The 83rd Annual Academy Awards, in an effort to appeal to a younger demographic, recruited Anne Hathaway and James Franco to host the ceremony. However, the new hosts and a streamlined broadcast were not enough to enliven the most predictable ceremony in years.
In terms of awards, the Academy delivered few surprises — unless you count the critically panned “Alice in Wonderland” pulling through to nab awards in both art direction and costume design. All of the major awards went as predicted, with “The King’s Speech” finishing out its awards season dominance, picking up the Oscars in best picture, best actor, best director and best original screenplay.
Natalie Portman also rode the buzz wave to a win best actress for “Black Swan,” while Melissa Leo and Christian Bale won in the supporting acting categories for “The Fighter.” The evening was rounded out by wins in best adapted screenplay and best soundtrack for “The Social Network,” best song and best animated feature for “Toy Story 3” and a slew of technical awards for “Inception.”
Hosts Anne Hathaway and James Franco struggled to keep the show going or achieve any kind of chemistry. From the awkward opening monologue onward, the pair failed to strike the right balance between funny and graceful, witty and playful. Anne Hathaway still deserves points for effort, or at least for having to carry James Franco all night. His delivery was lazy; he disappeared from the ceremony for long periods of time and was generally off-color and boring. At least Anne was obviously trying with her enthusiastic delivery, singing and shimmying in her ridiculous number of outfit changes. Franco’s one redeeming contribution was his “Oscar Real Time” photos and videos which he tweeted throughout the telecast.
Most of the skits fell awfully flat as well, with the exception of the “Bed Intruder”-style auto-tuning of scenes from some of this year’s most popular movies, most notably “Harry Potter and the Deathy Hallows: Part I,” featuring Ron’s (Rupert Grint) auto-tuned voice singing “A Little Ball of Light” while Hermione (Emma Watson) looked on, scowling. They also riffed on “Toy Story 3,” “The Social Network” and “Twilight: Eclipse.” Although it was obviously pandering to the younger demographic, it was still a funny skit, especially in the midst of so many dull musical performances and montages.
Throughout the ceremony, there was also an odd, seemingly random focus on great Academy Award-winning films and ceremonies from the past. This resulted in awkward moments like Cate Blanchett being introduced with a “Lord of the Rings” background, a decade-old trilogy which isn’t even her most notable credit, or the ceremony overemphasizing legendary films from the past like “Titanic,” only to make some of this year’s offerings pale in comparison.
Some of the celebrity presenters, however, managed to liven up the evening a bit. Sandra Bullock, presenting the award for best actor, casually called Jeff Bridges “dude” (perhaps a reference to his famous role as “The Dude” in “The Big Lebowski”) and then playfully lambasted him for getting nominated two years in a row. Melissa Leo dropped the f-bomb during her acceptance for best supporting actress. And Kurt Douglas, in one of the most simultaneously awkward and hilarious moments of the night, presented the award for best supporting actress, but not before getting into a mock-fight over his cane and dragging out the presentation of his award with superfluous random commentary.
This year was not a ceremony to remember, but at least it provided a few noteworthy moments, and rewarded — albeit predictably — some of the year’s best achievements in film.