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| Jim Taylor and Alexander Payne win the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay at the 2005 Academy Awards ceremony. |
The 77th Academy Awards
Ceremony date: February 27, 2005
Best Picture: Million Dollar Baby
Best Director: Clint Eastwood for Million Dollar
Baby
Best Actor: Jamie Foxx for Ray
Best Actress: Hilary Swank for Million Dollar Baby
This was the last year I did not see the Best Picture
nominees before the ceremony. There is a story behind that decision, but let’s
save that for the next piece. Truth told, the only nominee I had seen prior to
the ceremony was Sideways, which I loved. I love it to this day. It is
one of my 20 favorite movies ever, and if you want to get really nerdy, the
commentary track on the DVD – featuring Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church –
is one of the best commentaries out there.
This was also the last year I did not have my finger on the
pulse of the awards race. I was completely out of the loop, in fact. My memory
from this year was that The Aviator was winning everything as the show
kept going. It won several below-the-line awards, as well as Best Supporting
Actress for Cate Blanchett. In total, it won five of the 11 awards for which it
was nominated. To my untrained Oscar-watching eye, it looked like Martin
Scorsese’s Howard Hughes epic was going to win Best Picture. Obviously, that
did not happen.
Instead, a movie I had barely heard of won the top three
awards of the night: Picture, Director, and Actress. Million Dollar Baby
was in my consciousness only because its dark, powerful ending had proved
moderately controversial. I remember Roger Ebert, already my favorite critic
even then, going on CNN to talk about the ending. There was certainly a
cultural moment around it. I just did not realize that moment came with Academy
cache. It did, and the 74-year-old Clint Eastwood was the belle of the ball.
Apart from enjoying Sideways, I did not really have a
dog in the fight. I had enjoyed Mystic River from the year before, so I
was happy enough to see Eastwood win the award. This, of course, was prior to
any empty chair nonsense, though I must admit I still admire many of the films
he makes, up to and including last year’s Richard Jewell. It does seem
Eastwood’s misfires are becoming more frequent than his successes, though.
I was vaguely aware some people were disappointed Jim Carrey
was not nominated for Best Actor for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,
a film that missed me completely at the time but of which I was aware. Aware
enough, in fact, that I remember being pleased for the writing team of Michel
Gondry, Charlie Kaufman, and Pierre Bismuth, two of whom would go on to make
some of my favorite films of the ensuing years, winning Original Screenplay.
Eternal Sunshine might be Gondry’s best, though I
have a soft spot in my heart for The Science of Sleep, but this is
Kaufman mid-ascent. Kaufman’s best remains Synecdoche, NY, and Anomalisa
probably surpasses Eternal Sunshine, as well.
In the Adapted Screenplay category, I was happy for
Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor winning for their still-perfect Sideways
script. If you want a quick lesson in adaptation, check out the scene of Giamatti
and Virginia Madsen on the porch. His speech is from the book. Hers is not. It
is seamless, and Payne and Taylor’s thorough understanding of their characters
makes it so. Like I said, one of my favorites.
I was a fan of Documentary Feature nominee Super Size Me,
a film which only grows more problematic by the day. Another good commentary
track, but you have to get past Morgan Spurlock as a #MeToo symbol and the
Subway sandwiches pedophile Jared Vogel. Add to that the shaky science and
generally unrepeatable nature of the experiment, and well … Anyway, Born
into Brothels won the award, which is probably for the best, considering
everything.
Beyond that, my reminiscences of this year are few since I
had little awareness of the movies in the race. That will not be the case
moving forward. My Oscar night plans will also get a little more elaborate as
we move through the years, so stick around if you like hearing nerdy memories
of making people hang out with you while you watch an awards show.
Quick notes: I have gone back and watched most of the
major contenders from 2004. Sideways is still my favorite, but The
Aviator probably ought to have won Best Picture. Oh well, we’ll get to
Marty soon. … I did see Best Animated Feature winner The Incredibles in
theaters. I liked it a lot. … Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio both losers
this year. That will happen again in 2006. She will finally break through in
2008. He had to wait a little longer.
Next time: My first Oscars party! Oh, yeah, and a little
movie called Crash shocks the world.
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