What a ceremony!

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Was too busy playing host to over 70 people during the actual show, but finally watched it over the last few busy nights, and... CONAN SLAYED!

Loved his opening monologue. I thought he nailed the right tone, right pace, great balance of absurdity and topical comedy - for example, his Karla Sofia Gascon joke was just the right way to take that on (rather than avoid it) but not be too mean. His incorporation of the firefighters was genius - he was genuine, but made room for comedy by empowering them to deliver the jokes. Literally genius.

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I thought the presenters had fun & creative banter, that was clearly in line with Conan's comedic style - don't know if that was intentional or just a bi-product of his writers being the show's writers, but regardless that was great. I thought they used the space and setting to their comedic advantage - like Ben Stiller's production design trapped-under-the-stage bit and Bowen Yang's "wait why am I the only one in movie-costume" bit... both were chef's kiss.

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I scratched my head at having a long tribute to the scores of James Bond when they cut this year's Best Original Song performances for time... But I am in favor of making time for moments that acknowledge cinema of decades past, so I didn't wholeheartedly hate it.

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I'm most sad about Adrien Brody's speech, tbh. I thought his performance was one of the greats of all time, in one of the greatest works of cinematic art in years, and now he's going to be remembered for an obnoxiously long, ostentatiously delivered, pompous speech. His speech DID need an intermission (ha!), and more people saw that speech than the actual movie. Breaks my heart that now he's going to be more remembered for that speech than for the movie itself. Ugh...

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As for the winners, I will never understand how the towering achievement of The Brutalist​ lost PGA, DGA, and now the Oscar; but I just hope it stays in the collective memory of film lovers as a relevant and impactful accomplishment. It'll never leave my bones. 

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But also: happy for the Anora crew and its myriad fans. A precious moment for them... And pretty cool that Sean Baker tied Walt Disney's record of four Oscars in one night! (And Walt did so with multiple projects, so Sean is the first to do so with one movie - good for him!)

More thoughts on each category page, and check out my WINNER PREDICTION STATS page for how I racked up against the experts, and for who won my pool!

NOW, PIS FROM MY PARTY!