So I stayed up until the very end of the Oscars last night. I paid for it all day today. I’ve been so tired. I’ll be going to bed early tonight! The show actually started at 8:00 but the awards part didn’t begin until 8:30. Billy Crystal did a great job as the host. I always enjoy seeing what he’ll do at the beginning. I love seeing his montage of the movies nominated with his image inserted in just the right spots. This was his 8th time hosting. I wonder if he’ll brake Bob Hopes record of 18 times. The only thing I didn’t care for seeing was Billy Crystal’s naked body (mostly) during several of the clips. I went to the Oscars web site and download the ballot to keep track of my predictions. Of the 24 Oscars handed out last night, I actually predicted 15 of them correctly. Here is a list of the Oscars I predicted correctly:

Best Picture
Best Director
Best Actor
Best Supporting Actress
Animated Feature
Cinematography
Costume Design
Documentary Short
Film Editing
Makeup
Short Film-Animated
Sound Editing
Sound Mixing
Screenplay-Original

The interesting thing here is that I only saw 2 of the nominated movies. So my picks were completly by random. I mean, I knew Lord of the Rings would get all the technical awards but I didn’t think they would sweep every category they were nominated in. That was quite a feat. I didn’t even see the movie. I’m not a big fan but it seems that many gay men are. Go figure. It must be all those hobit men.

The best acceptance speech was by Charlize Theron. I had seen her a few years ago in a movie called Sweet November with Keanu Reeves and I thought she was great then. I think her speech was the most moving. Other speeches were just okay. And if I remember correctly, there were only two little political statements. I think Sean Penn said some little something about WMDs. Good for him. I considered what Robin Williams said when he grabbed Billy Crystal and said something about being the wedding cake models for San Francisco to be a political statement. Maybe no one else did. I was thinking Tim Robbins might say something because he’s so political. But nothing of a political nature. I do want to see Mystic River sometime. It sounds like a good movie. Every year I say I’m going to see more movies and end up seeing so few. There were many that I wanted to see but never made the time to see them. The last movie I saw was Girl With A Pearl Earring. That was a great movie. It should have been up for more Oscars then it was. I’d recommend you see it.

While watching the morning news shows, they all had segments about the Oscar fashions. They always tear up some and glorify others. I thought the fashions were beautiful for the most part. You can expect Diane Keaton to dress the way she did. That’s her style. The younger women looked fabulous. To me, the dresses seemed like a throw back to the really glamorous days of Hollywood with big bows, long gowns, muted colors. I don’t get into the fashion side of the Oscars at all but I couldn’t create a post without at least mentioning what I thought even though I didn’t give it much thought. It’s been more of an after thought actually.

Now that the Lord of the Rings Trilogy is complete, what movies will dominate the Oscars next year? Any predictions? Maybe The Passion of the Christ? We’ll see. But one thing is for sure, whether or not I actually see more movies, I’ll definitely tune in to see the 77th Oscars.

On a completely unrelated note, March came in like a lamb here in Northern Virigina. The weather was beautiful! It got into the low 70’s. The sun was out and there was a slight breeze. It would have been a great day to go on a hike. I can’t wait for Spring!