Oscars 2007: And the Winners are...

by Brian Eggert
2/26/2007

There were plenty of upsets last night. Although, the bounty of should wins did and were numerous enough for me to come away pleased. The Departed, not surprisingly, won the night with four Oscars (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Editing, and Best Adapted Screenplay). The next greatest amount of wins came from Pan’s Labyrinth’s three statues for Art Direction, Makeup, and Cinematography. The biggest upset of the night was perhaps that Pan’s lost the Best Foreign Film award, but somehow beat out Children of Men for Cinematography (there was no contest here—Children of Men should have won for camerawork). Regardless of the upsets, I was pleased, as Martin Scorsese finally got his due.

Ellen Degeneres did a wonderful job of hosting, I thought. There were a couple priceless moments in the ceremony—namely Ellen asking Spielberg to take her and Clint Eastwood’s picture and then telling him to center it on the second try. And then there was Ellen giving her "script" to Scorsese, who just played right along. These moments were human, allowing filmic mega-icons to show their sense of humor. That’s what viewers want to see, not interpretive body sculptures…

In what may have been one of the longest Academy Award ceremonies of all time, I’m struggling to understand what the producers of last night’s show were thinking. Does it have to take four hours? Did we need silhouette dancers building themselves into the Snakes on a Plane logo? As entertaining as some of this stuff was, the show lost its momentum half-way due to the endless array of baggage of filler. Do we need several compilation video pieces, because one will do… Do we need a sound effects choir? Do we need commemorative awards for which it takes twenty minutes to present? If the producers of the ceremony trimmed out some of this crap, audiences wouldn’t tune out half way through.

The best feature to the show was the song sung by Will Ferrell, Jack Black, and John C. Reilly. Hysterically commenting on how comedy is rarely acknowledged by the Academy, Reilly points out that mixing artistic and commercial successes will garner an Oscar nod. Just seeing those three hilarious goons on stage poking fun at themselves was a treat. Moments like this are why we watch the Oscars…

There were plenty of surprises last night: Alan Arkin happily won for Best Supporting Actor for Little Miss Sunshine over the virtual shoe-in Eddie Murphy (who apparently left the audience after losing). Dreamgirls’ three nominated songs lost to Mellisa Ethridge’s “I need to wake up” from Best Documentary Feature winner An Inconvenient Truth. And Dreamgirls, which everyone thought was going to win big time, only took home two Oscars.

Unfortunately, Jennifer Hudson won for Best Supporting Actress over four other REAL actresses. I won’t be surprised if we never hear from her again. And if we do hear from her, it’ll probably be in a musical or a commercial… I really can’t see how someone can justify giving Hudson an Oscar when there was an actresses like Cate Blanchett nominated… I just don’t get it; she was an American Idol star!?! What the hell?

Oh, and, for anyone wondering what was up with Jack Nicholson… He looked bloated and was sporting a shaved head. Not in his normal slicked back hair and sly grin, Ole Jack shaved his head for a movie he’s making called The Bucket List in which he plays a cancer patient. So, that explains why he looked the part...

Of course, I couldn’t be happier with The Departed’s wins. With its Best Picture and Best Director awards, the film will deservedly go down in film history books as a classic. Hopefully this win will be only the first for Scorsese, as the man shows no sign of slowing productions or artistic invention. I also hope many more for Thelma Schoonmaker, Scorsese’s editor since the 1980’s. Schoonmaker adds a fast-paced artistry to Scorsese films, giving his work a flowing majesty only equaled by Scorsese’s direction. She previously won for The Aviator and Raging Bull, and was also nominated for Gangs of New York, Goodfellas, and the documentary Woodstock. In total, she’s edited 17 Scorsese films.

I loved that Graham King, awarded the last Oscar of the night for his producing of The Departed, acknowledged the talent of Leonardo DiCaprio. I’m still upset DiCaprio wasn’t nominated for The Departed, as it was truly an award-worthy performance. But at the very least it was nice to hear the actor recognized for his talent from the winner of the most important Oscar of the night.

I hope you enjoyed the show and all of your favorites won. That said, below is a list of the winners highlighted in RED… I also placed an asterix next to the winner if I predicted it to win. I guessed 12 out of 24, but if you look back in January at my predictions, I only guessed at 19 of the 24 awards. So, all in all, not too bad.

Best Picture
THE DEPARTED*
BABEL
LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA
THE QUEEN

Actor in a Leading Role
Forest Whitaker, THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND*
Peter O'Toole, VENUS
Will Smith, THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS
Leonardo DiCaprio, BLOOD DIAMOND
Ryan Gosling, HALF NELSON

Actress in a Leading Role
Helen Mirren, THE QUEEN*
Judi Dench, NOTES ON A SCANDAL
Kate Winslet, LITTLE CHILDREN
Penelope Cruz, VOLVER
Meryl Street, THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA

Best Director
Martin Scorsese, THE DEPARTED*
Paul Greengrass, UNITED 93
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, BABEL
Stephen Frears, THE QUEEN
Clint Eastwood, LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA

Actor in a Supporting Role
Eddie Murphy, DREAMGIRLS
Alan Arkin, LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
Mark Wahlberg, THE DEPARTED
Djimon Hounsou, BLOOD DIAMOND
Jackie Earle Haley, LITTLE CHILDREN

Actress in a Supporting Role
Jennifer Hudson, DREAMGIRLS*
Adriana Barraza, BABEL
Rinko Kinkuchi, BABEL
Abigail Breslin, LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
Cate Blanchett, NOTES ON A SCANDAL

Best Original Screenplay
THE QUEEN
LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE
BABEL
LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA
PAN'S LABYRINTH

Best Adapted Screenplay
THE DEPARTED*
LITTLE CHILDREN
NOTES ON A SCANDAL
BORAT
CHILDREN OF MEN

Best Original Score
BABEL*
THE GOOD GERMAN
NOTES ON A SCANDAL
PAN'S LABYRINTH
THE QUEEN

Best Animated Film
HAPPY FEET
CARS
MONSTER HOUSE

Best Foreign Film
PAN'S LABYRINTH
AFTER THE WEDDING
WATER
DAYS OF GLORY (INDIGENES)
THE LIVES OF OTHERS

Best Art Direction
PAN'S LABYRINTH*
DREAMGIRLS
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN’S CHEST
THE GOOD SHEPHERD
THE PRESTIGE

Best Cinematography
CHILDREN OF MEN
THE PRESTIGE
THE ILLUSIONIST
THE BLACK DAHLIA
PAN'S LABYRINTH

Best Costume Design
DREAMGIRLS
MARIE ANTOINETTE
CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER
THE QUEEN
THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA

Best Documentary Feature
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH
DELIVER US FROM EVIL
IRAQ IN FRAGMENTS
JESUS CAMP
MY COUNTRY, MY COUNTRY

Best Documentary (Short Subject)
THE BLOOD OF YINGZHOU DISTRICT
RECYCLED LIFE
REHEARSING A DREAM
TWO HANDS

Best Film Editing
BABEL
THE DEPARTED--Thelma Schoonmaker*
UNITED 93
CHILDREN OF MEN
BLOOD DIAMOND

Best Makeup
PAN'S LABYRINTH*
APOCALYPTO
CLICK

Best Short Film (Animated)
THE DANISH POET
LIFTED
THE LITTLE MATCHGIRL
MAESTRO
NO TIME FOR NUTS

Best Short Film (Live-Action)
BINTA AND THE GREAT IDEA (BINTA Y LA GRAN IDEA)
ÉRAMOS POCOS (ONE TOO MANY)
HELMER & SON
THE SAVIOUR
WEST BANK STORY

Best Sound Editing
APOCALYPTO
BLOOD DIAMOND
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST
FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS
LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA*

Best Sound Mixing
DREAMGIRLS*
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST
FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS
BLOOD DIAMOND
APOCALYPTO

Best Visual Effects
POSEIDON
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: DEAD MAN'S CHEST*
SUPERMAN RETURNS

Best Original Song
“Love You I Do” – DREAMGIRLS, Jennifer Hudson
“Listen” – DREAMGIRLS, Beyonce Knowles
“I Need to Wake Up” - AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, Melissa Etheridge
“Patience” – DREAMGIRLS, Eddie Murphy
“Our Town” - CARS, James Taylor