(had to find a photo somewhere online just to remind myself this actually happened)
Victory Lap
RDJ first appeared on my radar in 2008 with Tropic Thunder and I’d been lobbying for him win an Oscar ever since. 16 years later (oddly enough, the same length of time between his first Oscars as a nominee and his 2nd nominated role), it finally happened.
From now on, when they show movie trailers of him, his name will be preceded by “academy award winner.”
I’m still in disbelief, honestly. As much as I wanted this, I didn’t want to give myself permission to get excited until his name was called. The fact Robert DeNiro was also nominated made me listen extra closely to make sure I heard correctly he actually won.
And his speech was pretty much everything I expected, but I’m sure all the victories preceding this one helped him prepare for it.
I’d go on some more but I have a more substantial post in mind. Something I didn’t want to post until I knew for sure he’d won. The last thing I wanted to do was jinx this.
I’ll just add a little retrospective on his history with this awards show.
He lost for “Chaplin” because Al Pacino had been passed over a few times before he finally won. Would winning an Oscar at the age of 26 have changed the way his life went during the 90s? There’s a good chance it wouldn’t have made a difference. If anything, him winning might have been the worst thing that happened to him. Showering praise on the young and inexperienced in show business tends to have some adverse effects.
Then his Tropic Thunder performance lost to Heath Ledger. Part of me will always believe the only reason he won or was even nominated was because he died in the middle of filmmaking. But considering the Tropic Thunder role and the controversy surrounding it, him getting passed over then also makes sense. Plus he was still winning back the masses after his personal life had gotten in the way of his professional life for so long.
Now, he’s finally the DiCaprio and Pacino nominee. He finally earned his due. And hearing how this year’s vote had a higher than normal turnout, part of me wonders if it’s because that many people wanted him to win as much as I did.
Also, Jimmy Kimmel said how 20 years ago, his most recent role was Tim Allen’s antagonist in the shaggy dog remake. I completely forgot about that movie, haha.
But he was also off by a couple years. In 2004, Robert’s movie that year was Gothika. The movie where he said his fondest memory (other than playing the doctor on the opposite side of the table) was “romancing the producer.” In his speech he said how he was the rescue pup she’d helped out of the gutter. It’s a bit more complicated but she deserves all the credit in the world for why he’s here. And on set, Team Downey is as good as a team as they are on the home front.
Yes, you read correctly. This is the short version of my victory lap over this news. More to come later this week.
From now on, when they show movie trailers of him, his name will be preceded by “academy award winner.”
I’m still in disbelief, honestly. As much as I wanted this, I didn’t want to give myself permission to get excited until his name was called. The fact Robert DeNiro was also nominated made me listen extra closely to make sure I heard correctly he actually won.
And his speech was pretty much everything I expected, but I’m sure all the victories preceding this one helped him prepare for it.
I’d go on some more but I have a more substantial post in mind. Something I didn’t want to post until I knew for sure he’d won. The last thing I wanted to do was jinx this.
I’ll just add a little retrospective on his history with this awards show.
He lost for “Chaplin” because Al Pacino had been passed over a few times before he finally won. Would winning an Oscar at the age of 26 have changed the way his life went during the 90s? There’s a good chance it wouldn’t have made a difference. If anything, him winning might have been the worst thing that happened to him. Showering praise on the young and inexperienced in show business tends to have some adverse effects.
Then his Tropic Thunder performance lost to Heath Ledger. Part of me will always believe the only reason he won or was even nominated was because he died in the middle of filmmaking. But considering the Tropic Thunder role and the controversy surrounding it, him getting passed over then also makes sense. Plus he was still winning back the masses after his personal life had gotten in the way of his professional life for so long.
Now, he’s finally the DiCaprio and Pacino nominee. He finally earned his due. And hearing how this year’s vote had a higher than normal turnout, part of me wonders if it’s because that many people wanted him to win as much as I did.
Also, Jimmy Kimmel said how 20 years ago, his most recent role was Tim Allen’s antagonist in the shaggy dog remake. I completely forgot about that movie, haha.
But he was also off by a couple years. In 2004, Robert’s movie that year was Gothika. The movie where he said his fondest memory (other than playing the doctor on the opposite side of the table) was “romancing the producer.” In his speech he said how he was the rescue pup she’d helped out of the gutter. It’s a bit more complicated but she deserves all the credit in the world for why he’s here. And on set, Team Downey is as good as a team as they are on the home front.
Yes, you read correctly. This is the short version of my victory lap over this news. More to come later this week.
Did the headlines hype the wrong rivalry?
Since last summer, many journalists were saying the same thing. Barbie and Oppenheimer were going to take all the awards. And when the nominations were announced, things seemed to be looking that way. But to echo what everyone else had said, there were two people conspicuously absent. Margot Robbie for best actress and Greta Gerwig for best director. Both of whom absolutely deserved to be there and I can’t imagine why, except to clear the way for the people they really wanted to win.
Of their 13 nominations, Oppenheimer took home half. I didn’t expect them to take all of them but I was admittedly concerned when we were an hour in and they hadn’t won anything. Then Robert won his and karma was coming back in their favor.
It seems like every Oscars, there’s one movie that has me caught between annoyance and concern because I hadn’t seen or heard of it and it wins a lot of awards. Last year it was the foreign film “on the western front”. This year it was “Poor Things.” Considering it was nominated for 12 awards, none of its wins were super surprising. But the fact it stole a bunch of the awards I’d picked Barbie to win, I was very much concerned.
So I have to say this- there was so much hype about the Barbieheimer rivalry. But really, Poor Things was the movie Barbie really should’ve been worried about.
Poor Things was also the only one of the nominated movies that was being regularly played in theaters nearby. The two aforementioned movies were already on dvd and/or HBO. But some of the others (The Holdovers I was very interested in seeing), only played locally 2-3 times and they were at inconvenient time slots. And I wasn’t going to subscribe to Peacock or buy a dvd we were most likely only going to watch once.
And yeah, I guess if Poor Things ever comes to TV, I’m gonna have to watch it now.
It looks like a bizarre cross between Tim Burton, Birdman and Wes Anderson (who won for a short film this year but wasn’t there to accept it in person). The kind of movie sure to stick with you- for better or worse and I hope it’s the former.
Barbie was a little bit of a letdown when I finally saw it but I’d be willing to give it another try. I didn’t like Ken’s story arc but Ryan Gosling’s performance was such a show stopper, it might be enough to bring me around. (It was so epic, I was like "dude, if this acting thing doesn't work out for you, this would be a good back up plan").
It was just sad after all that the movie only won one award. And in the Barbie vs Ken face off, Barbie prevailed. A well deserved second win for Billie Eilish.
The result of my Oscar ballot
I’ve only filled one of these out a couple of times but it might be a tradition I’ll continue going forward.
I got 13/23 wins correct, which is my average.
Barbie aside, it was kinda disappointing I didn’t get the lead acting categories correct. But I also couldn’t be too mad about either one. I honestly thought Lily Gladstone was nominated because she was going to win- Hollywood’s too-little-too-late way of making up for the Sacheen Littlefeather controversy. But I’d loved Emma stone since “Easy A” so any time she wins is a win for me.
After watching a Hollywood reporter round table on YouTube (featuring RDJ, Mark Ruffalo and three of the best actor contenders), I picked Jeffrey Wright to win for American Fiction. He received so much praise from the other actors and his role sounded interesting to me. It’s one of those roles and movies that people had been clamoring for that shines a spotlight on other backgrounds.(I'd have to see it for myself but it's about a black writer who earns accolades for writing a novel that- quoting Wikipedia here- "mock[s] the literary clichés expected from Black writers." He'd written it out of spite and it winds up becoming an overnight success).
That being said, I can’t be mad at Cillian Murphy winning for Oppenheimer. He did that role so well.
And of course I’m thrilled Oppenheimer won best picture because I can actually say I’d seen it and agree that it was worthy.
Although the way Al Pacino handled the presenting of the award, I was a bit concerned it was going to be the LaLa Land debacle all over again.
No disrespect but the academy needs to do better selecting people to present this award because it’s the most important one. Between Al Pacino and Warren Beatty, the ball has been dropped a bit too much in recent years.
The supporting actress winner, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, set the tone for the rest of the show. She thanked her publicist for being instrumental in her success. So a bunch of people rode those coat tails. (Robert thanked his stylist as well as his agent who’d helped him a lot over the years, not just limited to helping him get insured to do movies when he wasn’t at his most reliable).
Jimmy Kimmel
Again he was a good host. Although a couple of his jokes fell flat for me. Two of which were political jokes. :sigh: Dude just can’t help himself and I hate that.
And the whole John Cena streaker joke… I’d seen the dude have no issue with nude scenes in a couple movies but doing it live is a different animal. No wonder the poor dude was uncomfortable.
And predictably, he got one little job at Matt Damon in there at the end.
Best Oscars in years?
I may be a little biased in this regard but it was a great show even without all the Oppenheimer victories.
That being said, I can’t be mad at Cillian Murphy winning for Oppenheimer. He did that role so well.
And of course I’m thrilled Oppenheimer won best picture because I can actually say I’d seen it and agree that it was worthy.
Although the way Al Pacino handled the presenting of the award, I was a bit concerned it was going to be the LaLa Land debacle all over again.
No disrespect but the academy needs to do better selecting people to present this award because it’s the most important one. Between Al Pacino and Warren Beatty, the ball has been dropped a bit too much in recent years.
The supporting actress winner, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, set the tone for the rest of the show. She thanked her publicist for being instrumental in her success. So a bunch of people rode those coat tails. (Robert thanked his stylist as well as his agent who’d helped him a lot over the years, not just limited to helping him get insured to do movies when he wasn’t at his most reliable).
Jimmy Kimmel
Again he was a good host. Although a couple of his jokes fell flat for me. Two of which were political jokes. :sigh: Dude just can’t help himself and I hate that.
And the whole John Cena streaker joke… I’d seen the dude have no issue with nude scenes in a couple movies but doing it live is a different animal. No wonder the poor dude was uncomfortable.
And predictably, he got one little job at Matt Damon in there at the end.
Best Oscars in years?
I may be a little biased in this regard but it was a great show even without all the Oppenheimer victories.
And I think the biggest reason was the lack of grandstanding and soap box speeches. People won their trophies and thanked all the people that helped them get there. It’s the way it should be and hadn’t been for a while.
The only point that shifted away from this was Ukraine winning their first Oscar (Best Documentary) and the recipient speaking in support of his country. And also the snippet from Alexei Navalny, the Russian activist who’d died in prison (none of us believe the whole “death by natural causes” cover story) right before the "In Memoriam" segment. There were some complaints (including at least one person in our house) that you couldn’t read the names all that well. I saw enough of them that they left the intended impact. They showed Matthew Perry and his loss hit me as hard as it did when I first heard. It still doesn’t feel real. Having Andrea Bocelli there in person singing "Time to Say Goodbye" with his son, in Italian and English, also super touching.
Another cool thing was having 5 previous acting winners giving speeches for the nominees. You could really feel the love and admiration in the room.
And of course I didn’t expect anything less when Sam Rockwell delivered a few lines about RDJ with playful prodding. The most well known being “he doesn’t drop character until the DVD commentary.” Speaking from the 2-3 of his commentaries I’d sat through, it was just the one time. But I’d recommend the commentary for Tropic Thunder just the same.
Another neat thing about the awards this year. In addition to some of the international winners, several were from the UK and ended their acceptance speeches with wishes of “happy Mother’s Day.”
We have a wall calendar from the British Isles this year. It’s a bit strange having the week start with Monday. But sure enough, on March 10th it says “mothering Sunday”
This year, the show started a little after 7pm my time and ended around 10:30... there were some complaints about this, but honestly, I'd be all for this time slot going forward. Speaking as someone who has to get up early to work the next day.
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