" from "Once Upon A Time In America". I'm stunned this is billed as a world premiere. It sounds like "A Fairytale in New York". Anyhow, Karen Filipelli's Dad, Quincy Jones, is in the guest booth. Wait a minute, so is Karen Filipelli! Morricone thinks he's in Italy and speaks Italian. Clint translates in that odd way where the other guy speaks for 90 seconds and you narrow it down to 10. I thought it funny the signing lady was signing while he was speaking Italian. Lots of gestures. He ended by saluting his wife with the Oscar.


















11:06 Penelope Cruz...don't speak...don't speak...too late. Hugh Jackman along for the ride as they present Best Score. It goes to "Babel". I saw it, but don't remember the music. BTW, as I type, Art Bell is using The Bangles as his bumper music. Jeezy creezy, another page of notes to go.

11:10 President of the Academy gets a 60-second spot to explain their work.

11:20 J-Lo introduces the "Dreamgirls" nominated songs. Ellen had earlier referred to as "Beyonce Knowles". How dated is that?

11:28 Queen Latifah and John Travolta for Best Original Song. Remember Melissa Etheridge from earlier? She won and thanked her wife. I had no idea Al Gore was this much of an inspiration.

11:40 Kate Winslet, who doesn't care about her weight according to the magazines I saw at the grocery, presents Film Editing. Marty's old friend, Thelma, wins for "The Departed". He cannot contain his emotions.

11:44 Jodie Foster arrives on stage and forgets where she needs to walk. It's the Dead People Scroll! Loudest applause went to Robert Altman, with Peter Boyle a surprising second.

11:51 Ellen jokes the show is over. Philip Seymour Hoffman presents Best Actress. It goes to Helen Mirren for "The Queen". The most obvious winner of the night actually wins.




















Somewhere around here Reese Witherspoon, who obviously got counseling on her wardrobe, presents Forest Whitaker with the Best Actor Oscar. Forest actually wrote down a speech that was pretty good. But he does act awfully strange at these events, doesn't he?

12:01 Ellen starts vacuuming the carpet in front of the front row and finds some rolling papers. Obviously, the band's. About time they involved the band in a joke. Carson would have nailed this down in the first half.

















12:06 Lookee here. Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg present Best Director. Hey, I thought the winners were secret. Isn't this overkill for Marty. There is a funny exchange where Francis and Steven talk about how great it is to win. Lucas reminds everyone he did not win. About fuckin' time, as Marty wins. "Could you double check the envelope?"

12:13 Diane Keaton and Jack present Best Picture. Diane has definitely had some work done lately. "The Departed" wins. I guess I need to see it now.

12:17 Confetti falls from the ceiling as Ellen bids us "Good night!"





















12:21 The producer, Laura Ziskin, breaks her time record for a Personal Best. Overall, a pretty dull affair. Not much humor, not much glamour, and lots of stupid shit. Oh, and finally, I think I missed Cameron Diaz giving out an award. I don't really get her, that's why I ignored her.

I also forgot Must have been when I was checking laundry, Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst introed something. What happened to that girl? Officially off the list.