My unfiltered Oscars takes
As an awards show connoisseur, I find it only fitting to give my two cents on my personal Super Bowl: the Oscars. Overall, I enjoyed the show; obviously, another on-stage slap would have made the night just that more exciting, but what can you do when Will Smith is banned from any Academy event for the next 10 years?
To start, I thought Jimmy Kimmel did a great job as the host. He had a really solid monologue and set a very relaxing vibe for the night, keeping the vast majority of his jokes relatively “safe”. Even more impressive, he managed to only get himself slightly canceled for his question to Malala asking her if she thought Harry Styles spit on Chris Pine. She answered in true Malala fashion when she replied, “I only talk about peace” to which Kimmel responded, “That’s why you’re Malala and nobody else is.” Although this interaction created an uproar on Twitter, I personally thought that Kimmel’s intent was not to embarrass or harass Malala, but that it was clear in the way that he addressed her that he does have a lot of respect for her and her work. Also, I thought the phrasing of the question was hilarious which in my book is enough to get anyone un-canceled.
As far as the actual awards ceremony went, I felt that many of the awards were called for. Many of the night’s winners were the feel-good winners that were predicted to win. Ke Huy Quan set the bar high early on in the night with his heart-warming victory and enthusiastic speech, which brought many audience members to tears. This also was the beginning of “Everything Everywhere All at Once” victory lap as they clearly became the big winners of the night, despite my personal feeling that there were other nominees that deserved the coveted “Best Picture” award more. If I was the academy, I would certainly have given that award to Nar, but they never asked me my opinion on the matter. Other easy-to-root-for winners came later in the night, such as Naatu Naatu from the film RRR winning for best original song, even managing to beat out big-time names like Rihanna and Lady Gaga. Speaking of those two, I thought Rhianna’s performance slayed per usual, but I personally found Lady Gaga’s performance so strange. She sang a “stripped down” performance of her song “Hold my Hand” from Top Gun, where she remained seated for the vast majority of the performance, had no background dancers, and wore all black with no makeup. Although I understand the vibe she was trying to go for, this performance just felt boring to me, especially compared to the other performances of the night.
Overall, I found this year’s incident-free Oscars really enjoyable to watch. Between the likability of the vast majority of the night’s winners and the emphasis on movie magic, I am already eager to tune in next year to find out what the Oscars have in store.