Jon Stewart: Funnier behind a news desk. Bring back Steve Martin.
Did you notice that everyone stood very far away from Isaac Mizrhai? Every interview I saw was all about the women commanding maximum personal space.
Lauren Bacall: Staggering drunk. Who knew?
Dolly Parton! Oh. My. Goddess. It’s not the hideous plastic surgery, I think, so much as that everyone has the same hideous plastic surgery. The same huge floating lips. The same bulging yet shapely eyes. The same unnaturally carved cheekbones. Add that to her pre-existing wildly improbable figure and…I dunno, was she singing or something? My ears were ringing.
Joaquin Phoenix: Still in character.
The Academy seems to have decided that boring is the best way to do the Oscars. The presenters were on a very tight leash. JLo didn’t move her lips. Dustin Hoffman was sure that he’d never be invited back, because he dared to smile. Thank the gods for Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin (despite the latter’s very scary jacket thing). Instead of the tacky, splashy presentations of the past, we get meaningless montages. I mean, I love film noir. And epics. And message movies. Biopics, not so much. But other than acknowledging that these genres exist, was there a point? On the other hand, the homoerotic cowboy montage was a riot, and I loved the fake campaign ads.
Clooney: Good speech. Everyone else: Boring.
Advertisements for seeing the movies in movie theaters and snipes at watching on DVD. That is really annoying. That is, I think, more annoying than meaningless montages and presenters who are not allowed to move their lips at all.
Another annoyance? The camera in the audience. I have never seen so much inappropriate audience lingering. While Philip Seymour Hoffman was giving his acceptance speech, we actually saw more of Joaquin Phoenix, David Straithairn, Heath Ledger, Terrance Howard, and Hoffman’s mother than we did of Hoffman himself.
Crash wins best picture and shocks everyone. Pandemonium! The first genuinely interesting thing to happen all night.
Fashion thoughts
Has Hollywood banned jewelry? The only necklace in the place was on Keira Knightly (and wasn’t it fetching?). The only interesting earrings were on Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin, who were all dangly together while doing their fun thing for Altman. Reese Witherspoon had very nice earrings, and her dress was all spangly so that she didn’t need a necklace, but the evening was tragically low on glitter.
Boring dresses. Boring boring boring. Some ugly boring (Jennifer Garner) some lovely boring (Hillary Swank). But mostly the same sheath, with either a strapless or baby-doll neckline.
The other trend, besides boring, was the Scary Bow™. I am officially frightened of Charlize Theron’s shoulder armor. And Naomi Watts appeared to be pregnant with the world’s first chiffon fetus.
Best dressed: Salma Hayek (clearly compensating for last year’s gunnysack), Keira Knightly, Ziyi Zhang.
Worst dressed: Charlize Theron, Naomi Watts, Lily Tomlin, Jennifer Garner, and Sandra Bullock (whose pantyhose must have been waaaaay too big; they came right up to her bust!).
> Has Hollywood banned jewelry?
In a way, I think yes. I think there was recently some clarification of tax law explaining that the benefit derived from the loan of jewelry could be considered taxable income to the recipient. Takes away some of the incentive to wear big, loaned sparkly things if you have to pay for the privilege.
Very interesting! Still, don’t these women, y’know, own jewelry?
Well you heard what Jon Stewart said: some of those ladies could barely afford to cover both breasts! So how could we expect them to scrape together the money to be able to own their own baubles? What with all those DVDs being rampantly copied… *eye roll*
> The only necklace in the place was on Keira Knightly (and wasn’t it fetching?).
Michelle Williams?
Michelle Williams?
Good point. Still, look at all the bare necks: Witherspoon, Alba, Bullock, Latifah, Streep, Swank, Hayek, JLo, Garner, Keener, etc. etc.