The 78th Annual Academy Awards

Not only was this is a good show to watch, also most of the winners were surprising. No movie swept away the awards and the 'big' Oscars were evenly handed among the favorite movies of the evening. It made it a very unpredictable evening and because of that it also was fun to watch. It's never fun to see one movie just win all of the 'big' Oscars, especially when the movie is not deserving enough of it. So, for the more neutral and unbiased viewer, like myself, this was a great awards show in which the Adademy Awards, for me, regained some of its credibility and respect.

The show was fast paced and there weren't any slow or distracting moments. All of the presenters were good and didn't try to be forced funny all the time, like often in the past was the case. As for Jon Stewart, he surprised me. I never really had been a fan of him but he was a great presenter of the evening. Unlike the other presenters from the past, he stood there as a presenter that told some fun jokes in between and not as a comedian who tried to make the audience laugh with basically every single sentence. Stewart never overdid things and because of that he was a great presenter that also was fun to listen to.

A bit disappointing however were the montages. I normally always enjoy the montages during the Oscars but the montages used this year contained some weird and unimpressive movie choices at times. It also got a bit tiresome after a while when they kept repeating to the viewers that they should watch movies in theater's rather than home on DVD or on portable-DVD. It felt like one big, unpaid for, advert that in my opinion also was just totally pointless.

As for the winners...Like I said before, it was a great evening for the neutral movie-viewer. It was a mostly unpredictable evening, with some great and also some surprising winners. The Oscars were handed out extremely even and fair this year. "King Kong" took home 3 Oscar, as well as "Memoirs of a Geisha", "Crash" and "Brokeback Mountain". "King Kong" won the most important technical awards, "Memoirs of a Geisha" the most important visual awards and both "Crash" and "Brokeback Mountain" won the 'big' important awards. So, it was a very balanced evening for most movies.

Not all of the awards were a surprise though of course. Most movie buffs already knew that it was simply bound to happen once, that Philip Seymour Hoffman would win an Oscar for best actor and it really was no surprise to anyone that he won this year for his role in "Capote". It also was fairly determined that Reese Witherspoon would receive the Oscar for best actress, which she also did. Judi Dench already had received enough nominations and credit, plus she already won an Oscar once, Charlize Theron already one won recently, Keira Knightley will almost certainly still win an Oscar later within about 5 or maybe 10 years, the way her career progresses at the moment. She's young, talented and beautiful, so she'll get there. And Felicity Huffman...yeah right, like she even had a chance. So no, also Reese Witherspoon was surely no surprise, also because she already had won many other big awards this year for her role in "Walk the Line". Also no real surprises were; "La Marche de l'empereur" for best documentary feature, "Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" for best animated feature film and George Clooney for his supporting role in the movie "Syriana". Clooney was nominated two more times, first best screenplay and directing for "Good Night, and Good Luck.". Three nominations, so he was almost bound to receive one. For best screenplay and best directing would had been too controversial, so giving him one for his acting seemed like a fair and predictable move. Clooney himself also knew that he wouldn't receive the Oscar for best screenplay or directing after he had one the best supporting actor award.

Of course biggest surprise of the evening was "Crash" winning the best picture award, especially after Ang Lee already had won the best director award during the evening. Everyone basically assumed that "Brokeback Mountain" would win best picture and most of the other important awards of the evening, with maybe "Good Night, and Good Luck." as the most important underdog. Yeah sure "Crash" had 6 nominations this evening but honestly, who would had ever expected it to win so many and important awards. The movie almost didn't seem to make a chance to win against "Brokeback Mountain" and any of the other movies nominated. But yet it won, which is good for the unpredictability, surprise and credibility level of this year's award ceremony.

All in all, "The 78th Annual Academy Awards" was an unpredictable and fun evening with a good presented- and fast show set around it. 2005 was a great and competitive year for the Oscar's. No one will totally agree with the Oscar's handed out this year but for the neutral viewer there was plenty to enjoy.

8/10

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I was surprised to find Don Knotts left out of the Memoriam section during this years awards. He's one of the most beloved comics of his generation. His films made a fortune? GHOST AND MR. CHICKEN. THE INCREDIBLE MR. LIMPETT. Classics. I know Barney Fife was a TV character, but still, he's one of the most influential comedians of the post-War years. And he didn't even get a mention in the Memorial section? Let's not go into the fact that the composer of the GODZILLA theme was left out. That might be consider an obscure credit for an American awards show. But Don Knotts? Who's more classic that Don Knotts? What's up with that?

Jon Stewart, I suppose gave a good well done performance this year as MC of the 78th Academy Awards show. He's been known to be a lot funnier, but was a joy instead of seeing the usual regular hosts that normally include Billy Crystal, Steve Martin and Whoopi Goldberg. His funny remarks to the 'gay' films this year were funny though.

This year, the top prize of Best Picture was awarded to the independent feature 'Crash' starring Matt Dillion who also was nominated for Best Actor, but instead lost the award to the rather underrated character actor Phillip Seymore Hoffman for his role as the title character in 'Capote'. By far, I had actually expected that Joaquin Phoenix would win Best Actor for his performance as another title character this last year as legendary singer Johnny Cash in 'Walk the Line'. Nonetheless, his leading lady Reese Witherspoon gave a wonderful performance as June Cash in the film, which resulted her in a very much deserved Best Actress honor. For the supporting roles, Rachel Weiz got Supporting Actress, and George Clooney got Supporting Actor. Other films that got Academy Award notice included the gay romance film of two cowboys, "Brokeback Mountain" starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhall, both were nominated for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor respectively; Steven Spielberg's 'Munich' got Best Picture nod and one film that was particularly overlooked was the summer's blockbuster remake of 'King Kong' which got more of less of Special Visual Effects recongization.

The winner of Best Song was very very shocking, 'Hard Out there for a Pimp' was awarded to Three Hit Mafia and in turn it was quite an uproar as well.

The other annual events that are shown at Oscar included the honorary segment, this year awarded to director Robert Altman; legendary actress Lauren Bacall presented a tribute to film-noir movies from the 40's and 50's; as a tribute to the much controversial gay films done this year, the Academy showed clips of western films with funny gay themes just for laughs anyway, and then there was usual touching In Memoriam tribute paying respects to film industry members that passed away in the previous year which included: Teresa Wright, Pat Morita, director Robert Newmyer, Dan O'Herhily, Vincent Schivelli, director Robert Wise, Chris Penn, John Mills, Sandra Dee, Anthony Franciosa, Barbara Bel Geddes, producers Debra Hill, Ismail Merchant, Moustapha Akkad, Eddie Albert, Shelley Winters, Anne Bancroft and Richard Pryor, just to name a few.

At the closing of the Academy Awards, I really enjoyed the music the orchestra was playing and I'm trying to find out what it was.

They actually played two songs, one while Jon Stewart was saying goodbye and then transitioned to another while the credits were rolling.

It's the second song that I'm interested in.

I've already gone to Oscar.com and the Academy Awards websites, but can't find anything there or where else to go look.

John Conti was the orchestra conductor.

HELP!!

It's not often that I give the Academy Awards 10/10; after all, what is it except self-congratulation? But Jon Stewart was the perfect host. He was exactly right in his question to Steven Spielberg when referring to "Schindler's List" and "Munich": what will happen to us Jews next?

The only problem this year was the final award: "Brokeback Mountain" was something new, while "Crash" was a little too safe. But other than that, I liked "The 78th Annual Academy Awards". Back in the days when only big, overblown, pompous musicals could receive nominations for Best Original Song, who would have guessed that there would be a winner called "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp"? But, as Jon Stewart noted, it just got a lot easier for a pimp!

Anyway, I agreed with most of the winners, even if there were some predictable ones (but don't get me wrong: Philip Seymour Hoffman and Reese Witherspoon both did very well in their performances). And I laud George Clooney for encouraging Hollywood to make more movies about what's going on in the world, such as "Syriana". Knowing what a great host Jon Stewart was, I would like to see Stephen Colbert host the Oscars one year; in his persona, he could rant against Hollywood for hating America (let's face it: how many movies has Hollywood made saying anything good about the US of A?).

All in all, a great ceremony, especially with Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin overlapping their dialogue to award Robert Altman (RIP) his Honorary Oscar.