Recap of the 2018 Academy Awards

The 2018 Oscars was an event to remember. If for some reason you spent your Sunday night cramming for a test rather than watching celebrities on the red carpet, I don’t blame you. I’ll be giving you a quick recap of the whole night so you have come to the right place.

 

The 90th annual awards was held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles and was hosted by none other than Jimmy Kimmel himself. The night began with celebrity interviews and red carpet photo shoots which were all filmed through a temporary black and white lense for a throwback to the first Oscars. The camera caught multiple celebrities, including a very excited Tiffany Haddish jumping over ropes to meet Meryl Streep, which was downright hilarious.

 

After the red carpet, Kimmel jumpstarted the night with jokes ranging from asking Steven Spielberg if he had any pot to referencing Trump jokes. The best part, however, was when he announced that the person with the shortest speech of the night would be walking out with a $18k jet ski presented by Helen Mirren. Kimmel also commented on the human-sized statue of Oscar and how he is the most well respected man because he always keeps his hands to himself, never says a rude word, and is a picture of limitation. Kimmel’s presence made the night all the more exciting and engaging.

 

Staying with tradition of awarding the Best Supporting Actor first, the first award, the Oscar went to Sam Rockwell. Considering how similar Gary Oldman and Winston Churchill looked, Best Makeup predictably went to Darkest Hour. Best Costume Design went to Phantom Threads, a movie based on fashion, and it was their only award of the night. After this award, there was a three minute montage of all of the greatest movies, actors, directors, and everybody else in the show business being recognized. Continuing on from the very heart touching video, Dunkirk won the award for sound mixing and sound editing and Shape of Water won an award for best production design which was not the only award they took home that night.

 

To amp up the diversity and culture, there was a performance of “Remember Me” from Pixar’s Coco, which won Best Animated Feature Film. The song performed by a group of Mexican singers also went on to win Best Original Song. Then, Allison Janney won her first Oscar for her supporting role in I, Tonya, and Blade Runner 2049 won Best Visual Effects.

 

Coming to a short pause on the awards, Kimmel took a group of celebrities, including Gal Gadot and Ansel Elgort, to the theatre next door to surprise the audience watching a preview of A Wrinkle in Time with hot dog cannons. All of the people in the theatre were left speechless. Going back to the awards, Call Me By Your Name won for best adapted screenplay, Jordan Peele won an award for screenplay for the movie Get Out, and finally, Roger Deekens won his first Oscar in cinematography. After thirteen failures from Shawshank Redemption, Blade Runner and Skyfall, Deekens has gotten what he deserved. Shape of Water won Best Picture which was awarded by none other than Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, who muttered to himself, “Don’t say La La Land,” a throwback to last year’s screw up. The director of Shape of Water, Guillermo del Toro, also won the Oscar for best director. Gary Oldman won Best Actor in The Darkest Hour. Frances McDormand won Best Actress, and in her speech, she invited all women who were nominated for any award to stand with her, which was a moment to remember.

 

Some of the best moments of the 2018 Academy Awards were from the actors and actresses presenting awards. Jennifer Lawrence and Jodie Foster were presenting the award for Best Actor when in their introduction, they made fun of Meryl Streep. Foster claimed she tripped and was “I Tonya’ed” by Streep. Another moment to remember was Emma Stone throwing serious shade about the male-dominated nominees for Best Director by choosing to announce Greta Gerwig (only female nominee) which drove the crowd crazy. Not to mention, Maya Rudolph and Tiffany Haddish talking about how people kept saying that the Oscars were “too white” and now that both of them were presenting an award it was “too black,” calling out the lack of diversity present in the show business as well.

 

This year’s award ceremony seemed to be more impactful than previous years’ due to multiple speeches made by the cast and crew of Coco and Frances McDormand talking about the importance of inclusion, diversity, and support throughout the film business instead of having just one gender, race, and sexuality portrayed commonly in the media. Daniella Vega was the first transgender woman to ever take part in the Oscars, proving that the social construct of the media is changing and becoming more open to other people. A prevailing message that was present throughout the entire night of the Oscars was the importance of inclusion and how this is the time for proper representation, which is such an important and relevant message to end with.

 

Also, costume designer Mark Bridges ended up winning the jet ski for having the shortest speech, in case you were wondering.