Oscar Telecast Retrospective Part 1: Rock's Monologue

Time being the heartless thief that it is, you'll have to bear with me as blog my way through this year's Oscar telecast one bit at a time, as opposed to one massive post which just takes too long to write.

The show opened with the obligatory stirring montage of the year in film.
I counted no less than sixteen films that received zero nominations, with multiple shots of 2015's highest grossing non-nominees Jurassic World, Age of Ultron and Minions (but no screen time for Anomalisa, Boy and the World or When Marnie Was There -- shocking). Were they trying to dupe the casual viewer into sticking around past Chris Rock's opening monologue?

Speaking of which...

March is for postmortems

My usual week of Oscar night cataloging will have to stretch out into more of a post-mortem month.

We'll start by examining the winners as soon as possible (within the week). Lots to discuss here. Some good, some bad, and one bona fide craft category shocker that I still can't wrap my head around. But for the moment, let me just keep a positive footing by saying I can't remember the last time I was this excited about the outcome of Best Picture.

The right choice.

October Recap

So October is a wrap! As I was cobbling together my last-minute Doof Warrior costume in time for last night's frivolities, I figured now was the best time to start taking note of how the 2015-16 Oscar race is shaping up.

I realize that for many, the September festival circuit is the official kick-off of awards season. But for those of us without press credentials or travel time to burn, October is when we actually get to see the buzzy titles we've been reading about for a month or more. And this October was chalk full of them.