78th Annual Academy Awards (2006)

ah...all the excitement is over. Now I can start planning my year for next years Oscar movie options. Hopefully I will do better at seeing nominated films than I did this year. This years ceremony was uneventful. I think the awards were pretty evenly distributed amongst the nominated movies...Brokeback won a few, with Ang Lee getting the coveted Best Director Oscar, the screenplay got the win (though I wanted Capote to win that one) and the score, which I was sooooo happy about. I truly loved the music in that movie. Philip Seymour Hoffman won, which was the only thing I felt really confident about winning, and the only thing I had my heart set on. I was so happy that he won that one, and he was adorable as always. Reese Witherspoon won for Best Actress, which I was hoping for, even though a win by Felicity Huffman wouldn't have made me unhappy either, even though I didn't see the movie, it looks good, and she looks incredible. I had a moment of sadness when Joaquin Phoenix didn't win. Even though I didn't really want him to win, he was so good, and I think any other year he would have taken that award home. I am sure he will have plenty of chances, he is always so wonderful in anything he does. Best picture was kind of surprising, though not disappointing. Crash, that came out of nowhere. I love to see movies like that win...not only was it a good movie, but it clearly didn't aspire to be out there just to get nominated, it was released way earlier in the year, the buzz had kind of died down by Oscar season, and it didn't get a whole lot of acting nominations (only Matt Dillon was recognized) but here it comes from behind to destroy the front runner, Brokeback Mountain. I thought it was exciting that they won instead of the predictibility of Brokeback taking it home. Jon Stewart did a great job, granted, he was no Billy Crystal, but I thought he held his own. I liked the little film clip montages too, even though there seemed to be too many of them, they were all good. And I of course, loved the fact that they brought up the importance of going to the movies so often. I can't imagine my life without going to the movies, watching on DVD is just not the same, and it never will be for me. I hope the box office has a better year!