The Front Page: Surprise! Surprise! Surpri…ZZZZZZZ!

It was almost as if they did it on purpose. Two hours in, and Oscar was bucking the trend. Eddie Murphy was left standing at the altar, his all but guaranteed Best Supporting Actor award walking off with Alan Arkin. You could almost see the cloud caused by Norbit filling up the Kodak Theater. Then Dreamgirls suffered another setback when it’s 60% chance of winning the Best Song category was completely ignored. A certainly shocked Melissa Etheridge walked onto the stage to the thunderous applause of an audience already in love with everything that Al Gore and An Inconvenient Truth stood for. Even the ancillary categories got into the act. A little known animated short called The Danish Poet beat out a category of competitors that each sounded like a shoe-in.

But then it all collapsed, falling apart faster than Clint Eastwood’s remarks for specially recognized recipient Ennio Morricone. Instead of continuing the snubs, instead of recognizing something other than the predicted winners, Oscar went right back to following the formula. Though it seemed like it could conceivably continue the twist ending trend – they gave the cinematography award to Pan’s Labyrinth (beating out favorite Children of Men) only to turn around and award Germany’s The Lives of Others over Guillermo Del Toro’s popular pick – the voting members decided to stick to the script. With the exception of The Departed for Best Picture, the rest of the major categories went as planned.

And in some ways, that’s how it’s meant to be. What would have been the story this manic Monday had Babel swept all the categories, or if Peter O’Toole had finally won his well deserved trophy? Would the headlines read differently had Martin Scorsese walked out of the ceremony sans the little gold man, and would anyone outside a certain cinematic fanbase really bat an eye had Helen Mirren been upset by, say, the absentee Dame Judi Dench? No, Hollywood handed the media just enough spectacle mixed with speculation to guarantee a lot of post-presentation quarterbacking. But that’s all. While it may be interesting to ponder these questions while going over the big night’s picks and pans, it doesn’t make for a satisfying celebration of film.

It’s fairly obvious that somewhere along the line, Dreamgirls wasted all its acquired Academy Awards goodwill. Snubbed from most of the important categories (actor, actress, director and film) it could only snag an obvious victory for Jennifer Hudson. Had that predicted incident not occurred, the heavily hyped musical would have only had the Best Achievement in Sound award to its name (kind of obvious, don’t you think?). Similarly, Babel was oft cited as the Crash of 2007, a stunning possible spoiler with as many detractors as defenders. Oddly enough, it too was tripped up – multiple times. Of its seven nominations, it could only win in the Best Score category. Even Little Miss Sunshine underachieved. It’s wins for Arkin and Best Original Screenplay represent a 50% return on its four lowly nods, but for a film regularly anointed by divergent groups as the year’s best, even that number seems like an underachievement.

Then there’s poor Guillermo Del Toro. How horrid was Oscar to him? Here’s a man who made what was, arguably, one of the greatest foreign films of the last few decades, a work easily comparable to the likes of Fellini and Buñel, and yet he has to sit back and watch as his work merits three technical awards. What seemed like a sweep at the beginning of the evening turned into a kind of inverse rebuff. As a matter of fact, if you look at the awards Pan’s Labyrinth lost, you’d think the Academy had it out for him personally (two of the three losses were for his direct involvement in the film). The same could be said for Disney. Aside from a lone statue for The Pirates of the Caribbean‘s F/X work, the studio was shut out of the Best Animated Short Subject and Feature category. In all, the House of Mouse and its partner Pixar lost four potential Oscars.

Certainly there are reasons to celebrate. It was a smooth move on the part of the telecast to have Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppolla and George Lucas present the Best Director category. Though it gave conspiracy theorists fuel to fuss that the Academy Awards voting (and results) are not as secret as one thinks, it was awesome to see Scorsese take the stage to the warm embraces of the men with whom he helped shape the ’70s – the last great decade of film. It’s great that he finally has the Academy monkey off his back. Now maybe they can recognize him when he makes one of his truly great films. Similarly, Al Gore’s victory for An Inconvenient Truth may have marked another illustration of Tinsel Town’s liberal leanings, but the piercing documentary on global warming really does deserve all the supporting accolades it can get. Even Ellen DeGeneres was warm and witty, using her dry and droll style as the perfect counterbalance to what always ends up being a sadly sloppy spectacle of self-importance.

Naturally, the Academy still can’t get its shindig technicalities together. Pointless montage tributes by the likes of Michael Mann (some random look at America in movies) were upstaged by even worse visual dance interpretations of the nominated films by the stupid shadow ballet of something called Pilobolus. While those in the theater got to witness the warm embrace that Morricone gave Eastwood after his Once Upon a Time in the West-less resume was screened prior to the awarding of his honorary Oscar, the folks at home missed the moment. Whoever was doing the directing decided that random shots of clueless stars was better than viewing a little Spaghetti Western history. Similarly, George Miller’s award for Happy Feet was another of those minor upsets that will end up being overblown by pundits come column time, but Mr. Road Warrior needs a better stylist. He looked like an Aussie barrel of petrol in a bad penguin suit.

Overall, Oscar remains a horrible waste of nearly four hours, superfluous Celine Dion included. Another big budget high profile release from a major Hollywood studio loaded with celebrated superstar talent ends up walking away with Best Picture, the pre-season awards glut tore all the tension out of the major triumphs, and Jack Nicholson was once again the self-imposed life of the party (apparently, in his next film, he’ll be channeling Rod Steiger). The artist formerly known as Dirty Harry proved he can’t improvise worth a crap and Leonardo DeCaprio has sexy stoic game face to spare. It was a night of prepared statements on folded index cards, frequent shout outs to God, and the overwhelming impression of a major awards derailment diverted. It was safe. It was static. It was Oscar.

Maybe one year the Academy will simply go for broke. It will ignore SAG and the DGA, the WGA and the Golden Globes, and decide for itself what deserves end of the cinematic season praise. It will press past the publicists eager to meter out a little more marketing mantle and avoid the studio heads who hold the fate of the film community in their baffling business minded mitts. Instead of ignoring movies like The Fountain or Children of Men, it will find room on its plate for inventive, edgy efforts. There may even be a time when comedy comes to the fore, finally taking its place alongside the drama and the musical as Best Picture mainstays. Until that day, we can be thankful for the little surprises scattered amongst the aggravating annual afterthoughts.