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6 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
SOMEBODY had a good night, 7 March 2004
8/10
Author: bsinc from Ljubljana, Slovenia

This year's Oscars were a return to normalization as far as I am concerned. The Academy at least had the dignity to "show" where it had been going wrong in the last past years and nominated a bunch of indie movies in all kinds of categories which I thought was excellent and above everything else just! Keisha Castle-Hughes may just have an incredible acting career in front of her and I was actually happy she didn't win. The acting she blessed "Whale Rider" with was simply amazing and although I haven't seen "Monster" yet I thought that at her early age an Oscar would be more of a burden than a blessing. Bill Murray was shockingly the night's sore looser which only proved that even he(who in the past weeks so repeatedly insisted he despised actors who let these kind of nominations get to them and sometimes bring out the worst in them) could make a fool of himself over an award. I love you Bill (although in my mind your performance wasn't worthy even of a nomination, let alone of you having the feeling you were robbed of any award for it) but hey, I thought it was more of an Academy's way of saying "Hey, we don't want to be the stiff and boring ones anymore, so let's nominate Johnny Depp and Bill and Diane Keaton to show people that comedy CAN win". No offense to any of them, it was just too apparent and undeserving to me to have any of these three walk up the isle that night. The person among the acting nominees I missed the most was Alison Lohman for "Matchstick Men". Her amazing performance wasn't even nominated among the supporting actresses which made annoying Renee's Oscar win even more painful to watch. Billy Crystal's return this year was quite good although I remember his opening movie clips actually being funny, hilarious even, and not just a three minute filler. But he commended himself immediately with the funny and silly songs for each of the best picture nominees. Jack Black and Will Ferrell's song also made a strong point and I hope future winners will at least try to be different and not as BOOOOORING. And I've quickly come to the end of it all, nothing left but the grand winner of the night. Perhaps to some it was worth the wait, I say it was more than deserving to pick up every single award it was nominated for. Maybe I'm being short-sighted, but in a couple of decades I still think we won't have the privilege of seeing a motion picture of such grand epic and unprecedented proportions. Next Christmas we'll be sobbing over the end of Peter Jackson's immaculately perfect depiction of Tolkien's work and none of the movies will (perhaps even in the whole of my lifetime) be quite as grand and as big as events as "The Lord Of The Rings" trilogy. Peter Jackson with cast and crew managed to bring back the true meaning of Blockbuster and their fantastic fantasy voyage will be passed onto generations and generations of movie-lovers without ever loosing a speck of its raw power. I was witness to true movie history in the making and mark my words, these three movies will be talked about for A very very long time so all of the haters should start thinking about moving to lonely remote islands. This years Oscars were a nice start for re-building the culture of past nominees, MAY THE BEST WIN, and not the ones that have the most money or are the most politically correct. 8/10

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4 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
Nothing special, 28 February 2005
4/10
Author: hppg from Australia

I have to admit I didn't sit through the whole ghastly long presentation of the Oscars, but I think the fact that I found myself utterly unable to watch if all says enough for me to be able to comment. The whole thing was completely boring, totally unfunny and looked like it was barely keeping the audience interested, let alone me. Billy Crystal was not a good host. Well, he was confident and everything, but nothing he said was funny (although to be fair somebody else probably wrote it). I'm not sure if the audience has no sense of humour, or if they just felt obliged to laugh so as to not be rude (most likely). The laughs started to wear thin though and it was embarrassing to watch. It made me cringe. Okay, so there were some highlights: an emotional tribute to Gregory Peck, a nice interview with Keisha Castle-Hughes, and some great winners (the main four: Sean Penn, Charlize Theron, Renee Zellweger, Tim Robbins) and Johnny Depp being present. Unfortunately though, there were some crap presentations (a hideous Scarlett Johansson wears too much make-up and informs us that make-up can make us look gruesome...quite ironic...John Travolta and Sandra Bullock, both of whom I like, had to give some stupid speech about rehearsals and being early…ha ha?). All the Lord of the Rings New Zealand jokes were rather lame and I don't think Return of the King deserved to win all of those; it just did a clean sweep because it's a well-made, huge-budgeted and fantastically-promoted blockbuster. Overall, I would have to say that the Oscars are highly recommended if your idea of fun is to watch rich arrogant twits in fancy clothes pat each other on the back and make totally lame and cringe-worthy attempts at jokes.

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Okay night., 2 July 2008
Author: duckmanfanatic from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

First of all, everybody knew that Lord of the Rings would, and I am really glad that it did. It is one of the greatest fantasy/action/adventure films of our time. But there were other good events that happened on that evening at the Oscars.

Charlize Theron won her Oscar for her brilliant performance in the powerful film Monster. Plus, as a bonus, Sean Penn, Renee Zellwigger and Tim Robbins finally had won Oscars of their own. Plus, Peter Jackson finally won his first Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture. He even said at the podium that he feels that the Academy Awards had completely snubbed his old films, Meet the Feebles and Bad Taste. That was a classic quote.

My favorite moments of the evening were Billy Crystal's comedy sketches where he digitally inserted himself into clips of the years nominated films. He was, by far, the best host for the show ever.

Another cool event was the production number of the song Belleville Rendezvous for the amazing animated film, The Triplets of Belleville! The woman who sang the song with three amazingly choreographed dancing girls behind her was terrific. But I do somewhat wish that the song's original artist, -M-, had actually sang it. The other musical segments were pretty good too.

One of the best highlights of the evening was Sofia Coppola, daughter of the Oscar winning director, Francis Ford Coppola, winning the Oscar for her great screenplay for her outstanding film, Lost in Translation.

Overall, despite a pretty predictable Best Picture winner, the events leading up to it were decent enough.

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there are no WMDs, 13 January 2007
10/10
Author: Lee Eisenberg (eisenberg.lee@gmail.com) from Portland, Oregon, USA

Since I was never a full-scale "LOTR" devotee - although I will agree that Peter Jackson directed a pretty impressive trilogy - I have to say that my favorite moment from "The 76th Annual Academy Awards" was when Sean Penn accepted his Best Actor award for "Mystic River": he said (I don't know whether or not this is verbatim) "There is one thing that an actor knows, aside from the fact that there are no WMDs...". Kudos also to Errol Morris for repeating the anti-war call when he accepted his Best Documentary Feature Oscar for "The Fog of War".

I guess that the rest of the show was pretty routine, although I liked what Jim Carrey did to present Blake Edwards with his Honorary Oscar. And although I'm not really a fan of Billy Crystal, you gotta admit that his songs at the beginning were a real hoot (especially the Michael Eisner comment).

New Zealand and South Africa (Charlize Theron definitely deserved her Oscar) both got widely thanked. Which other parts of the world are gonna get that in the near future?

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2 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
What happened to the show element?, 2 March 2004
5/10
Author: Boba_Fett1138 from Groningen, The Netherlands

It all began so well with Billy Crystal's amazing opening number but after that nothing spectacular happened. What happened to all the musical and dance numbers the Oscar ceremony always used to had?

And as for the awards, nothing unexpected happened and it wasn't even tense since all the winners were already as good as known weeks before the ceremony. The only category that was tense was the one for best performance by an actor in a leading role. Bill Murray and Sean Penn were favorites but there also was a chance for Johnny Depp to win. Sean Penn won and most likely he deserved it to win and oh boy, Bill Murray looked mad and disappointing. Billy Crystal responded brilliantly with saying: Common Bill we love you! And he was right at that. Anyway Bill Murray deserved to win an Oscar years ago for his role in "Rushmore" but that's a whole other issue. I just hope he will get nominated again. No doubt that he then will win his long deserved Oscar.

And then the big winner of the night: "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King". It won 11 Oscars, in other words it won everything it was nominated for. Finally justice will most people say but as a movie critic you can hardly call it justice. Sure I understand why it won, it was a tribute to the ending of one of the best trilogy's in movie history and a compensation for the last two years when the previous two movie hardly won any Oscar's of importance. But I don't think it's really fair to give just only the last movie all the awards, they should have awarded all the three movies since they are all part of a trilogy that should be seen as one big whole movie. And really did they have to win really every award they were nominated for? It wasn't really fair and it didn't do any justice to all the other movies that were nominated and it surely didn't do any good to the tension but at least the fans are happy now.

The presenters were nothing special this year, except for Robin Williams and Adrien Brody that were at least a bit interesting. The "thanks speeches" were as always not interesting and nobody even cried although some came close to. But at least there was luckily hardly anything political said.

All in all; nothing spectacular or exciting this year. And thank God that "Lord of the Rings" will not be a contestant next year! The only reason why it was watchable was because of Billy Crystal, the "in memoriam sequences" and the honorary award for Blake Edwards who in my opinion really deserved it.

5/10

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3 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
No surprises, just a regular show this year., 27 March 2004
Author: (eddy-28) from Lake Isabella, CA

The 2004 Academy Awards show was was pretty plain this year, with no surprise winners and this year lacked tons of nominations. The Best Picture this year went to the obvious third sequel "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" with eleven wins tying with "Ben Hur" and "Titanic". Billy Crystal was fine as the host, he usually has a good sense of humor, but this year as the Master of Ceremonies probably wasn't his greatest compared to the 1997 Oscar show. The Best Director went to Peter Jackson for "Lord of the Rings", and Sofia Coppola won the Best Screenplay award. Blake Edwards took the Lifetime Honorary Achievement Award for his long career as a comedy director. The acting awards were kind of odd, I was hoping Bill Murray would win the Best Actor Oscar for "Lost in Translation", but he lost to Sean Penn for Clint Eastwood's "Mystic River", Tim Robbins won the Supporting Actor for "Mystic River" and Renee Zellweger took the Supporting Actress award for "Cold Mountain". Charlize Theron won the Best Actress Oscar as real life serial killer Aileen Wuornios for "Monster" the film's only nomination and win. Another odd thing about the acting awards this year was the International stars that didn't win. We have New Zealand born actress Keisha Castle-Hughes for "Whale Rider". Hughes was the youngest ever nominated in the Best Actress category. Japanese actor Ken Watanabe was nominated for "The Last Samauri", African American actor Dijimon Honseu was nominated for "In America" as was English actress Samantha Morton and Iraq born actress Shohreh Aghdashloo for "The House of Sand and Fog". Other known nominees for acting included Diane Keaton for "Something's Gotta Give", Johnny Depp for "Pirates of the Caribean", Alec Baldwin for "The Cooler", Ben Kingsley for "The House of Sand and Fog" and Holly Hunter for "Thirteen". Academy President Frank Pierson did a terrific job at presenting the In Memoriam segment of the show, which was very long this year to pay tribute to the many stars that died this year. They included Gregory Peck, Bob Hope, Hope Lange, Wendy Hiller, Charles Bronson, directors Elia Kazan and John Schlesinger, Buddy Hackett, Buddy Ebsen, Art Carney, Jeanne Crain, Guy Rolfe, Ron O'Neal, Hume Cronyn, Karen Morley, Robert Stack, John Ritter, Ann Miller, Donald O'Connor, Gregory Hines, Michael Jeter and a very special memorial to screen legend Katharine Hepburn.

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4 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Very Boring And Unfunny, 5 March 2004
4/10
Author: Theo Robertson from Isle Of Bute, Scotland

Last years academy awards was a classic year because ...

A ) Steve Martin was a brilliant host and

B) There were some shock winners

This year`s awards were very boring because ...

A ) Billy Crystal wasn`t as good as Steve Martin and

B ) There were no shock winners

Before everyone writes an angry private message to me I will point out that in no way was Crystal bad it`s just that I didn`t find him all that good apart from his New Zealand one liners and his plea to Bill Murray not to walk out . As for the rest of the jokes during the ceremony can someone please tell Owen Wilson and Jim Carrey they`re not funny.

As for the Oscar awards themselves I was absolutely delighted to see RETURN OF THE KING pick up all the Oscars it was nominated for ( But I can`t help thinking Andy Serkis deserved a best supporting actor nod for Gollum ) and the academy recognising this film for being the masterpiece it is was the closest we got a surprise winner , everything else was so predictable with the only real contest being between Bill Murray and Sean Penn for best actor. Penn won much to the heart breaking disappointment of Murray . I couldn`t help noticing Francis Ford Coppola seemed disgusted with the result , I doubt if Penn`s next starring role will be a Coppola production

In terms of shocks and presentation I do hope next year`s ceremony will be an improvement and we get to see Steve Martin in a cheeky mood

As a footnote we in Britain get to a see a slightly different Oscar show . In the American presentation there`s ad breaks while over the pond we get to see Johnathan Ross interviewing guests for their opinions during the ad breaks . This year his guests were composed of Rob Brydon , Roni Ancona and Alistair McGowan and what this trio`s connection to Hollywood is I have no idea and none of them had either interesting or funny to say . If the BBC insist on flying over guests to LA to talk about movies could they please use people with a passionate interest in movies . There`s hundreds of people who contribute to this site wondering why they weren`t invited

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0 out of 1 people found the following comment useful :-
Billy Crystal's Song, 1 March 2004
Author: Marietha Brink (marietha.brink@smartcast.co.za) from Cape Town, South Africa

Wow, what a loooooonnnnnggggg ceremony, but still we watch it! I'm personally very glad Billy is back - he is one of the best presenters ever. The video montage at the beginning was very funny, but enough naked presenter already... The speeches were way too long too, I thoroughly agreed with Jack Black's song - "You're BORING..". Does anybody know where to find the lyrics to Billy Crystal's Oscar opening song? I couldn't hear half the stuff he said! There must be a website or somewhere one could find it. Thanks, Marietha

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1 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Predictable entertainment, 2 March 2004
8/10
Author: rbverhoef (rbverhoef@hotmail.com) from The Hague, Netherlands

It is funny how one of the most predictable Oscar shows in years was also one of the most fun to watch in years. Billy Crystal was back as the host and what a tremendous job he did. All of his jokes worked, not all of them planned, and together with other comedians like Robin Williams, Jim Carrey, Jack Black, Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson he made sure we had a lot of fun.

The winners themselves were very predictable. I didn't expect the clean sweep for 'The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King' but I thought there was a possibility it would happen. I like the 'Rings'-trilogy, although I am not a huge fan, and I think the trilogy deserved the recognition. Still, I was hoping for a little more diversity.

My personal favorite of 2003, 'Lost in Translation', won for Best Original Screenplay and that as well was pretty predictable. As were Charlize Theron for 'Monster', Renée Zellweger for 'Cold Mountain' and Tim Robbins for 'Mystic River'. Sean Penn deserved to win an Oscar although I hoped for Bill Murray this year and they both had a chance. Adrien Brody announced Best Actress and made a little fun of himself after his kiss last year with Halle Barry. Best Cinematography and Best Sound Editing went to 'Master and Commander' (it deserved some technical recognition) probably only because 'The Lord of the Rings' wasn't even nominated in those categories. If it was it would have won.

The Best Foreign Language Film went to Canadian 'Les Invasions Barbares' and the woman who accepted the Oscar had a nice joke being thankful to 'The Lord of the Rings' that it could not be nominated in that category. Of course, being from The Netherlands, I was hoping for 'De Tweeling'. I think both films were good enough to win. Again being from The Netherlands I was also hoping for 'Girl with a Pearl Earring', about Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer, in the categories Best Costume Design and Best Art Direction since Ducth persons were nominated. Both went, of course, to 'The Lord of the Rings' although I think Best Art Direction could have gone to 'Girl with a Pearl Earring'. That movie looks so beautiful.

Best Animated Feature was for the great 'Finding Nemo', again very predictable, and Best Documentary was for 'The Fog of War'. The only real competition for that movie was 'Capturing the Friedmans'. Of course the filmmaker gave us some political words but he kept everything pretty decent. Although the category is not very important, I liked the Best Animated Short for 'Harvie Krumpet'. 'Boundin'' from Pixar or 'Gone Nutty' with the little creature from 'Ice Age' were my guesses.

In the end the main thing I liked was the show itself. I had only a couple of my favorites really winning (Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress, both Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress and Best Animated Feature) but had a great time as well. I think that is the most important thing. Especially after last year's show where things were a little different because of the war in Iraq I thought it was some kind of a relieve. If next year will be as much fun as this, a little less predictable may be, I will be very satisfied.

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2 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
The winners were easy to predict and the show has the usual problems but Crystal's return is worth seeing, 2 March 2004
Author: bob the moo from Birmingham, UK

Is it that time of the year already? Well, sort of, they have come a month early this year in an effort to cut out the whole nasty marketing campaign that was seen in the last few years. Whether or not this was needed in the year when I suspect no amount of smouzing would have stopped Return of The King from collecting Oscars covering all three instalments.

As it was, there were almost no real surprises at all - certainly not in the main categories. Each of these were made up of two likely winners and three `the nomination is enough' type nominations (City of God, Johnny Depp, the girl from Whalerider etc). Did anyone doubt that LOTR would get Director and Best Picture? Or that Penn would get actor with Robbins the only sure fire supporting Oscar. Zellweger was not a worthy winner on this role alone but she was always going to get it and with her makeup, weight gain and performance, it was always going to be Theron. The only surprise to me that was that LOTR managed to sweep every single nomination it had.

So as an awards ceremony I didn't really find any controversy or any major talking points, but (thanks to fast forward) I did enjoy the show. Crystal is the best host the show has had in the past decade or so. He is witty, imaginative and very funny. His traditional opening of being edited into films was not quite as good or sharp as it has been before - only Michael Moore declaring the hobbit's was `shameful and fictitious' got a big laugh from me. However, his songs and his gags were all pretty good and only occasionally fell flat. `Seabiscuit' to the tune of Goldfinger was hilarious and singing `Mystic River' in the style of an old spiritual was just inspired. The show is great with him and the host is the main reason I watch it.

Everyone accepted their awards with good grace and everything was pretty clean and obvious; only Sean Penn dropped a little dig about WMD's apart from Crystal's scripted digs. Overall this was a good show despite the usual problems of it being too long and having absurdly long commercial breaks all through it. Crystal makes it worth seeing but it is a shame that the main awards were so very obvious - I tried to get a combination bet on the 5 main awards but no bookie's would allow me to do that combination and the individual odds were just a waste of time (1-16 for Jackson to be director?!). Aside from this it was a good show - but I would never watch it live, I need the fast forward!

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