Hollywood's Big Night

Hollywood's annual self-congratulatory evening of haute couture and haughty egos came and went without a hitch.

At least, no purely technical ones.

The Oscar presentations started on time and seemed to end on time. But I could only tell by checking the clock during commercial breaks - my own inner timepiece felt it was taking forever. That's not to say the show was slow-paced, just that some of the material made me feel trapped in temporal quicksand; the more I wanted to move out and onward the deeper I was sucked down into the moment.

The feeling wasn't helped by the host-less-ness of the show. I'm not sure why the program's producers hired Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin: after an auspicious start we didn't see much of either of them. That's a fair degree of talent unused, and possibly money wasted.

But then again, perhaps the suits didn't want the evening's thickly dramatic and poignant moments to be interrupted by comedy. Steve and Alec were funny, and their comic interplay might have stolen the show if not vigorously reigned in.

However, despite the occasional treacly passage and the Steve-Alec insufficiency, there wasn't too much to complain about. It was good to see the big box office movie get somewhat short shrift - Avatar was in this respect no blue-toned 'Titanic' for Mr. Cameron. And it was pleasant to see the first woman win an oscar for best director. It didn't hurt the mood that she was once James Cameron's wife. Her little film even won Best Picture. Gotta love it.

I was also happy to see Jeff Bridges get his for best actor. The Dude Abides. Heck, he even mentioned 'Sea Hunt' on the stage, which I loved to hear, though probably only Boomers, the odd SCUBA diver, and Hulu-addicts knew what he was talking about.

On a sad note, the short film that brought me my 15 seconds on screen didn't get a mention (hope it wasn't me). That omission was almost as painful as sitting through Ben Stiller's bit done in Navi makeup.

There's balance to the Universe, though, and Barbara Walters announcing this year's post-Oscar interview show would be her last brought my evening into harmony. Nothing against Ms. Walters - I can only take so much Schmalz in one single evening.

Oh, wait - there's one last 'Up' I almost forgot to mention: Lauren Bacall. Still with us, and still beautiful. Ms. Bacall, I know how to whistle ...