Sunday, February 27, 2011

THE 83rd ANNUAL ACADEMY AWARD WINNERS

So...... a little award show happened just now. Wasn't a big deal or anything. You know... it's just the Oscars. The greatest holiday ever since St. Patrick's Day. So anyway, I've been blogging simultaneously with the awards ceremony which was a fair distribution of prizes as predicted.

The King's Speech took home the Best Picture award along with 3 other awards in Directing, Actor in a Leading Role and Original Screenplay. Along with it was Inception packing in 4 awards all in the technical categories and The Social Network winning 3 in Music, Editing and Adapted Screenplay.
2 awards were given to Toy Story 3 for Best Animated Feature and Original Song while trashy underdog The Fighter took home awards for Melissa Leo and Christian Bale for their supporting roles. Alice In Wonderland also took home 2 awards for Costume Design and Art Direction. While Black Swan claims the Best Actress prize for Natalie Portman.

The full list of winners are below. And.... GO:

BEST PICTURE
•The King's Speech
•127 Hours
•The Social Network
•Toy Story 3
•True Grit
•Winter's Bone 
•Black Swan
•The Fighter
•Inception
•The Kids Are All Right

BEST DIRECTOR
Tom Hooper- The King's Speech
David Fincher- The Social Network
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen- True Grit 
Darren Aronofsky- Black Swan
David. O. Russell- The Fighter

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
Colin Firth- The King's Speech
James Franco- 127 Hours 
Javier Bardem- Biutiful
Jeff Bridges- True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg- The Social Network

BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
Natalie Portman- Black Swan
Michelle Williams- Blue Valentine 
Annette Bening- The Kids Are All Right
Nicole Kidman- Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence- Winter's Bone

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Christian Bale- The Fighter
John Hawkes- Winter's Bone
Jeremy Renner- The Town
Mark Ruffalo- The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush- The King's Speech 

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Melissa Leo- The Fighter
Hailee Steinfeld- True Grit
Jacki Weaver- Animal Kingdom 
Amy Adams- The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter- The King's Speech

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone 
127 Hours

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
The King's Speech 
Another Year
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
•In A Better World
•Incendies
•Outside the Law
•Biutiful
•Dogtooth

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
•Toy Story 3
•How to Train Your Dragon
•The Illusionist

BEST ART DIRECTION
•Alice In Wonderland
•Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
•Inception
•The King's Speech
•True Grit

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
•Inception
•The King's Speech
•The Social Network
•True Grit
•Black Swan

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
•Alice in Wonderland
•I Am Love
•The King's Speech
•The Tempest
•True Grit

BEST FILM EDITING
•The Social Network
•Black Swan
•The Fighter
•The King's Speech
•127 Hours
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
•Inside Job
•Restrepo
•Waste Land
•Exit Through the Gift Shop
•Gasland
BEST MAKEUP
•The Wolfman
•Barney's Version
•The Way Back
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
•The Social Network
•How to Train Your Dragon
•Inception
•The King's Speech
•127 Hours
BEST ORIGINAL SONG
•We Belong Together from Toy Story 3
•Coming Home from Country Strong
•I See the Light from Tangled
•If I Rise from 127 Hours
BEST SOUND MIXING
•Inception
•The King's Speech
•Salt
•The Social Network
•True Grit

BEST SOUND EDITING
•Inception
•Toy Story 3
•Tron: Legacy
•True Grit
•Unstoppable

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
•Inception
•Iron Man 2
•Alice In Wonderland
•Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1
•Hereafter
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT FILM
•Strangers No More
•Sun Come Up
•The Warriors of Qiugang
•Killing in the Name
•Poster Girl
BEST ANIMATED SHORT FILM
•The Lost Thing
•Madagascar, A Journey Diary
•Day & Night
•The Gruffalo
•Let's Pollute
BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM
•God of Love
•Na Wewe
•Wish 143
•The Confession
•The Crush

It is slightly disappointing that  misplaced heavyweights like True Grit, Winter's Bone and 127 Hours left empty handed. It's even more disappointing that The Social Network didn't win Best Picture, which was what I was hoping for. Now before anyone goes off on me about how great Speech was, let me explain.

The King's Speech is the better film, but Network is the more important one. Up until now, we haven't had a film immortalized in the Academy that captures our generation and our time. The old days had Casablanca, Lawrence of Arabia and On The Waterfront. The 60's had West Side Story, Tom Jones and My Fair Lady. The 70's had The Godfather and The Sting. The 80's had Kramer Vs. Kramer, Ghandhi and Terms of Endearment. The 90's had Titanic and Forrest Gump.

We haven't had that movie yet that people 50 years from now will look back and remember the Internet generation and technology and youth revolution. The Social Network was our movie. That was supposed to be our time. The King's Speech is just yet another fantastic British film under the shadows of other fantastic British films that will be forgotten in a year or two. Seriously, name me another British period piece that will stand the test of time longer than the likes of Raging Bull or Avatar or Tootsie.

That's just my opinion. Would love to hear comments. Anyway, congrats to the winners and I'll see ya'll next year.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

Oscar Special: Best Picture Winners From 1929-2010

So last year I did this post where I had all the posters of every film that has won Best Picture since the Oscars started in 1929 and people seemed to love it, so I guess this is going to be a new blog tradition on Oscar time.

Personally I've only seen 56 of these, Yes shameful I know. Leave a comment below, whats your favorite Best Picture winner and why? I'll be back with the winners of the 2011 Academy Awards tomorrow!

1929

 1930                                                       1931

  
 1932                                                      1933

 1934                                                    1935

 
 1936                                                    1937

 
 1938                                                    1939
1940

 
 1941                                   1942                                 1943

1944

 
1945                                                          1946

 
 1947                                                   1948

 
1949                                                    1950
1951

 
 1952                                 1953                                  1954

1955

 
 1956                                                    1957
 
 1958                                                     1959

1960

1961

1962

1963

1964                                                      1965

1966

 
 1967                                                   1968

 
1969                                                    1970

 
1971                                                            1972

1973

 
1974                                                      1975
 1976                                 1977                                  1978

 1979                                                      1980

 1981                                                    1982

1983

1984                                                     1985

1986                                  1987                                  1988

1989                                                    1990

1991

 1992                                                     1993

1994
1995

 1996                                                     1997    

1998

 
1999                                                        2000

2001

 
2002                                                      2003

2004

 
2005

 
2006

2007

2008
2009

2010