So…the 2021 Oscar has happened. They handled it like it was a film, which I think is cool because, when you look back at previous Oscar events, they are not rated nearly as close to the films that they are honoring. They even said think of it as a movie with a cast of 200 nominations. They butcher it in the third act because that twist was on them.

It was the third hostless Oscars in a row after Kevin Hart dropped out years ago. The worst part is the restrictions on streaming it. I usually watch the Oscars on YouTube with YouTubers that I watch, and goodness they were not even allowed to show the actual show. They could only put the audio up which is crazy because they were against streaming, and now Netflix has the most wins. This time around, they showed less footage, which sucks because I like seeing all the behind the scenes for the nominees while they get mentioned, it is cool seeing the excerpts of the actors, and their really good moments. The songs were pushed to be a part of their pre-show, the categories were rearranged, and they declined letting anyone do Zoom calls if they were not there so that they could keep the same aesthetic. The aesthetic was not good. It looked like Soderbergh shot another film on iPhone. I like Soderbergh and all the risks that he takes but they should not have shot it like this. I did love the speeches. Thank goodness they did not have music playing before and after each speech because it made these ones feel deeper. Sure, some of the speeches did drag a little too long, but I would rather the winners do a long speech than have a schedule they have to follow and there was proof of that with Thomas Vinterberg’s speech. 

For the acting side, I am glad that Amanda Seyfried got a nomination, but I have been on that Minari hype train for the longest time, so you do not know how happy I was to see Yun-Jung Youn win, plus she killed it with her speech! Daniel Kaluuya was my second favorite win of the night. Frances McDormand won her third leading Oscar for Nomadland, and if you thought her howling on stage was dumb, please just keep that to yourself. She did it for a crewmate that passed away (his name was Michael Wolf Snyder). The final award was switched to be Best Actor, which should alway be Best Picture. They clearly did it because they wanted to end the show with Chadwick Boseman winning, but Anthony Hopkin won instead. I loved Anthony’s performance, but they played everyone with this, including themselves. I guess, on one hand, it is good because it proves it is not rigged, but then again, they played themselves pretty bad. Oh, and remember how I said they did not allow Zoom calls? Anthony was not able to give his speech through the call. They really denied an 83 year old man that lives on the other side of the world during a global pandemic a Zoom call. The thing that angered me the most about this is The Academy hyped up Chadwick so much, they promoted the Oscars with him on their ads, they had Chadwick Boseman gift bags, and they rearranged the whole show for him. They were so embarrassed that they cut to credits faster than The Sopranos.

I can not speak much about the short films category because I only watched one of them, so shout out to Two Distant Strangers for winning Live Action Short and also shout out to them for showing us that Joey Bada$$ is a good actor. 

Same as the short film category, but I watched none of the documentaries but apparently some people were upset about this because My Octopus Teacher should not even have been nominated, but good for them I guess.

For the other things about the event, I have seen Tik Toks longer than the In Memoriam. You could not even say DMX before they zoomed by eight slides. My biggest question is why in the world did Glenn Close did Da Butt for a corny sketch. They kept using Brad Pitt’s name, which got annoying. I get it you do not have to say it every time before a commercial. This is the biggest night for film, so show some trailers and announce more films. The Academy only liked Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom enough to give them Makeup and Hairstyle. Sound of Metal won Editing and Sound which this year they combined those two. TENET became Chirstopher Nolan’s third film to win Visual Effect. A great highlight was when H.E.R. won an Oscar because that means she won a Grammy and an Oscar in the same year. Soul won Original Score, which should have gone to Minari and, if you do not believe me, go listen to both and tell me which is better. Mank won best cinematography which is the second stupidest thing to happen that night it should have been Nomadland. Promising Young Women should not have won Original Screenplay, it should have been Judas And The Black Messiah, Minari, or Sound of Metal those three were far more superior. The queen of the night was 110% Chloé Zhao. She won Best Picture for Nomadland and Directing for it also, and we can not forget that she is the second woman to win Directing. She is the first POC woman to win the award, it was well deserved and I cannot wait to see what she is going to do for Marvel’s The Eternals.