THE LACKLUSTER, BLOCKBUSTER OSCARS

While the Oscars have never been the most entertaining of awards ceremonies to behold, the 92nd Academy Awards show on Sunday will at least go down in history for its historical Best Picture nomination.

For the first time in the Academy’s history, the award for Best Picture was given to a foreign language film. More specifically, director Bong Joon-Ho’s “Parasite” was presented with the award.

But the accolades don’t stop there: Parasite ended up taking home four Oscars, out of its six nominations, also winning for Best International Film, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay.

Bong gave several small speeches in Korean, stating his shock and gratitude and concluding his last acceptance speech with a quick phrase in English, saying “I will drink to the morning.”

But, aside from this historic moment, the 2020 Oscars were nothing special and even rather cringeworthy at times, thanks to the lack of a host and the unfunny “comedy” skits presenters were forced to perform.

There were a few moments of reprieve, such as Billie Eilish’s appropriately sad and sultry cover of The Beatles’ “Yesterday” during the celebrity death commemoration.

Of course, the real meat of the Oscars is finding out who won for each category. Firstly, The Academy was obligated to give director Quentin Tarentino at least one award and honored his movie “Once Upon a Time In Hollywood” for Best Production Design. Following Tarentino’s win, Brad Pitt won for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film.

Next up was “Little Women,” which won for Best Costume Design, and then the Best Documentary award went to “American Factory.” Later in the ceremony, various technical awards were given and both “1917” and “Ford v Ferrari” were chosen for achievements in sound editing.

The critics’ favorite, “JoJo Rabbit,” was also a winner, for Best Adapted Screenplay. And after many years, Roger Deakins finally won a much deserved, long-awaited Oscar for his cinematography work on “1917.” The latter also received an award for Achievement in Visual Effects.

As the evening reached its conclusion, Renée Zellweger was presented with an Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role for “Judy!” and proceeded to give a heartfelt but somewhat rambling acceptance speech – though she was not the only winner to do so. The Oscars wouldn’t be complete without at least one celebrity taking over the show to push an agenda; this year it just so happened to be Joaquin Phoenix.

After taking the stage to accept his award for Best Actor in his role as Joker, he proceeded to make his own rambling speech, criticizing the treatment of farm animals and the use of animal products of all forms. Fortunately, the communal guilt trip was short-lived, and was quickly overshadowed by the announcement of the Best Picture winner.

To end the night, the cast and crew of Parasite crowded on stage to give their heartfelt thanks, were briefly played off, but were then quickly called back by a cheering audience to finish out their joint speech. After a few more “Thanks yous,” the band started up again and the night was officially over.

Overall, this year’s Academy Awards were fairly par for the course, but that was somewhat to be expected. Thankfully Parasite’s big win was the exciting spice that kept the night interesting. While the show itself may have been underwhelming, this year’s Oscars kicked off the decade with a historic moment in cinema and will go down as a defining moment for international film.