Oscar Rundown

For my thoughts on Crash winning Best Picture last night, you should read Nathaniel R over at The Film Experience. I love his blog and his essay sums up my feelings pretty accurately. There was also an excellent article in The Los Angeles Times this morning by Kenneth Turan that you can read at The Envelope.

My favorite movie of the year was The New World, which was nominated for only one Oscar, but a Brokeback Mountain would have meant so much to me... I'm not even sure that I know exactly why. But I do know now that gay people love the Oscars but Oscar doesn't love us back. That's how I feel today.

At any rate, I threw a rather kick-ass Oscar party. The usual problems were present (why don't I have enough chairs for everyone and why are those people in the back so quiet?), my friends were in fine form (you know who you are: you were hilarious), and I had some awesome food (this year was stuffed mushrooms, asparagus with prosciutto, egg salad, chicken salad, brownies, blondies, and a cheese platter of which I was very proud.)

As usual, I was a basket case before the party started. I forget how long things take when you do them by yourself. I was arranging furniture and grating cheese and toasting baguettes while people were still arriving! I was unprepared for how early I told people to get there. I really ought to have asked for help earlier in the week, but as usual I thought I could just handle it. Not so!

Things turned out okay though and almost everyone I asked made an appearance. It's a shame the show was such a downer, but then, it is the Oscar nominations that I love the best. The winners invariably disappoint. And then the whole point of having an annual award ceremony is to get us all talking about movies and what makes them good and what makes them bad in the first place. There were a lot of interesting discussions last night at my condo and so I guess, in a lot of ways, the Academy is doing its job, even though I think they're utter fools for not voting for Brokeback Mountain.

To everyone who showed at the party, thanks for coming! I had a great time.