Centerfield

Hope you didn't miss The Defiant Ones/Network/To Kill A Mockingbird/Inheriet The Wind/Every Problem Film In History Ever Made montage. When it was over, thrilling music and all, Jon Stewart snarked "And none of those issues were ever a problem again."

I did catch that one, Jean! Yet another reason to love John Stewart.

Of course, the Academy followed it up with the Academy President coming out to assure all the pompous egos in the room that "we're relevant, we're relevant, we really truly are relevant!"

Did you see Capote? That clip they showed right there was the culmination of an expose into the ultimate shallowness and ego that was Truman Capote. That's what I got out of the movie, anyway (and it was a very good movie).

Hmmm...was that the one we're he's talking to the killer in the jail cell? Or the one where a porter tells Capote "Each of your books is better than the one before!" then he leaves and Harper Lee says "You paid him to say that, didn't you?" and Capote whines "I thought it was good!"

'Cause I thought the latter was pretty funny. :-)

I was talking about the scene with the killer in the jail cell when he tells the guy, essentially, that he's only been pretending to be his friend, that he's much smarter than the killer, and that all he cares about is getting the story about the murders.

But you're right, the other scene was pretty funny. Did you notice that not once in the whole movie did he ever congratulate Harper Lee on that little minor novel she finished and had turned into a major motion picture during the course of this movie?

Would I be in trouble if I said: "Jessica Alba. Hubba Hubba Hubba"?

Poor Lauren Bacall seemed to have trouble reading her cue cards; she looks great, though. I thought the tribute to film noir could have been better. It didn't even mention The Big Combo., which is my favorite FN...well, next to Laura.

The Big Combois named after a huge criminal gang, (that's right, all five of them) headed by a guy named Mr. Brown (oh, the terror.) It features the first pair of gay hitmen (and you thought Brokeback was groundbreaking) as well as the hottest love scene ever filmed during the Hays Office regime My favorite line? "I'll break him so fast he won't have time to change his pants."

Let us raise a champagne glass to the time when such a line was understood as only a single entendre. ;-)

Would I be in trouble if I said: "Jessica Alba. Hubba Hubba Hubba"?

LOL! No, it just means you have something in common with every other heterosexual man watching the awards. (Besides, I was too busy gaping at Russell Crowe to pay much attention to Jessica Alba) ;-)

Did you notice that not once in the whole movie did he ever congratulate Harper Lee on that little minor novel she finished and had turned into a major motion picture during the course of this movie?

Haven't actually seen Capote yet, so I can't say for certain. He does congraulate her in Capote In Kansas so in one respect I can say the graphic novel is better than the film.

My favorite so far is the staging of "In The Deep" complete with a burning car and slow motion silhouettes. Now, there's
a fire in a crowded theater!

Oh, boy, the "pimp" song, for which a few words are being bleeped, while "bitches" and "hoes" are acceptable. Yeah, it's real hard out here for a pimp. Maybe they need a government rental assistance program.

I love Queen Latifah. Don't tell my Republican friends, though.

There's that tape delay... lol

Your secret is safe with me. I agree with you; she's great.

For a while, I thought they were singing "It's hard out here for a parent/when you're trying to make the money for the rent" then I saw the actual title and thought "I better get my ears checked."

Will they include Don Knotts in the memorial retrospective?

Anne Bancroft

Richard Pryor

... but no Don Knotts

Will Smith looks like he's growing Spock ears. He didn't get the tops shaped while he was getting the piercings on the lobes, did he?

Ouch! "For those of you keeping score at home, that's Martin Scorsese 0 Oscars, 36-Mafia, 1".

Awwww.... Philip Seymour Hoffman thanked his momma... whom he brought to the ceremony! And it was beautiful and heart-felt. Good for him!

Sorry, I've been wathcing MASH. The original.

What channel, Tully? Have I already missed Hot Lips' shower scene? (actually, they played that in one of the montages tonight}

AMC, but they're running it again so you can still catch it. Trapper just punched out Burns.

But they blur it out, darnit.

I have real problems actually "seeing" Tom Skerritt in Duke. He's got the accent down too well, and no moustache. Great job.

Trivia: SYRIANA added a new word to the Hollyweird lexicon. "Petronoia."

I just say thank goodness they kept Radar on into the TV show.

Yeah, what's the point of CABLE if they still conform to the FCC's idea of what is proper?

Jean, you've gotten awful quiet. You still there?

They broadcast in some markets, I think. But heck, I remember when FOX used to have full frontal nudity. (1985?)

Rachael Weisz and Philip Hoffman. Cool.

And Witherspoon! They finally forgot LEGALLY BLONDE 2!

Looks like Brokeback's going to get it. Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. It's got to be Best Picture...

IMDB.com has a great list, by the way.

Whoa! It's Crash! I didn't see that coming...

Go CRASH go....

They're playing the music to cut off the thank yous for BEST PICTURE? I'm all for a tight schedule, but shouldn't the BEST PICTURE get just a little leeway?

I did--I see our messages crossed.

Not when they get the cut in by the half-hour.

Except for Clooney, I nailed "the big ones" down the line.

We should have done a prediction thread on Friday.

Yep. We coulda had the "Bet against Coulter" show!

Ack. Ap photowire has a pic of Haggis taking the OScar for CRASH, but syas it's for CAPOTE. But the site won't let me use the link for "questionable content."

Jean, you've gotten awful quiet. You still there?

Still picking my jaw up off the floor, Pat. I thought "Brokeback" had it locked. And Reese Witherspoon? I thought Dame Judy Dench would get it for sure. (Though I did love the commercial "Dames For Truth".) And why on earth did they cut off the Best Picture speech?

Still, they did have Larry McMurtry, who did a purty speech about preserving the power of the written word and wore jeans to the Oscars. My kinda guy.

Stewart did an OK job, but I miss Billy Crystal's tribute songs; he probably would have done "Brokeback Mountain" to the tune of "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence". We loved-- "Brokeback Mountain." That's right! "Brokeback Mountain"! It was the gayest film of alllll!

Going to bed now...probably hear the "Brokeback Mountain" theme in my sleep.

The Billy Crystal version? :-0

Weisz didn't surprise me. Witherspoon did, but I thought she earned it and she was one of my picks.

A word of Star Wars, Revenge of the Sith:

I'm genuinely surprised that it didn't at least get recognized with a nomination for special effects. Say what you will about Lucas' ability to direct (which dooms the picture from other awards like Best picture, actor, screenplay etc.), the film is still technilogical marvel and at least the equal of King Kong. Much of the special effects, like in King Kong itself, are products of the effects technology pioneered by Lucas thru Star Wars.

Very disappointed.

To tell the truth, John, I didn't even remember that Sith came out last year... I guess there's a reason the studios generally release their contenders towards the end of the year.

John, while the Star Wars franchise has indeed set the standard for SFX it has kind of waned in the past few years. The 2nd installment was especially bad in terms of both story and FX execution.
Narnia had some good solid work except for 2 main scenes that were just bloody awful.
The train station scene where they used a simple matte painting with a little smoke in it to represent a train yard in the distance. Just awful Then there was this fly though a bunch of creatures in formation. No one moved. Horribly static.

ugh.
Probably why Kong won.

Sorry about that, Tully. It was there; I had to take the opportunity. Maybe my tinfoil hat (or my fillings) was picking up transmissions from an alternate dimension where Billy was hosting. ;-)

Weirdest Yet Most Touching Moment? When Robert Altman said his original heart had been replaced by one from a young woman in her late thirties, therefore giving him another forty years of life. Reminds me of the old Robert Bloch joke; "I have the heart of a young boy. I keep it in a jar on my desk."

Oh, and when I was surfing on Oscar Night, I found "Popcorn And Chainmail" which specializes in sporking history films; kinda like MST3K if Mike/Joel and the Bots all had PhDs. Thought of y'all when I read it, especially their treatment of Elizabeth.

I agree, Jean that was a very nice moment with Altman.

I thought it was "heart of a child," but I heard it first from Bob Tucker, neither of us were strictly sober at the time, and Tucker has been known to pull legs a bit. (Understatement there.)

The Billy Crystal version would be a lot more fun than the original! And think of what he coulda done with PASSION OF THE CHRIST....

Whew! For a moment there, Tully, I was afraid you were sending FP and his Wild Bunch over to gang save me. ;-) I'm glad you liked the Billy Crystal joke; he would indeed have had fun with "The Passion Of The Christ". Probably would've set it to "I Could Have Danced All Night"--"He was flo--ogged all night! He was flo-oogged all right! And still was flo--ogged some more!...It came from Gibson's bra-ain, And the worse Christ's pain, the more the BO sco-ored!"

At least, that's what I thought it was before static broke it up. I'd send you a tape, but my tin foil hat doesn't have a VCR. ;-)

Cheer up, Pat; I think Don Knotts died too late to make the "Goodbye" reel. They'll probably give him an extra big cite in next year's version.

I got the "heart of a small boy" quote from an interview with Stephen King. I could be wrong, though.

Hey, would YOU want to live on the Ponderosa? Where the biggest entertainment was trying to get Hop Sing to pitch some jalapenos into the chop suey? Or gathering the Rocky Mountain Oysters in branding season? No wonder all the women died. They wanted to!*

Seriously, though, being a woman on BONANZA really was like being a red-shirt on a STAR TREK "away team."

[*--"She had left Jamaica to keep from dying of the yellowjack and being eaten by the land crabs, though sometimes she wondered if that had been so very clever after all." --Patrick O'Brian]

LMAO! Hey, you forgot the thrill of telling Hoss to wipe his feet for the upteenth time, and the joy of making pinecones into festive Christmas decorations!

But seriously, folks, it's on the tip of my tongue to say that if I could have Little Joe all to myself, I'd be happy to live in an ice shack in Siberia.

But the Ponderosa?

Naaah.

For one thing, it's got all those tacky fake pine trees. For another, it's a thousand square mile ranch, and there are entirely too many places to hide dead bodies. I agree with Pat; Hoss is OK and Ben's not much of a problem, but I wouldn't turn my back on Adam for a second. If there were any Bluebeards among the Cartwrights, it would be "too neat--don't want to get my hands dirty" Adam.

On the upside, housekeeping would be a breeze, since the "thousand square mile ranch" seems to have all of three rooms.

But then again, there is that Hop Sing problem. Never mind. ;-)