Oscars post mortem

Post mortem is such a cliche for these pieces, but when your best picture winner is The Departed . . .

~ There was a lot of talk, including the lead off of Ellen's monologue, about how international this year's Oscars were, including best picture nominations about global communication, or lack of it; World War II, from the Japanese perspective; and British royalty and citizenry, though the Royals are really nothing new to Oscar. But ultimately, the Academy Awards are an American honor handed out in Hollywood, and that is what ruled the day. I mean, you don't get much more Hollywood than Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola handing Martin Scorsese the best director prize. (copyrighted AP photo, right) (I would have hated to be a director that beat him, since anyone else probably would have been booed.) And then, Mr. Tinseltown Jack Nicholson gives Departed's producer the best picture prize a few minutes later.

So much for globalization and independents. And I will invoke a new rule in my prognosticating: Absent a clear winner from another corner, go with the most Hollywood movie of the bunch. And The Departed sure had that, with multiple generations of current and former A-list actors on the screen. You don't have to venture far on the net to find grumbling that the Oscars blew it, particularly folks who felt Babel was much better and more important than Scorsese's gangster drama. Departed will go down as yet another belated honor given to an unworthy film, along with Al Pacino's best actor prize for Scent of a A Woman (1991). But Hollywood doesn't really care. What was that David Letterman said about rich people giving trophies to other rich people?

~ Hollywood also has been pretty blatant  about not caring if we all have sleep-deprivation hangovers the day after it's big, bloated show.

It used to be we complained about the big production numbers -- Rob Lowe and Snow White, anyone. Not so much, anymore. But this year's Oscars were loaded with all of these little bells and whistles like the Pilobolus dancers and the comedians' number (copyrighted AP photo of Jack Black and Will Ferrell, left) that just made the show drag. The rest of the ceremony should be like the last awards. Take it from a live blogger. All night, I could get up a fairly substantial post about an award before the next envelope was opened. Then, bam-bam-bam (how Departed), actor, director, picture.

If they could run the whole show at this pace, it might not scare off people who usually only stay up until midnight for New Year's Eve.

~ While George, Johnny and Ashley were all on the sidelines this year, a Kentuckian did finish in the money last night. Louisville native Bub Asman, who now makes his home in Union, Ky., earned an Oscar for sound editing on Letters from Iwo Jima. He shared the Oscar with his editing partner Alan Robert Murray (copyrighted AP photo of, L-R, Murray and Asman, right). They were also nominated for Flags of Our Fathers and have been nominated twice before, for Space Cowboys in 2001 and Eraser in 1997.