Just a little note to say that I watched the show twice yesterday (!) and I loved Jon Stewart as the host. I absolutely hate the Daily Show, but I thought he was very funny at the Oscars.
Now, as to the awards
I was very happy about Reese Witherspoon and George Clooney (even though I would have preferred it if he won Director- loved his speech btw).
Ohter than that, there was no category that had any surprise element and that makes the show a bit boring to me.
I knew PSH win for Capote, Ang Lee also and I wasn't that surprised about Crash. There was too much hype lately and it is not so rare anymore to "split" Director and Picture. I haven't seen BBM or Crash yet, but from what I have read and seen so far, I have the feeling that Crash is not what I would call a great movie. But I haven't always agreed with the Academy's voting (*cough* Gladiator, Beautiful Mind *cough*), so well...
On another note, I would like to say something about actors portraying real characters: I think PSH is a very good and talented actor, but yes, I DO believe that playing a real person is easier than creating a whole new character from scratch, and make it believable and worth watching. I don't mean to say that it comes down to "better" or "worse" acting - it is just different. It's a whole other thing to create someone new, with believable reaction and another thing to pick up an existing person's reactions and facial expressions and reproduce them on screen. It might be hard, it might be difficult, it might be something that only good actors can do, but IMO IT IS JUST NOT ACTING. I am not particularly talking about PSH, because I do believe that he went far beyond that (as well as Joachin Pheonix as Johnny Cash) but Jamie Foxx's oscar win for Ray was ridiculous to say the least.
That's why I was so glad about Reese (and would have also been about Joachin Phoenix had he won). They both totally owned the screen and never - not for one second- did they give the impression that they were just mimicking a real person's expressions&attitude.
It also reminds me of Gwyneth Paltrow's win in Shakespeare in love (fictional character) over Cate Blanchett for Elizabeth (not fictional at all). I know many people thought it was a joke, but if you think about it, it was totally deserved (that comes from someone who thinks that Gwyneth is a lousy actress). IMO it is easy for a normal actor, with medium acting skills to portray an historical person, where everything is sort of given and you have something to refer to. What is not easy, is to make a fictional character believable and not laughable.
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