The ballots are in...

and one girl had to win ("Bring It On," anyone?)!

Anyways, the long-anticipated Academy Awards aired last night from the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles. Clocking in at 3.5 hours, it felt a little eternal. How did I fair in my movie-viewing, you ask? How were my predictions? What did I think? Don't worry, readers, you are about to find out.

First off, as far as all of the big awards go (not including documentaries, foreign language, and shorts) - we did see all of the movies that won. I did not think that was going to happen because I was almost FOR SURE that Mickey Rourke was going to win for "The Wrestler." I did see all of the animated shorts (shocked by that win, but I should have seen it coming, I'm just a sucker for rabbits), but none of the others. Biggest upset of the night - "Departures" over "Waltz With Bashir" in the Best Foreign Language Film category, I had read some articles arguing that "Waltz" should be eligible for Best Picture. Period. It looks violent, but I imagine we'll see it when it opens in Austin.

So my husband and I printed out scorecards and filled them out while watching the red carpet coverage. We came up with a scoring system that entails making up to two selections for each category - what WE want to win, and what we think the Academy will pick. Last year we had 3 categories - what we wanted, what should win, and what will win (I think it was because of our love for both "There Will Be Blood" and "Juno", and the inevitability of "No Country for Old Men") - this proved to be too complicated. So for scoring you got 2 points if you accurately selected what you thought the Academy would pick and 1 point if what you wanted to win did in fact win. For instance, I thought that the Academy would pick Mickey Rourke for Best Actor, but I personally thought Sean Penn would win. Since Sean Penn won, I got one point. Conversely, I thought the Academy would pick Kate Winslet for Best Actress, but I thought Meryl Streep gave the best performance. Kate Winslet won, so I got 2 points. I ended up with 36 out of a possible 48, while my husband got 26. A few I was just totally wrong on - Best Costume, Best Animated Short - and a few I just didn't amply use my 2 selections (Best Original Song). I was overall happy with all of the awards - especially the sweep by "Slumdog Millionaire." Everyone that won was gracious and I almost choked up a few times (Dustin Lance Black's win for Best Original Screenplay - phenomenal and well-deserved, plus he looked all of 15!).

The show itself...was okay. I thought Hugh Jackman was a good host. Each of his musical numbers went on a little long (plus we all just really wanted to see Beyonce do "Single Ladies"), but they were fun. As per usual, WAY too many montages. I think it's honorable that the Academy was trying to recognize films that were not nominated, but the Oscars are not about those movies. Mostly that was 15 more minutes of blah blah blah. I did like the vignette with James Franco, Seth Rogan, and the DP guy - especially when he told this year's best cinematographer to suck it. I appreciate the "In Memoriam" montage each year, but this year they were trying to do all of this artful camera work to keep Queen Latifah in the shot and you couldn't read all of the names. Cyd Charisse just deserves a little more remembrance than that. The 5 actors/actresses things was kind of cool, but I was disappointed because I had tried to pick out in each movie we saw what scene they were going to show for each nominee as they were announced. I'll just have to assume I was right.

Everyone looked great, no blatant missteps. Didn't love Sophia Loren or Jessica Biel. Lies - Miley Cyrus' dress was terrible. Mickey Rourke was right on and I loved his tribute to Loki, his chihuahua. I mostly didn't like getting to bed after 11, but I don't think this sort of thing will ever change.

To look forward to...maybe some commentary on "The Girls Tell All" tonight, definitely a "Top Chef" wrap-up, the promised look into "Last Restaurant Standing," and I believe Tuesday night will become movie night at our household - so there are still movie reviews on the horizon. Thanks for reading!