BEN

Every year I subject myself to watching over 3 hours of celebrities falling all over themselves congratulating each other like they’ve all just discovered the cure for cancer. Why do I do this? On the odd times that I didn’t, I always listen to the newspaper and radio journalists the next day talking about it and I guess I just don’t like feeling out of the loop. Here are some thoughts:

Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin – loved them, particularly Steve Martin who can say just about anything and it would crack me up. His deadpan delivery that managed to poke fun at the room around him as well as himself for being there was perfect for the night. It’s too bad his recent films have been so terrible but please watch “Bowfinger” and be prepared to laugh your head of at the absurdity.

Awkward moment – When the director of the Best Short Documentary started making his speech and gushing how he never dreamed he’d end up there and his producer just rudely interrupted him and spoke over him and in the end he never got to give his real speech of thanks. They both came off looking pretty ungracious.

John Hughes Tribute – just seeing that montage clip, never mind hearing the actors’ memories, was pure nostalgia. I was the perfect age of 14 when “Sixteen Candles” came out, and of course I saw everything from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” to “Breakfast Club”.

Sandra Bullock – A lot of people are saying she only won because “it’s her time” but I have to say her speech was excellent. She was gracious, she shared her award with her fellow nominees without being phony or annoying about it, and she had the self-awareness and sense of humour to acknowledge she was being awarded because “I just wore you all out”.

Katherine Bigelow and the Hurt Locker – I liked how stunned she and writer Mark Boals were about their success, they seemed truly overwhelmed and humbled. These kinds of reactions made up for the worst part of the evening which was…

The Best Actors and Actresses awards being done in that new format where you have other actors walk onstage and stand there waiting to be applauded like they have all won lifetime achievement awards. This started last year, I didn’t like it then and I like it even less now. Basically you have these actors take turns heaping praise on the nominees, basically just gushing and acting as though the person nominated was God’s gift to humanity or Mother Teresa or something. The worst ones were Michelle Pfeiffer talking reverently about Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore oohing and aahing over Colin Firth and using superlatives like “magnificent human being” etc. And no one had even won yet! I mean, they acted in a movie and they were good. The male presenters were a lot less cringe-inducing and less reverent in their tones. Surprisingly Oprah talking about Gabory Siddibe was fine and matter-of-fact, respectful and concentrating on the role instead of old Michelle going on and on about Jeff being married for fifty years and loving his daughters – what does all that have to do with his nomination? Anyway, that kind of thing just really ruins it, in my opinion. Thank goodness for Steve Martin.