Finally, we have reached and now passed, the pinnacle event in cinema, the Academy Awards. This year was the 88th Academy Awards, hosted by comedian, Chris Rock, and it certainly was an interesting show to say the least.
Between the anticipation as to whether or not Leonardo DiCaprio would win his first Best Actor award Oscar and the "Oscars So White" boycott, this show stood on its own as one for the ages. Despite all of the controversy and excitement, there weren't actually too many surprises when it came down to the winners.
"Mad Max: Fury Road" won a whopping six awards of its 10 nominations, including Costume Design, Film Editing and more. This was certainly expected by anyone who has seen the film, it was a technical masterpiece. Despite its lack of creative writing and character development, the sound, costume, makeup and visual creativity proved to be excellent, allowing the film to go home with so many awards, but not being good enough to snag a Best Picture award.
This was one of the most highly anticipated Oscars to date for a few reasons. One of these reasons is because of the huge race controversy surrounding the nominations, which led to a boycott supported by many celebrities, like the famed director Spike Lee. Host Chris Rock took advantage of this phenomenon in every way that he could on stage. He turned the show into his very own stand-up special, cracking jokes about Hollywood being white-dominated and black artists not getting enough recognition.
By the end of the night he had said everything that could have possibly been said so that nothing more could be said after the fact. This, in my opinion, was extremely successful and was absolutely necessary. It's apparent that Rock's primary goal was to put an end to the conversation and it seemed to have worked. The president of the Academy addressed the audience, shedding light on their new initiatives to show more recognition to all artists, no matter what race. This shows promising progress in Hollywood moving forward.
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We also were fortunate enough to witness some very emotional musical performances by Sam Smith, The Weeknd, Dave Grohl and Lady Gaga. Sam Smith ended up with a win for Best Original Song for "Writing's On The Wall" featured in the newest Bond movie, "Spectre." Although Smith took home the gold man, Lady Gaga's performance of "Till It Happens To You" from the documentary "The Hunting Ground" was utterly powerful and moving, featuring real victims of sexual assault and domestic violence.
The night ended with a long-awaited win for Leonardo DiCaprio, taking home the award for Best Actor for his excruciating role in "The Revenant" and "Spotlight" winning Best Picture. The Best Picture award seemed to be a toss-up going into the Oscars, according to the prediction polls, which had been showing a neck-and-neck race between "Spotlight," "The Revenant," and "The Big Short." Throughout the night, "The Revenant" and "The Big Short" had been picking up wins in categories like Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay, but they weren't enough to go against the overall excellence displayed in "Spotlight."
This year's Oscars were one of a kind in that there was more controversy and activism shown by all of the participants (and non-participants), making it one of the most remarkable Academy Awards to date. Topics covered that night included racial equality, sexual assault, global warming and so much more. Of course, for the attendees, the Oscars are already a night they will remember for the rest of their lives, however the 88th Oscars were a night that we, as fans, will never forget.
