And the Oscar Goes to…

Reptastic live blogs from the red carpet at the 80th Annual Academy Awards

Last night we at Reptastic blogged live from the Red Carpet (by red carpet we mean the blood-stained carpet in our Seattle apartment) to bring you all the goings-on of the 80th Academy Awards. It was a night with a few surprises and some superb cinema, heightened by the deft touch of Jon Stewart who showed an uncommon level of sincerity in his role as host. A lovely night, some lovely winners, let’s relive it:

5:31–“Welcome to the make-up sex.”
Master of ceremonies and political funnyman Jon Stewart takes the stage to start us off on this long, arduous journey which is the Academy Awards telecast. He instantly amuses by asserting the proceedings would provide an amorous end to the writers strike.

But with this being a Hollywood crowd obsessed with back-patting, some of Stewart’s best material actually receives scattered groans from the crowd, including the priceless line, “Even Norbit got a nomination this year which I think is great. Too often the Academy ignores movies that are not good.”

His monologue was decidedly short though, betraying the obvious time crunch for him to complete it in the short time since the writers strike. It could also be that the higher-ups at the Academy want to keep this sprawling mess of a show under 5-hours, let’s see if they’re successful.

There Will be Hipster

The smarmy Juno suffocates itself with hipster-speak, but a good story still finds room to breathe

Hipsters are an interesting breed of human. Commonly found roving in packs, they exhibit characteristics including a predilection for indie music, art-films, irony-drenched witticisms, thrift-store fashion, an air of pomposity, and a need to constantly cultivate their image, all while exhibiting derision towards those whose interests don’t jive with theirs. Hipsters share an overarching ambition to be so clever, witty, hip and unaffected, they effectively build a wall between themselves and the outside world, convinced that the things one likes is more an indication of their value than one’s feelings or actions.

In film hipsters can be extremely funny, such as John Cusack and Jack Black in High Fidelity. Their pretentious hijinks can be quite the source of entertainment as audiences laugh at their overt and biting snobbery–“‘I Just Called to Say I Love You’? Has your daughter been in a coma?” However, there are times when a hipster is so full of sass and sharp-tongued wit that it’s hard to see the real human below; all you encounter is a façade which feels contrived and unlikeable. Unfortunately, the titular character in the film Juno falls into the latter category and the movie suffers for it.