The Oscars 2007

12:31 p.m.

So no major sweep, no major shut-out, just a little Oscar taste here and there for all the major contenders. But The Departed takes it in the end, in all its gory glory. I love this movie, and I love that it’s hardly typical Academy Award fare: a winner without real redemption or period costumes.

But for all the unpredictability, the whole evening felt a little dull and rudderless; a solid opinionated host would have helped. It turned out to be a pretty apolitical Oscars, considering what’s going on in the world right now. The only politics on display came in the form of the smug we-like-recycling eco-Oscars theme. Whither Ed Harris's
misplaced anger? Michael Moore's raging? A truly nuts emotional display from a winner? It’s nice to be nice and keep the ego in check on a human level, but it doesn’t really make for great TV. And finally, while the naked acrobatic human shadow puppets were impressive, without their time sucking displays of flexibility, I would be in bed right now. They are gone, and so am I. Good night.

12:18 p.m.

Martin Scorsese enfin. People seem to like him. It’s a great moment not only because he’s overdue, but because there’s no James Cameron bravado, just a humble sense that he’s part of film history.

12:08 p.m.

Forest Whitaker delivered a beautiful, considered speech about the connective power of acting, the transformative possibility of the craft. He thanked his ancestors and his tear-streaked wife. The room was moved, briefly changed. And then he ran backstage and stole Peter O’Toole’s gift bag.

11:59 p.m.

Things I love about Best Actress winner Helen Mirren: That she seems both respectful and entitled; that she works the stone-cold-cougar thing but doesn’t take it too seriously; that she delivered a speech acknowledging the sheer strangeness of playing a woman who is still alive and finally, that in the Barbara Walters special, she said: “I don’t understand why Americans wear shorts.”

11:53 p.m.

Philip Seymour Hoffman has been taking advantage of the free crate of hair wax that came with Oscar last year.

11:51 p.m.

The traditional two-for-one Obituary-and-Popularity Contest is always an uncomfortable thing. I say this every year: Just hold your applause until the end, you ungrateful first tier-ers. Not everyone has as many friends as Robert Altman.

11:49 p.m.

Martin Scorsese got tears in his eyes when editor Thelma Schoonmaker won for The Departed. A small human moment. Nice.

11:37 p.m.

It truly is a "Green Oscars" when Melissa Etheridge trumps the sultry, givin'-it Dreamgirls with a song about greenhouse gasses. It is really hard to rhyme Kyoto, though.

I wonder if the fact that Etheridge kissed and thanked her wife will even make a ripple in the press, or are we finally okay with gay PDA? As Ellen said in the only memorable line of the evening: “If there weren’t blacks, Jews or gays, there would be no Oscars, or anyone named Oscar.” That was 67 per cent funny.

11:28 p.m.

Sweet heavens above Beyonce is physically perfect.

11:18 p.m.

Little Miss Sunshine wins Best Original Screenplay That Most Resembles National Lampoon’s Vacation.

11:07 p.m.

Ennio Morricone is a genius who refuses to deliver his speech in English. Clint Eastwood, who forgot his glasses, is doing a kind of out-of-sync Lost in Translation translation of his Italian thank-you speech, reading his very gracious words off cue cards. Awkward, but moving. And defiantly long. Let the master ramble; he's earned it.

11:05 p.m.

As the Ennio Morricone montage is floating by -- go, montage, go! -- I take a moment to reflect on Ellen DeGeneres. Is it just me, or does this show seem to be hosting itself? I can't really remember anything she's said or done, except for that slightly funny moment when she made Steven Spielberg take her photo with Clint Eastwood. Did she even do a monologue? Don't get me wrong: I'm not mourning the wankerdom of Billy Crystal or the somnambulent ramblings of Whoopi Goldberg, but Chris Rock put a bit of an edge on it (remember when he raised Sean Penn's bile with his Jude Law diss?), and even a neutered Jon Stewart got a bit dangerous once or twice last year. What I will remember about Ellen: Squeaky suits. Lots of them.

10:51 p.m.

Al Gore wins something.

10:49 p.m.

Best Supporting Actress: This Jennifer Hudson thing is undeniably cool. There’s real innocence and old- fashioned gumption in her story: an American Idol wannabe gets her big break and burns up the industry. Until now, The View's Elizabeth Hasselbeck was the world’s most famous reality TV graduate. But may I hop on my little black cloud and float on in and rain all over her beautiful moment – she’s thanking her grandmother! -- with a question: What’s next? How many great roles are there going to be for J. Hud in the future? The thrill of her performance was mostly in the singing, and roles for singing non-anorexic black women…Well, it hasn’t been great for Halle Berry. I’m just sayin’. Okay, I’ll shut up now. I don’t want my bad energy to float over to LA and dry up her champagne.

10:35 p.m.

Best Foreign Language feature: What a strong category this year, too strong for Deepa Mehta's wonderful Water. But Germany's The Lives of Others is amazing, too, and managed to beat Pan's Labyrinth. Still, Deepa Mehta has experienced what so many of us hope for: Clive Owen said her name. Maybe it's enough. Maybe not.

10:30 p.m.

I love a montage. Foreign winner montage includes Armarcord, Barbarian Invasions, A Man and A Woman: I still love movies. You can’t make me hate them, you money sucking machine who has turned it all into a reality TV fashion show with the cruel hard centre of Simon Cowell and the artlessness of Survivor!

10:26 p.m.

Hello, Gwyneth. What's with the long blonde Marcia Brady hair everywhere tonight? It's the tube sock dress of hairstyles. Pan's Labyrinth wins Cinematography over Children of Men. Poor, overlooked Children of Men. Pan's Labyrinth was magical and brutal, but Children of Men felt urgent. And that camera work was mental. In a good way.

10:19 p.m.

Tom Cruise gives out a Jean Hersholt Humanitarian award to Sherry Lansing, executive, producer, humanitarian. Of course, even as I’m mentally applauding her work with the Red Cross, inner city educators and stem-cell researchers, and thanking her for a cluster of “women’s movies” that might never have been made in the male dominated studio system – 9 to 5, The Hours – what I’m really thinking is: Tom Cruise is here to rescue himself from himself. And how come he wasn’t on the red carpet? Did he go in through Randy Newman’s basement entrance? And also, it’s unfair that his forehead gets to move, and his ex-wife’s doesn’t. Somehow his normally aging forehead is linked to Lansing’s progressive career, but I’m too distracted by the prospect of little Abigail Breslin crying in the near future to put it together right now.

9:59 p.m.

Randy Newman just wrote another song. It rhymes.

9:58 p.m.

William Monahan wins Best Adapted Screenplay for The Departed, and launches into the most agonizing speech thus far with: “I guess valium really works.” Great lead! Then he goes on to deliver a nervous, sweaty, uncomfortable thank you through squinty, terrified eyes lost under a curtain of quivering long hair. He’s straight out of Adaptation. He’s the embodiment of every winner’s anxiety. I love this man.

9:46 p.m.

Looking at Cameron Diaz doling out Best Animated feature in her perfectly inoffensive white gown is evidence that women's clothes are officially boring at the Oscars now. Everybody chose some variation of the solid coloured tube sock. Yawn. Happy Feet wins and somebody has to sit next to an animated penguin and pretend it's not happening.

9:39 p.m.

Internationalism, Melissa Etheridge, carbon emissions, Al Gore: this feels like another night in the Wymyn's Union at McGill circa 1993. So I hear.

9:35 p.m.

I picture Randy Newman going through his day, just farting out the tunes: breakfast, song, song, snack, song, lunch, song, song, song, nap, song, dinner, song. All from his special cage in the basement of the Kodak Theatre where he lives, emerging once a year to sit in profile on the stage and pound one out on that grand piano live. He’s being lowered back down right now. It’s true. Union guys are doing it.

9:28 p.m.

Alan Arkin takes Best Supporting Actor for Little Miss Sunshine. There’s justice in this, but does the veteran’s win mean Eddie “Anti-Social” Murphy doesn’t have the good will one needs to get an Oscar in Hollywood, which is really just a big version of junior high? Maybe next year, Eddie…for Norbit.

9:23 p.m.

Sound Mixing did not go to Kevin O’Connell for Apocalypto, who has been nominated 19 times. That really sucks. Dreamgirls takes it. It’s a Dreamgirls sweep! I like to declare sweeps whenever things get dull.

9:21 p.m.

James McAvoy and Jessica Biel presenting together, two young actors who Hope To Be Invited Again. There are always those aspiring stars who appear one year, anticipating a lifetime of red carpet evenings, and things just don’t go that way. See: Kristy McNichol.

9:08 p.m.

Canada in the house! Montreal's Torrill Kove wins best animated short -- OH MY GOD JACK NICHOLSON IS BALD! -- for her charming National Film Board short The Danish Poet. She actually draws by hand, and Liv Ullman narrated and also, JACK NICHOLSON IS BALD.

8:59 p.m.

The Will Ferrell, Jack Black, John C. Reilly “comedians don’t get Oscars” number is actually kind of hilarious, if a tad long, and the first spark of life in this rather bland first half hour. Pan’s Labyrinth wins Best Makeup: It’s a Pantastic sweep! And thus, they’re swept off the stage before finishing their speeches.

8:52 p.m.

Nicole Kidman’s forehead still immobile. Pan’s Labyrinth wins Best Art Direction and she can’t even force out a 'congratulations' crease?

8:50 p.m.

So within a few seconds of Ellen DeGeneres’ debut (in pajama like velvet tux that looks like it might squeak when she walks), a theme emerges: this night is “international.” Hola amigos! Ellen then makes a pro Al Gore joke and the crowd goes wild; what are these people, liberals? Earlier, many of the celebrities pulled up to the red carpet in “hybrids”: limousines powered by 50 per cent hydrogen, 50 per cent STAR!

8:38 p.m.

First Can-con moment: director Deepa Mehta appears in a rather sweet montage of nominees, famous and otherwise, directed by Errol Morris. Her producer describes being nominated: “It’s been fabulous,” to which Mehta says: “It’s had its ups and downs.” She gets a laugh. Too bad we will not hear from her again tonight, unless she cries out in agony when Water loses.

8:29 p.m.

A carpet interviewer just corralled the three Mexican directors Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Alfonso Cuaron and Guillermo del Toro and referred to them as “the three amigos.” This happens every year at the Oscars: racial apples and racial oranges rolled out together, and yet somehow, in the guise of tolerance and togetherness.

Hold that thought (thoughts have no place here!): When did Leonardo DiCaprio grow into such a manly man? He was such a pudge-faced teen over-emoter for so long, and now he’s all charming and enviro and thespian and I kind of want him to win. This feels like a betrayal of my 1997 self who mocked him regularly when drunk.

8:18 p.m.

Okay, Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts are being guided between the red carpet cameras, playing the we’re-just-average-Aussie-gal-pals-who-happened-upon-a-big-party-on-our-way-to-the-barbie (truly, Kidman just said: "We go to bar-b-ques together," furthering the Australian cliche), which is kind of sweet. But what’s with Nicole Kidman’s forehead? It looks like a deli slice stretched around a beach ball. What would Virginia Woolf say?

8:00 p.m.

For the past six hours of pre-Oscar cable TV red carpet foreplay, I’ve been sitting in my freezing cold attic wearing more fleece than a Mountain Equipment Co-op cashier (balaclava on standby) and I have already had my first Oscar night epiphany: I will never in my life utter the sentence, “My dress is from Valentino and my jewelry from Van Cleef.” It is, of course, this gap between plebian reality and the upper caste fantasy being sold by Ryan Seacrest et al that keeps me (us?) tuning in year after year. And so, it’s 8 o’clock on Oscar night: Let the smallness of your own life be flooded in the spotlight of envy! On y va!

This Sunday evening, check out the CBC Arts Online Oscar blog. It’ll be live! Exciting! Despite what you may have heard on those TV shows that pander to celebrities, CBC.ca is actually the place to be on Oscar night.

Writer Katrina Onstad will be weighing in throughout the night with her unique brand of Oscar commentary: insightful, fearless, with a dollop of bemused, morbid fascination. She won’t be salivating over the fashion, the acceptance speeches or the rest of the spectacle. But she will be answering the questions that so many people have been asking: Will Eddie Murphy win an Oscar despite appearing in Norbit? Is this Martin Scorsese’s year? Will former Oscar winner Marlee Matlin make an unwanted surprise appearance?

Katrina will have all the answers. Be sure to check in on Oscar night and feel free to send in your own comments once the proceedings begin.

Before his Titanic role turned him into a pin-up boy for the pre-teen set, Leonardo DiCaprio had a recurring role on Growing Pains, starring Canadian comedian Alan Thicke. He’s nominated for Best Actor for his role in Blood Diamond.

And the nominees are:

Clint Eastwood, Letters from Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears, The Queen
Paul Greengrass, United 93
Alejandro González Iñárritu, Babel
Martin Scorsese, The Departed

Here’s why it kind of sucks to be Martin Scorsese right now: If he doesn’t win the best director Oscar for The Departed, then he goes down in history as the guy who lost six times. But if he wins, it’ll be among speculation that it was a sop, a nod for his entire body of work – in particular Raging Bull, which lost out to Robert Redford for Ordinary People in 1980 – rather than a win for The Departed itself.

And the nominees are:

Babel
The Departed
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

With only two days to go, best picture predictions are all over the place, even amongst the general public: one ABC poll suggests a gender split, with women rooting for The Queen and Little Miss Sunshine (human, intimate = girly) and men crossing their fingers for Letters From Iwo Jima and The Departed (violent, heroic = manly).

So that movie about stardom and corruption in the world’s biggest Motown girl band has absolutely nothing to do with the Supremes, huh? That’s the word from DreamWorks and Paramount, who gave in to weeks of pressure from Motown veterans like Berry Gordy and Smokey Robinson and ran ads in today’s Hollywood trades calling Dreamgirls “a work of fiction.”

Meanwhile, former Supreme Mary Wilson has her own, yeah-right take in The Washington Post: “That someone can do your life story and you don’t get paid, they don’t ask you for any input? It’s kind of a bittersweet thing. It’s wonderful, but it’s sad. If you’ve made history, people should give you 100 percent credit.”

All of this when support for the film, shut out of Best Picture, seems to be waning.

What do you think? Is Dreamgirls real or no real?

By Katrina Onstad