Oh, What a Night! - 2018 Oscars Recap

Post by: Emily McTyre & Sarah Barclay

This year’s Academy Awards were yet another memorable experience. This time, for more reasons than the wrong envelope. Diversity, movement, history, and hope for the future were prominent throughout the entire event. The love of cinema radiated from everyone in the theater to the millions watching at home. Here are some of our favorite moments from the 2018 Oscars.

To celebrate this year’s awards, we decided to create a menu based on all of the Best Picture nominees, including:

Pizza rolls from somewhere in Northern Italy - Call Me By Your Name

British scones - Darkest Hour

Bread and jam - Dunkirk

Sweet tea - Get Out

Parmesan wafers (aka Communion wafers) - Lady Bird

Twizzlers (to represent thread) - Phantom Thread

Deviled eggs - The Shape of Water

Soft pretzels from the streets of New York - The Post

A cheese board - Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (We know that one is a stretch, but just let us have the pun.)

We also appreciated Jimmy Kimmel’s ongoing competition for a jet ski, Helen Mirren not included. A challenge to all nominees, a jet ski was going to be presented to the shortest acceptance speech. For the most part, they did not play people off of the stage this year

for having too long of speeches. This was a wonderful chance for the winners to not only thank the people who inspired and helped them, but also to speak about the prominent issues in Hollywood and bring voices to light. Mark Bridges was the ultimate winner of the jet ski with a speech clocking in around 30 seconds.

One of the show’s aspects that we absolutely loved was the inclusion of cinema history through compilations of Oscars winners in most of the categories. These segments inspired, flowed beautifully, and showcased the essence of movie magic. From Best Supporting Actress to Best Picture, we were reminded of the many talents and genres that are considered ‘Oscar Worthy’.

The live performances of the Best Original Song nominees each shared a unique message that was mirrored in the films the songs were featured in. ‘Mystery of Love’ is our personal favorite, but all of the performances were outstanding. They created an incredible, unified atmosphere for all creators, performers, and dreamers alike.

Stepping away from announcing Oscar winners, host Jimmy Kimmel took the time to acknowledge all of us sitting at home and in the theaters — the ones who have been supporting these films that make it to the big screen. To do this, Kimmel took a small army of stars across the street to surprise an unsuspecting audience of movie-goers.

Complete with two hot dog blasters, baskets of candy, and Mark Hamill, himself, the stars were able to close the gap between Hollywood and its followers. And, I mean, who doesn’t want a hot dog shot at them by either Armie Hammer or Ansel Elgort?

On a more serious note, the In Memoriam and Tom Petty tribute were beautiful ways to remember those we lost in film and entertainment this past year.

Throughout the ceremony, the amount of diversity and calls for change were executed delicately, but prominently enough to get the message out into the world. It was evident that previous barriers of gender, race, religion, ethnicity, and sexuality have been and are still being broken down. History was made at this ceremony, but there is clearly a new norm being created.

Without further ado, here is a list of this year’s Oscar winners:

Gary Oldman - Actor in a Leading Role

Sam Rockwell - Actor in a Supporting Role

Frances McDormand - Actress in a Leading Role

Allison Janney - Actress in a Supporting Role

Coco - Animated Feature Film

Blade Runner 2049 - Cinematography

Phantom Thread - Costume Design

The Shape of Water - Directing

Icarus - Documentary Feature

Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405 - Documentary Short Subject

Dunkirk - Film Editing

A Fantastic Woman - Foreign Language Film

Darkest Hour - Makeup and Hairstyling

The Shape of Water - Original Score

“Remember Me”, Coco - Original Song

The Shape of Water - Production Design

Dear Basketball - Animated Short Film

The Silent Child - Live Action Short Film

Dunkirk - Sound Editing

Dunkirk - Sound Mixing

Blade Runner 2049 - Visual Effects

Call Me By Your Name - Adapted Screenplay

Get Out - Original Screenplay

The Shape of Water - Best Picture

All of the speeches left an impression, but the two that stood out to us the most were those of Frances McDormand and Guillermo Del Toro.

Frances McDormand made a statement for all of the women who were nominated in categories ranging from design to camera work to performance, including the women also nominated in her category. Equality is becoming the new norm; women are being represented more and more as the years go by.

Between his two acceptance speeches for Best Directing and Best Picture, Guillermo Del Toro reminded us that we are part of a legacy. He said, “I think the greatest thing that art does, and that our industry does, is erase the lines in the sand when the world tells us to make them deeper.” Film is a universal language that stretches beyond borders, beyond countries, races, genders, religions, despite what the world wants us to follow. In the end, Del Toro left us with an inspiring message. He held up the trophy for Best Picture, The Shape of Water, a film about accepting anyone and everyone and seeing past the flaws we all have, and concluded, “This is a door. Kick it open and come in.” This is something we plan to follow as we pursue our dreams, and we hope you do, too.