It Should Never Be Longer Than THE BRUTALIST! - My Thoughts on the 97th Academy Awards

 This was a very bizarre ceremony.

The host, Conan O'Brien, made a point near the end of his opening monologue that he wanted to run a tight ship...and while we can't necessarily blame him for segments such as the one devoted to the James Bond series, it is clear that the producing team of the ceremony combined with overlong acceptance speeches (I am looking at you, Adrien Brody...) and the apparently "necessary" evil of seemingly constant commercial breaks, led to this nearly 4 hour ceremony. I feel like the Oscars haven't lasted this long in over 20 years. 

I can remember as a kid/teenager when the Oscars would start at 8:30 and then last until nearly 1 A.M. and while I do love the early 7pm start time, I don't like that it still lumbered along. That is also with them getting rid of the Best Song performances, which this year was welcomed as that had to be one of the worst lineups the category has ever seen. If there was ever a time to toss Diane Warren a bone, this was it. 

The first half hour was wonderful, even if by the half hour point I was like "Oh hell, they still haven't presented anything". The opening number with Ariana Grande singing "Over the Rainbow", Cynthia Erivo belting out "Home" from The Wiz, and then the two of the joining forces for "Defying Gravity" was a strong way to open the show and the two of them did an absolutely lovely job. 

I haven't looked at a lot of the online commentary about O'Brien directly, but I frankly enjoyed him as host. His snarky and irreverent nature felt refreshing for the ceremony, plus I do love the jab he took at Karla Sofia Gascon. I also very much loved his self-deprecating humor as the show slowly chugged along where he referred to any viewers remaining as having Stockholm Syndrome. I am a pretty die hard Conan O'Brien fan and I would very much like to see him try this gig again. I did appreciate him a bit more than Jimmy Kimmel and he was certainly far more successful in the role compared to people like Neil Patrick Harris or Seth MacFarlane. 

I feel like last year's ceremony, with Oppenheimer winning, was such a swiftly moving ceremony in comparison. The Academy has had a longstanding contract with ABC to air the ceremony which is scheduled to last until 2028. This year was the first time the ceremony has been simulcast on Hulu, which was how I viewed the ceremony...and how many people ended up pissed off (more on that in a moment). 

Part of me does like the idea of the Oscars moving strictly to streaming a la the SAG Awards which had left the TBS/TNT deal for a streaming contract on Netflix with limited ad breaks. I would like to think something such as this could help keep the time down...but if that were the case, I hope that Hulu or whichever service would take it actually allows the livestream to keep going and not cut it off right before a category that had some legitimate suspense. Considering it was a moment many people following it were building to, including me, it was a bit of a bummer to switch on YouTube TV and see Mikey Madison mid-speech and find out that way.

Let's talk about the winners, as I do have some thoughts in every direction.

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THE CRAFTS:

The majority of these prizes went in the way that I expected.

Dune Part Two winning for Sound and Visual Effects seemed like a given just as much as The Substance taking Makeup/Hairstyling. 

The Brutalist rather handily won Cinematography, and I would argue Score was an easy win as well considering the most acclaimed Score of the year, arguably Challengers, was not even nominated. 

Best Song ended up going to "El Mal" from Emilia Perez, which was yet another expected winner though one I desperately hoped would somehow lose...even if it was arguably the only semi-decent song in that trainwreck. As to be expected, the songwriters who won turned out to be absolutely obnoxious onstage seemingly wanting to sing the "Emilia" motif from the film...and also just felt like salt to the wound of seeing this dumpster fire taking awards.

Wicked made history as Paul Tazewell became the first black man to win the Costuming prize, while it also won a well deserved victory for its Production Design. Every set from the Wizard's quarters to the rotating library were an absolute marvel!

However, the one crafts prize that I want to talk about is that of Sean Baker winning for Anora. 

The Editing prize was considered to be a bit all over the place as a lot of the editing awards prior had given their trophies to Challengers...but in the last couple of weeks, the consensus from most seemed to think that BAFTA winner Conclave could pull it off and that it could signal another factor towards a last minute Best Picture surge.

Some did wonder if Anora could pull it off, but I have to that based what is onscreen, it isn't a film that seems to be screaming for an Editing win. One saying that is often said amongst awards prognosticators is that the Best Editing winner is usually "Most Editing". If you were to go based off that logic, Emilia Perez would've won this but as you can probably guess, that would never happen in my book. 

I think they could've just tossed this win to Wicked and called it a day, but I will say that despite my admiration for Anora, I do feel like its win here probably could've been spared. I did really love Sean Baker saying "I saved this film in the edit!" and proclaimed that the director (himself) should never work again. Truthfully though, Anora is a film that could've been about 15-20 minutes shorter. When I first saw the film way back in October, I felt it then and on a rewatch just two weeks ago, I still felt it. I don't think it is enough to be a true detriment to the film, but this was the win where it was clear that these voters more or less embraced Anora with a lot of passion.

I do want to express my absolute joy at seeing I'm Still Here overtake Emilia Perez in Best International Feature, which was very well deserved and it felt good to see that film barely get any wins last night...although it was still two too many.

And also - No Other Land defying against the odds of not getting any distribution and netting this win based on independent distribution. Considering its pro-Palestine subject matter, I am impressed enough Academy members embraced it considering a lot of Hollywood and the industry are rather Zionist leaning in their beliefs.

Now let's move to the Big 8 categories:

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BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY went to Anora as was expected, but I want to save more of my Anora discussion for other categories.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY went to Conclave which was one of the biggest locks of the night. A solid win, even if I would've personally wanted Sing Sing.

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BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Kieran Culkin, A Real Pain

A foregone conclusion. I don't hate this win, but I still think the steamrolling surge through the entire award season was a bit much. It is even more crazy when you take into account that it is a category fraud lead performance and that is Succession co-star Jeremy Strong was right there in a magnificent supporting turn as Roy Cohn in The Apprentice.

But it is hard not to be happy for Culkin and we have certainly seen far worse winners in this category over the years. 

His speeches, particularly this one where he called back his desire for more children based on a comment made by his wife Jazz, are always just so off-the-wall eccentric and I do think in this case it was the right mix of that quality while also having a bit more structure.

I do love that he did call out Jeremy Strong from the stage, especially considering how Strong and his Succession co-stars do have a bit of a strained history due to Strong's serious and more method approach to his acting.

Just to reiterate, this performance winning in Supporting is truly insane. 

He is in more than 60% of the 90 minute film. This is a record for a Supporting performance...and not one I think should be celebrated. Even compared to the Supporting Actress winner I will be discussing next, Culkin feels even more like a lead in that a lot of the film's tension and catalyst pushes come from his character...even if Jesse Eisenberg does have a tad more screentime. 

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BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Zoe Saldana, Emilia Perez

I am not going to spend a lot of time on this one for obvious reasons, not just because of my hatred for the film, but because she too was another locked victor. 

I will reiterate that Saldana was far and way the best thing about that film, and despite the being handed truly abysmal material, she came out of it unscathed.

However, much like Culkin, she is a lead...and perhaps the true lead of the film even over Gascon.

In what world should Saldana and Grande, who are leading characters, be competing with Isabella Rossellini who is only in 7 minutes of Conclave; Felicity Jones, who only comes to prominence in the final hour or so of The Brutalist for roughly 40 minutes of screentime; and Monica Barbaro, who flits in and out of A Complete Unknown to a total of roughly 33 minutes.

Saldana had close to an hour; Grande had around 1 hour and 10 minutes!

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BEST ACTOR

Adrien Brody, The Brutalist

Despite some predicting Chalamet could take it in a last minute surge, I still felt that this was Brody's to lose. It also seemed like he had a lot of fans calling his work "the performance of the year", at least amongst the male performances.

I think Brody suffered, at least in my opinion, upon seeing the film as I didn't feel like it was as rapturous a portrayal as some made it out to be. He had some wonderful moments, particularly his crying scene near the beginning of the film when he learns that (spoiler alert of sorts) his wife survived the camps. 

I would still likely rank him 3rd in the category with the sterling work of Ralph Fiennes in 4th, and even if I would rank Chalamet in 5th, he did give a very good performance as Bob Dylan and was clearly committed to doing good work. It was certainly better musical biopic portrayal than, say, Rami Malek in Bohemian Rhapsody. 

For me, this category was about the two candidates who arguably had the least chance to win: Colman Domingo and Sebastian Stan.

Stan's work as Trump was a bit of a masterclass in how to take in the essence of a real life person but not try to make it a caricature. As the film progresses, we watch him become more and more like the Trump we see today but it is a performance based around nailing the mannerisms and the tics along with, as I said, the essence. He also made Trump feel far more human than he ever actually deserves, but it was what the film needed.

 Domingo would've gotten my personal vote. What a truly vibrant and heartbreaking performance and one that I found showcased what a truly wonderful actor that he is and one that I have loved since I saw him in the fantastic Kander/Ebb musical The Scottsboro Boys. 

As for Brody, he's been here before. He pointed that out himself when he chose to demand them to cutoff the playoff music...something he also did when he surprisingly won this same award 22 years ago for The Pianist.

Nikki Glazer: "Oh look, it's two-time Holocaust survivor Adrien Brody!!"

Brody's speech certainly flirted with extreme pretentiousness, and it just felt unfair to a lot of other winners who may have gotten cut off throughout the night...something I wish had happened to the Emilia Perez songwriters.

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BEST ACTRESS

Mikey Madison, Anora

Words cannot express how much I love this selection.

Considering the fact they snubbed Marianne Jean-Baptiste from Hard Truths, my personal pick in this category was Mikey Madison.

This isn't to say I would've been unhappy with Fernanda Torres or Demi Moore or Cynthia Erivo winning. In fact, that quartet of women make for one of the strongest lineups I have seen in this category. Had they swapped out Gascon for MJB, it would've been an all-timer.

Demi Moore had the narrative plus the haul of the largest amount of televised precursor prizes. When she beat Madison at the Globes and then at CC, it seemed as though the buzz was shifting in her direction. 

Things took a shift when Anora began to dominate (more on that when discussing Best Picture) and that capped off by Madison winning at BAFTA right before Oscar voting had closed. 

Moore did comeback with SAG, but this was after voting ended with the Oscars. Still though, the passion for Moore was clear and her narrative was strong and her commitment to the role was apparent and thrilling. The question became: will Moore overcome the genre bias and the fact she didn't have an awards overdue narrative to take the prize OR would Madison win because she took a key industry award and was the face of the film deemed the BP frontrunner OR would the passion behind Fernanda Torres cause her to bubble up as more people discovered I'm Still Here.

I predicted Moore, but clearly knew Madison and Torres had a significant shot to take it. It does make sense in hindsight that Madison would benefit from being the face of the BP winner...which helped recent Actress winners like Frances McDormand for Nomadland and Michelle Yeoh for Everything Everywhere All at Once. 

Madison has received quite a bit of vitriol from online film forums as being too young and green and lacking charisma. On top of that, I keep seeing the phrase: "Any young actress could play that role".

Well...maybe to an extent, that is true. However, I am judging the actress who got the role. Madison's natural demeanor is shy and timid; a girl who grew up in LA and has a very chill and sunny vibe.

The character of Ani (whose official name is Anora) is a Brooklyn born and bred girl on the fringes of poverty who works at a club entertaining male clients...or not to sugarcoat it: a sex worker. She is brash and snarky and full of spunk. She has a lot of street smarts and is tough, but it is very clear that there is a lot she needs to learn about life. I don't really want to say any spoilers for anyone who hasn't seen the film, but for me, the amount of work she put in ranging from perfecting a Brighton Beach accent, learning Russian, learning how to pole dance, meeting with multiple sex workers to discuss their experiences, shows she put in the work and it paid off in spades.

I am curious to see what the trajectory is for Madison after this win. She is about to turn 26 and at such a young age and for a breakout role, this kind of win doesn't happen that often. You'd have to go back to Brie Larson winning for Room for the closest example. I do hope that she doesn't struggle to find work or that many feel she peaked too early, but frankly, I feel like she shows a significant amount of promise.

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BEST DIRECTOR

Sean Baker, Anora

Going into award season, Sean Baker was talked about a lot more as a Best Director possibility, but it felt like a choice based more around not truly knowing who the alternative was. Once The Brutalist took off, it did seem like Brady Corbet was going to lead the charge even if that film would lose Best Picture.

Things begin to change when Jon M. Chu, very randomly, won Director at CC...an award many felt would go to Corbet.

Then at DGA, some worried that if Corbet didn't win, it could go to Jacques Audiard...especially with the buzz that Emilia Perez was getting fresh off the wins at GG. I was a tad worried as by the time the award was announced, the controversy for the film had already begun, but voting had ended prior to it.

It wasn't Corbet...or Audiard...but Baker. This win at DGA changed everything.

But then, Corbet won the BAFTA which wasn't exactly surprising as they didn't take to Anora as a voting body, even though they were the major boost to Mikey Madison.

Something about Corbet seemed like a more natural fit for the Directing prize, considering what he accomplished on such a small budget while Baker's achievement seemed less grand by comparison. Many still predicted that Corbet would win, and I certainly thought he had a strong chance...but winning the DGA is pretty much strong sign you're also taking the Oscar.

In the last 15 years, only twice did the DGA winner not win at the Oscars. Sam Mendes lost to Bong Joon ho while Ben Affleck famously got snubbed for the Oscars despite winning Best Director everywhere else, which then led to Ang Lee getting his second Oscar.

So, Baker won as I expected and it certainly feels like a refreshing selection.

I do sort of wish Coralie Fargeat had played more of a role in this season with winning.

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BEST PICTURE

ANORA

Even though we've been seeing the Academy embrace films that didn't seem like typical Oscar fare for the last decade with the likes of Moonlight, The Shape of Water, Parasite, and Everything Everywhere All at Once, there still seems to be something very strange about Anora taking the prize.

It's not like it is the first time an indie film has won, but the film just feels so small and intimate. It is also a film that is modern with a female lead and deals with themes of sex work and class and capitalism...while also having a raunchy edge with slapstick comedy to boot. 

For those of us who saw Anora early on, I feel like we did the film something of a disservice by hyping it up so much...particularly when it managed to win the prestigious Palme d'or at the Cannes Film Festival almost a year ago.

When I saw the film in its first week of limited release back in October, it was being deemed as the early frontrunner but it also seemed like it was one of those frontrunners that would likely got unseated by something else. It didn't seem truly invincible like Oppenheimer, and that was very apparent when it got shutout of the Golden Globes.

With most of the award shows getting postponed right after due to the wildfires, the month of January became a month of speculation as to which film was now the frontrunner to win the Oscar...especially with Anora's Globe shutout.

I always suspected it could pull off the win at PGA, but this is where some suspected Conclave or even Wicked could gain the upper hand.

In one fell swoop over that weekend, Anora took Best Picture at CC despite strangely not winning any other award...and then it took PGA and got that surprise DGA win along with its expected WGA victory. Once the film lost at SAG and BAFTA to Conclave, that did open the door to a possible upset. 

While that kind of path to victory has happened with similar trajectories from Spotlight to Moonlight to Parasite...hmmm...maybe the "ight" rhyme is the key there...it still just felt too strange to stray from a film that won PGA/DGA/WGA. The only time a film lost Best Picture after winning that trifecta was Brokeback Mountain.

I think the crazy thing is that Sean Baker managed to sweep to such a degree that he broke a new record last night. With 4 wins, he becomes the first person since Walt Disney to win the most Oscars in one night...but Disney won for different projects. Baker is the first to win them all for one film...and I will admit, such a stat does seem crazy for a film like this. I am still not convinced he should've won for Editing, but regardless, I do love Baker's work and I love how he champions film and his politics within his choice of film content. 

This is the same man who just 10 years ago made Tangerine, a film about two trans sex workers that was shot on two iPhone 5s. I have considered him something of an indie auteur over the last decade and to see his work and a film like this recognized on such a scale makes me very happy. 

Perhaps seeing Anora early on allowed me to not be as affected by the hype in any way, but I did truly appreciate a lot about it and found it to be a very well done effort.

And now...let the 2025/26 award season begin!