81st Annual Academy Awards predictions

[Ziegfeld Girl]

Let's bump this thread with some (horrible) information:

Original Song performances reduced to a 65-second medley in favour of Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens, Hugh Jackman and Beyoncé performing a huge number.

Zac Efron is also presenting Original Song (EW, he might actually give the Oscar to Peter Gabriel, A.R. Rahman or M.I.A and A.R. Rahman. Robert Pattinson is also presenting, but I don't mind that.

Traditionally, the previous acting winners present. Not happening this year.

Only the nominees will grace the red carpet.

That's a lot of bad information. It looks like the Oscars is turning into the MTV Movie Awards. What next? Lauren Conrad and Heidi Montag seat filling the place? On a positive note, Steve Martin and Tina Fey are presenting together.

I'll probably only watch to support Slumdog Millionaire, Milk, Pené (or I wouldn't mind any of the other Supporting Actress nominees) and Sean Penn or Mickey Rourke (either one would be great).

That doesn't sound promising.

The performance of all the nominated songs is one of my favourite parts of night. I was really looking forward to hearing "Jai Ho" performed in full. I also think that it is really unfair to the singers and songwriters who worked so harding creating a song and getting a nomination to have it reduced to 20 seconds in a minute montage! That reminds me of one year when some Oscar winners were presented their awards at their seats!

I know that the Academy wanted to keep the presenters a secret but only letting the nominees walk the red carpet?! That sounds awful. I also think it will be bad for viewers as a lot of people like to watch the red carpet more than the event itself. I also really like the tradition of past acting award winners presenting the next year. I'm really not looking forward to watching the Oscars now.

I know the Oscars want to cut running times and attract more viewers but I don't think that should be done at the expense of the nominees and the integrity of the ceremony.

 

[LolaSvelt]

Good news, Marion Cotillard and Tilda Swinton are presenting. Don't know about Daniel Day-Lewis and Javier Bardem. Day-Lewis did present last time he won, though.

 

[Flashbang]

Only the nominees will grace the red carpet.

wud??? NOoo!!

 

[LolaSvelt]

They want it to be top secret this year. They want to surprise viewers with the presenters by making them skip the red carpet. Which kind of sucks, but when the ceremony starts, it would be good to start picking out people from the ceremony.

 

[RedAzalie]

did anyone know where i can view academy awards live online? coz here in poland only canal + show this an i havn't got that chanel so...

 

[saucer-like]

I wonder if there are going to be any surprises/upsets this year. It does seem like the competition is fairly sewn up, but you never know. The noms are kind of a yawn (imo), so I'm kind of hoping for a little unpredictability. The red carpet thing sounds weird because I thought awards shows kind of thrived on that sort of thing.

Original Song performances reduced to a 65-second medley in favour of Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens, Hugh Jackman and Beyoncé performing a huge number.

I think this is just ridiculous, but I wouldn't really expect anything less from these awards shows (even the Oscars). Plus I'm pretty sick of hearing/seeing 3 out of 4 of these names.

Traditionally, the previous acting winners present. Not happening this year.

Ugh, can't believe this.

 

[smartarse]

i've been hearing rumors (not internet rumors) that Michelle Williams and Matilda Ledger are in LA, and that theres a possibility that Matilda (with Michelle) will accept Heath's award?

anyone read something similar to that on the internet?

ETA: Michelle is in LA (that's confirmed)

 

[Scott]

it has been such a beautiful event this year. much congrats to penelope who made perhaps the most thoughtful speech of the night for me. and did anybody else love the presenting for the acting categories?

 

[Ma†t]

congrats to Slumdog Millionaire. im not sure if it won all of its nomination but it got the one that really counts.

 

[quiet heartbeat]

To sum up most of my feelings -

- Dustin Lance Black's acceptance speech for Best Screenplay ['Milk'] was absolutely stunning and so powerful. Plus, he's gorgeous. ;D
- At first I was nervous about the new Oscar presentation set-up, but ended up loving the way they did it. It was so cool being able to see all of those previous winners present the awards. I also loved how the set-up made the awards seem so much more emotional and personal, but shared at the same time. Nearly all of the nominees were crying as the previous winners spoke of them, and that definitely struck a chord in me.
- I was such a big fan of Hugh Jackman's intro number and musical medley/montage. Very cool, and everything went without a hitch. Props!
- I laughed so hard at the comedy montage with James Franco and Seth Rogen, great stuff.
- There were so many pale colors on the red carpet tonight, not a big fan of that. I was hoping there'd be more color and variety. There seemed to be so many more mermaid dresses than normal, as well. At least there was no one with a horrific outfit... surprisingly. Maybe Tilda Swinton was borderline, but then again - 'Unique' is her middle name. Haha.
- I was quite fond of Mickey Rourke's [and Jay Manuel's] off-white/cream suit. It was a breath of fresh air amongst all the black tuxes, and he still looked classy [or as classy as someone like him can get].
- One of the best lines of the night was when 'Departures' won for Best Foreign Film, and in closing, Yojiro Takita quoted the Styx song by saying, "Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto."
- When the younger cast of Slumdog was being interviewed by Ryan Seacrest on the red carpet, I pretty much died. They were so sweet and excited, very well spoken too.
- I wanted to slap Freida when she responded to Ryan's question regarding any romance between her and Dev. She said something along the lines of how like the younger cast in the film, Dev is just a kid. LOW BLOW. lsdk;jfsa;ljfd WTF. He's 18, and she's only 24. Hello! Demi and Ashton, Jen and John. GTFO. =[
- I was gutted when M.I.A. didn't appear when A.R. Rahman sang 'O... Saya'! I remember him saying he didn't want to sing it without her, but as they always say - the show must go on.
- Kate Winslet was gorgeous and so humble/extremely nervous as usual. She's such an amazing actress, and seeing her act like it was her first time receiving much deserved acclaim for her work/going to an awards show makes me smile. She really is one of a kind.

 

[Label Basher]

I just want to say that I'm hacked off Mickey didn't win and I'll just leave it at that otherwise I will rant all day.

So happy for Kate.

 

[plumaffair]

I was pretty impressed with Hugh Jackman as a host...especially loved his opening musical segment with Anne Hathaway! I think he did great job last night.

The winners were fairly predictable (even the Best Actor winner...it was definitely a heavily contested category but in the end, I think Sean Penn was finally going to get his due).

 

[quiet heartbeat]

Yeah, I loved the awards this year. I think it would've been my favorite Oscars so far if there had been some sort of surprise winning in at least one of the categories. I guess there was an upset when Departures won for best foreign film, but if it had been a bigger award, that would've been pretty cool.

 

[AnaBGD]

^ I completely agree with you! The best foreign film was the biggest surprise, the only other I wasn't sure about was actress in a supporting role, I'm very happy Penelope won and I think Marissa was big competition.

 

[Chaky]

I wanted Marisa to win instead of Penelope and Mickey to win instead of Sean. Most of the winners were fairly predictable though. Yeah I agree the big surprise was Foreign Film.

Oh and having only just seen Doubt yesterday I was rooting for Meryl instead of Kate. Sorry I really think The Reader is one of the worst films I've seen this year. If they'd nominated her for Revolutionary Road it would have been a different story.

 

[dvbist]

i loved it this year.

 

[MyNameIs]

I wanted Marisa to win instead of Penelope and Mickey to win instead of Sean. Most of the winners were fairly predictable though. Yeah I agree the big surprise was Foreign Film.

The ONLY surprise was in Best Foreign film.

 

[Working Girl]

The idea of having past Oscar winners give speeches to the current crop of nominees was a bad idea. Oscars are a show about performances, not people talking about how great a performance was. Show me some clips. The actors' egos are inflated enough, why congratulate them even more.