Early Oscars

While it seems to be a huge slap in the face to the winners of honorary Oscars that they will not be receiving them in front of the millions of TV viewers around the world in February, bumped off the schedule by the now infamous decision to nominate ten movies for Best Picture rather than the usual five, it seems that the party last night was kind of a blast. The relaxed setting amongst friends may have been great consolation for honorees Lauren Bacall, Roger Corman and Gordon Willis. John Calley, admired studio chief who won the Irving Thalberg Award, was too ill to attend.

Bacall, of course, is the great actress who's career began in the 1940's under the tutelage of the great director, Howard Hawks, working with Humphrey Bogart who became her husband until his death from throat cancer in 1957. Corman, the perpetual low-budget filmmaker and studio owner, is responsible for launching the careers of Oscar winners Jack Nicholson, Francis Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Jonathan Demme, James Cameron, Ron Howard (as director) and many others.

Gordon Willis is the best cinematographer never to win a competitive Oscar. As in, The Godfather (I & II), All the President's Men, Manhattan...the list goes on. He invented a form of long-shadow lighting (using his own custom light box) now used as the standard of crime dramas and NYC filmmaking. Here's a great post with some representative scenes from great movies.

Meanwhile, one has to ask, what ten pictures are worth nominating? Is this meant to provide a place at the table for such box office draws as Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen?

My bet: ratings continue to fall. Hooray for Hollywood!