Helga without the H

 

Well, well, well, the results are in, and its time to dissect my pics! First, check out my reviews of the nominees (and should-have-been nominees) here: https://helgawithouttheh.com/2019/02/15/2019-oscar-reviews/

Next, take a look at this handy hastily-made chart (complete with misspellings and typos that I’m too lazy to correct) of the winners, as compared to who I thought would win, and who I thought deserved to win:

Note, I didn’t have predictions in every category. Sound and score categories won’t evaluated because I admittedly know nothing so didn’t have guesses, shorts and documentary weren’t evaluated because I didn’t see any of the nominees, and to my own surprise I don’t think I ever actually recorded any comments about director or editing, and I don’t trust my memory to not be tainted by having seen the results, so I didn’t put them in the chart either.

OVERALL ACCURACY:  As per usual, even with having watched almost all of the movies, my predictions were only correct roughly 50% of the time. Doh! Should have stuck with a coin flip and saved some money on movie tickets!

OVERALL REACTION:  Still, I was very happy with the results. Again, roughly 50% of my picks wound up winning (huzzah for them!). Of the remainder where my favorite didn’t win, I still found the winner deserving in 4 categories (Roma for cinematography and foreign film, and Black Panther for production design and costume), and I hadn’t seen the winner in 2 categories (Regina King in If Beale Street Could Talk for best supporting actress, and Spiderman for Animated Feature). The only one I really disagreed with was BlacKkKlansman for best adapted screenplay. I just honestly did not think it was good. But, as I mentioned in my review post, I also thought it was a weak field, so… I dunno, it’s not like there was some super clear winner that got robbed.

PROUDEST MOMENT:  I am most proud of my very confident picks in the acting categories. I thought Malek, Colman, and Ali were all so obviously fantastic that there was no way the award could go to anyone else (yes, even Glen Close), and I was right. Huzzah!

BIGGEST ERROR:  My biggest error in this entire endeavor was never making it out to see If Beale Street Could Talk. I had a sinking feeling after having recently published by picks that Regina King would beat out my favourites (both nominees from The Favourite), but I was following the Pub Trivia rule: never change an answer (unless new evidence comes to light). Just 2 nights before the awards, I had an open evening to conveniently last-minute go slide this one in, and was planning to do so. But, I’ll be honest, I think I just hit my limit for movie-going and just didn’t feel like going, and going into the theatre grumpy wouldn’t have been fair to the film. Still, if I had managed to see this film in the right mindset at some point, maybe I would have gotten the Best Supporting category right. Doh!

BIGGEST SURPRISE:  I was super happy to see that Green Book won, because it was easily my favorite best picture nominee, but holy cow was I surprised. Just as I had suspected, this morning the internet is nothing but a stream of articles and posts complaining about all the problematic things I knew people would complain about. It’s a very divisive pick for sure, and I just didn’t think the academy would go there. The optics are just terrible here.

HAPPIEST MOMENT:  Olivia Colman FTW!!!!! I was so super super happy to see her cast in a major film, particularly in such an amazing role, was even more happy to see her absolutely nailing in to the point that I felt certain she’d win, and then did a freakin’ back flip when she won. Part of that happiness is just arrogance because I’m feeling pretty smug with my pick right now, but for the most part I’m just happy for her because I’ve been a fan of hers since seasons 1 of both Peep Show and Green Wing, two of my favorite offbeat British comedies.

I leave you here with a taste of these shows for those unfamiliar with her previous work, so you can all love her and these quirky weird shows as much as I do: