It is a curious thing about the Oscars: Millions of people watch the Sunday broadcast each year, talk about the show for perhaps five minutes at the office water cooler Monday morning, then never think about it again. Seeing as it’s already Tuesday evening, post-Oscars as I write this, methinks this blog entry is dead in the water. Still, I’m a completist, and I didn’t want to leave my Oscar predictions blog simply hanging in the GringoPotpourri wind without a proper bookend. I promise to keep this brief. No, really!
The Winners
So, not too surprisingly, it was Ben Affleck’s “Argo” as Best Picture, Life of Pi’s “Ang Lee” as Best Director, “Lincoln’s” Daniel Day-Lewis as Best Actor, and “Silver Linings Playbook’s” Jennifer Lawrence as Best Actress. I called ‘em all, of course. Supporting honors went to Christoph Waltz for “Django Unchained” and Anne Hathaway for “Les Misérables.” Waltz’s win threw me for a bit of a loop; I had Robert De Niro for “Silver Linings Playbook,” and in fact predicted that if there were any major category upsets they would be in favor of “SLP.” Alas, ’twas not meant to be. “Django Unchained” also earned Quentin Tarantino his second Best Original Screenplay Oscar; his acceptance speech was one of the better ones of the night, and about as humble as you could ever expect Tarantino to act. I failed to predict either of “Django’s” Oscar wins; although I’m a big fan of the film I thought it would go home empty-handed, considering that Tarantino’s superior effort, 2009’s “Inglourious Basterds,” lost in the Original Screenplay category. Waltz won the same prize in that same category then; I simply didn’t think lightning would strike twice, nor so soon after his last win.
GringoPotpourri 