Eight Oscars Go To A Movie About Mumbai

The 81st edition of the Academy Awards Sunday night bestowed eight Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director for Danny Boyle, upon a film about a boy and a girl who meet and fall in love amidst the grinding poverty of Mumbai, India. We won't mention the title of the movie because we don't believe in racial stereotyping, and we probably won't go see it either.

Kate Winslet won for Best Actress in "The Reader", Sean Penn for Best Actor in "Milk", Penelope Cruz for Best Supporting Actress in "Vicki Cristina Barcelona", and--in the least surprising result of the night--Heath Ledger became the second dead person to posthumously win an Oscar, for Supporting Actor in "The Dark Knight". Ledger's family accepted on his behalf.

Jerry Lewis won the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for his efforts to raise money to fight muscular dystrophy. You may be wondering why, after more than fifty years and millions of dollars, there's been little to show for his efforts. But we'll discuss that another day. Besides, Lewis didn't look too good onstage.

Hugh Jackman hosted the ABC telecast, which continued its long tradition of running overtime (three and a half hours) and setting the template for lousy awards shows. Jackman, whose last movie was the flop "Australia", was a pretty good song-and-dance man who got stuck with an opening number with sets that must have been designed by five-year-olds.

Whose idea was it to have five presenters (past Oscar winners all) deliver testimonials individually to this year's nominees in acting categories, instead of simply showing us the scenes from the films they were in? Don't do it again.

Ben Stiller did a great job impersonating Joaquin Phoenix's indifferent appearance on David Letterman's show, but he could just as well have been speaking for the viewers watching this jumbled mess. As long as the Motion Picture Academy insists on rewarding films that were made for critics instead of moviegoers, TV ratings will continue to go down.