No offense Billy Crystal, but his musical bits were better. Its great that even a wider audience now knows that he's capable of doing much more than scratching things with his adamantium claws. He's a Tony-award winning muscial theater actor everyone. Recognize.
Phillip Petit
Man on Wire won for Best Documentary Feature, and the film's subect balances the Oscar upside-down on his chin. Gotta say I never saw that one before.
Kate Winslet
My favorite speech of the night. The moment where she asks her father to whistle so she see him in the audience was priceless. Sure Meryl has lost more Oscar races than she has, but she also won on her second nomination, so those losses have to be easier to take. Thank god they finally gave Kate her due.
(honorable mention for favorite speech moment has to go to the guy who won for Best Animated Short Film...He can barely speak English, and yet he can make me crack a genuine laugh by quoting a Styx song.)
Steve Martin & Tina Fey
While some might pick their thinly-veiled dig at Scientology, but I thought Martin's last line "Don't fall in love with me" was gold. Kudos to the Oscar producers for surprising no one and finding a way to get the red hot Fey on the stage.
James Franco & Seth Rogen
The short film they made w/ Judd Apatow was solid. The idea of stoners finding the overly-serious Best Picture nominees hilarious is not particularly clever, but it was delivered well, and the awkward moment after the clip of Franco kissing Spicoli had to be done. And the cherry on top was James Franco butchering the German pronunciation of the winning live action short film (Spielzeugland). Way to put that Columbia University education to good use.
Pineapple Express at the Oscars! - watch more funny videos
The younger actors from Slumdog Millionaire
It was not a surprise that Slumdog would clean up this year. But those kids were awesome. On the red carpet they exposed Ryan Seacrest for being a talentless hack (he didn't even try to pronounce their names, they refused to shout them all at once when he asked, he singled out the only one that didn't speak English to interview individually first...needless to say it was a train wreck). And I love it when the Best Picture winner becomes a chance for all involved to come on stage. Even though its the film producer who gets the statue, the award is called Best Picture. Each piece of the intricate puzzle that makes up an impressive film deserves to be on that stage
Seeing the kid who played the youngest version of Salim high-fiving Danny Boyle was really neat. You can't really replicate the brightness of his smile on that stage.
Acting nominee tributes
This was a new wrinkle in the show this year, and I loved it. They brought out five former winners of each acting award to praise each of the 20 nominees individually. Almost every one of the nominees was visibly moved by the gesture. I'd imagine that it was supremely tough to coordinate (they had sneak some of the bigger stars in through a side entrance to keep the surprise intact, and finding 20 former winners had to be a scheduling nightmare), but I really hope they try to do this again.
Good show...will have to keep me until next year.
PS - I hope they keep doing the Coming Attractions previews after the show. That was the first look I got at Public Enemies. Michael Mann really got himself a dynamite cast: Depp, Bale, Cotillard...(and that only scratches the surface)...really looking forward to that one.
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