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LA LA LAND — The 87th Annual Academy Awards featured all the stars and drama we’ve come to expect over the years. Celebrities of all kinds made an appearance ranging from Lady Gaga to Julie Andrews. Those two actually shared the stage.
While we all try to get over the hangover of watching Hollywood celebrate itself and hand out coveted statues for movies many of us haven’t seen, let’s take a look at some of the biggest winners and losers from Hollywood’s biggest night.
Winners
The bizarre yet mesmerizing film “Birdman” was the Oscar darling Sunday night, winning four of the nine awards it was nominated for. While that’s an impressive haul for a movie that was an experiment to begin with, the real shocker is the fact that the mad scientist behind it cleaned house.
The writer and director of “Birdman,” Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, was personally nominated for three awards for his film and won every single one.
While a majority of audiences likely won’t enjoy “Birdman,” they won’t be able to deny Inarritu’s ambitious undertaking and pinpoint execution. Like “Birdman” or not, Inarritu’s wins were well-deserved.
Neil Patrick Harris is a fan favorite and many were anxious and excited to see what he would do as the host of the 87th Annual Academy Awards. Those patient fans were not disappointed.
Harris was classy, clever and genuinely funny as he made tasteful jokes about Oprah as well as pot shots at himself with lines like, “And now the most well adjusted child star in the room, Jason Bateman.”
Harris has hosted the Tony Awards on numerous occasions and been a hit with audiences, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to see him back on the Oscar stage.
Xfinity’s Emily’s Oz commercial
The cable and Internet provider Xfinity may not offer the best prices, but it did offer the night’s best commercial.
Xfinity is introducing a new feature it calls the first talking guide. The service is supposed to help the seeing impaired enjoy their favorite movies. To set up the new feature, Xfinity produced a commercial called “Emily’s Oz” that is one of the most beautiful and moving commercials produced in a very long time.
Instead of explaining it, you’d be better served to watch it.
Mexico
Mexican filmmakers are starting to take over Hollywood the past two years.
We’ve already mentioned Mexico native Inarritu and his three wins along with his film-winning best picture. That is now two years in a row a Mexican has won the award for best director. Alfonso Cuaron won last year for his efforts with the space adventure “Gravity.”
In addition to Inarritu, “Birdman” cinematographer and fellow Mexican native Emmanuel Lubezki took home his second consecutive Academy Award for best cinematography. Last year he won for his work on Cuaron’s “Gravity.”
Losers
“Boyhood” and “American Sniper”The films “Boyhood” and “American Sniper” were nominated for a combined 12 Academy Awards and they won a combined two. One each.
Both films were highly respected and while not many expected “American Sniper” to win in the major categories, many experts thought “Boyhood” would walk away with multiple awards, but it wasn’t meant to be.
“Boyhood” won its one award for best supporting actress with Patricia Arquette and “American Sniper” won for best sound editing.
The Academy nominated writer and director Wes Anderson’s “The Grand Budapest Hotel” for nine Oscars and the quirky film took home four of those awards, but the mind behind the movie came up empty-handed.
Anderson’s film was praised for its originality and unique look, but the Academy didn’t award him with any of the three statues he was nominated for.
Anderson is a proven director and he has now been nominated a total of six times and won zero.
Running time
Neil Patrick Harris was a blast, the films nominated this year were all worthy, but the running time of the awards show itself was entirely too long.
The Academy Awards is notoriously long, but Sunday night's show managed to go overtime, and we felt it. There were moments that it seemed all we got were teases about Lady Gaga’s eventual performance and commercial breaks.
When you break it down, there are a total of 24 categories. That means it takes a little over four hours to announce 24 winners. That breaks down to roughly 10 minutes to announce each category, or at least nine minutes to eventually get to a one-minute announcement of the winner and following speech. The show could easily be done in three hours or less and be every bit as meaningful and entertaining.
Animated feature category
It’s wonderful that the Academy added the Best Animated Feature category to the awards show in 2001. There are amazing animated films produced every year, and it’s fitting that Hollywood recognizes these films. With that said, they totally dropped the ball this year.
Let’s start with the nominations. All the films nominated were fine films with some great value, but the fact that “The LEGO Movie” was left out is ridiculous. That was hands down the most entertaining animated film and possibly the most entertaining film in general in 2014, and it wasn’t even nominated.
“The LEGO Movie” grossed over $250 million at the box office and delighted audiences young and old all over the world. The Oscars aren’t about what movie made the most money, but they are supposed to be about the best, and “The LEGO Movie” was undoubtedly one of the best.
Now that we’ve covered the fact that they totally blew it with not nominating “The LEGO Movie,” let’s now move onto the movie that did win.
“Big Hero 6” was a fine film, but out of the nominees “How to Train Your Dragon 2” was a superior film and lost. Disney and Pixar chief creative officer John Lasseter seem to have a strong hold over the Academy and whatever they touch is automatically given the award.
Sure, “The Incredibles” and “Up” deserved to win over “Shrek 2” and “Coraline,” but “Big Hero 6” did not deserve to win over “How to Train Your Dragon 2.”
While we love the best-animated feature category, this was an ugly year for the Academy when it came to animation.
There you have it, the winners and losers from the 2015 Academy Awards. What were your highs and lows from the awards ceremony? Let us know on the comment boards and all that social media stuff.
John has been writing about movies, news, sports and pretty much anything awesome for more than five years. John is the co-host of the Flix Junkies podcast and will always entertain you with his stories. John is an alumnus of both Utah Valley University and BYU. He, his wife and their two children call Salt Lake City home.
