The Oscars were last night. I watched most of it. Like 99% of it. I turned it off during Anora’s best Picture speech because that film talked enough. I swear I saw the American Idol thing was programmed at like 10:05, so if that is true, that was a huge over run. John Lithgow is fired. A lot of firsts happening. First black man to win for Costume Design. First time Flow was shown with audio description of any kind. Oh, they didn’t celebrate that? That’s why we need more voices in the room, so a movie like Flow, when it wins an Oscar, doesn’t also feel like a stab in the back. Nefertiti is now the only person to have ever done any audio description for Flow. Those little clips. Also, that is true of Best Documentary winner No Other Land, and likely the winners of Animated Short and Live Action Short. The Only Girl In The Orchestra has audio description on Netflix. there was a funny moment where during the International acceptance, Nefertiti clearly didn’t have a name for an individual, and just threw out Brazil, when someone was winning the award. yes, the country won, but they weren’t physically present. Though, I guess they were? The AD was great. I saw people online frustrated that Youtube TV didn’t pick it up, nor did Hulu. Shame on the Oscar’s for forgetting Michelle Trachtenberg. Her credits aren’t quite as profound, but when you ad Hackman, it is clear that you chose not to add Michelle. I’m sure some other very deserving people didn’t make the cut. I’d rather have a longer segment here than that Bond segment with some singers who were “meh”. It would have been way cooler if Adele had done her own song, since she’s still alive and performing, and it was the third in that trilogy. And yes, Adrien Brody spoke way too long. His last 30 seconds should have been his speech. the first part was “I didn’t write anything down.” Which is stupid, since he’s won everything but SAG.
TV Shows Watched: Surface: S2E2 (Apple Plus) with audio description, From: S1E8 (Amazon) with audio description, Wags To Riches: S1E8 (Netflix) with audio description, Invincible: S3E3 (Amazon) with audio description, The Eastern Gate: S1E1 (MAX) with audio description, Krapapolis: S2E10 (Hulu) no audio description, Harley Quinn: S5E7 (MAX) with audio description, The Baldwins: S1E1 (MAX) no audio description, Are You Smarter Than A Celebrity?: S1E16 (Amazon) with audio description, Have I Got News For You? S2E3 (MAX) no audio description, and The Oscars: S97E1 (ABC) with audio description.
Best Episode: From- We took a look back at how our Sheriff arrived into town, and I did not expect that to be his tragic backstory. Man. Also, we see what it was like before they had supplies.
Runner Up: Have I got News For You- I needed this. I love that they got Jasmine Crockett on as a guest.
Best Audio description: From- Still, really excellent audio description.
Runner Up: invincible- Also really excellent. Lots of superhero fighting that lands.
Special Achievement In Audio description: Descriptive Video Works (The Oscars)- What a lovely ceremony. Nefertiti was great, but I know it takes more than one person, so thanks to the whole team. The balance was good. She had to not step on a lot of toes, including Nick Offerman who narrated for all audiences and made there less space for audio description. Still, they became the first people to put any audio description on these little clips from films with no AD. Special achievement!
Best Performance: Cynthia erivo and Ariana Grande (The Oscars)- What a way to kick off the show. Loved it. Cynthia had the unenviable task of having to belt out home, and then immediately after get to the meat of Defying Gravity. Those are two ball busters. I loved learning that Ariana kissed Cynthia’s hand before giving her the stage. Just. Perfect.
Runner Up: Harold Perreniau (From)- As we saw Boyd’s past, we now understand his pain. what a difficult choice he had only a second to make.
Best Moment Of Audio Description: Flow Gets Audio Description Whether It Wants It Or Not (The Oscars)- seriously, it made my night. It felt like a fuck you from the blind community to every film that had ignored us. Of course, it isn’t sufficient for long form, but it still felt like it was a long time coming, and secretly revealing the deep shame these movies should feel. Like, see? We CAN audio describe your movie. We can even do it live! Accessibility matters.
runner Up: The Bond Segment, Conan’s The Substance, Conan’s Time Wasting Opening Number, and the two tribute sections (The Oscars)- yes. I can’t pick just one. we got this excellent and silly description of Conan coming out of Demi Moore. We got the dance sequences. We got names for who passed away. We got the Quincy segment. So many excellent staged presentations that were pulled off well, far beyond “what is that person wearing?” Although, even in that, finding out that Chalamet wore a Yellow Tux made me think he needed attention.
Worst Of…- A lot of lacking AD. I thought The Baldwins might feature more than just Alec and his wife. his wife is not someone who i would enjoy in a long format series, so this might very well be a one and done. Some people are fun to have on a reality show, and i get that. I didn’t get that vibe from her. Perhaps, it was the worst thing I watched. Either that or the first 90% of Adrien Brody’s speech.
Also, Conan had some savage jokes in there. that Kendrick/Drake joke caught everyone off guard. He made fun of Carla with her in the room for her social media posts. Some of that was really biting stuff.