The 88th Annual Academy Awards

If I didn't have a stake in it, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed this year's awards. The best part of the whole night for me was Lady Gaga's performance, and when the Star Wars robots appeared on stage. Chris Rock, on the other hand, did not impress me at all. He was unnatural and his attempt to be funny was one big embarrassment. Plus, the whole black and white thing got boring pretty quickly. And next year I'm definitely going to skip the red carpet and get an hour more sleep. (03/01/2016)

“I is here representing all of them that's been overlooked - Will Smith. Idris Elbow. And, of course, that amazing black bloke from Star Wars...Darth Vader.” We don’t have to like it and we may consider it to be the height of Hollywood hypocrisy, but the times demand a politicised Oscars ceremony. On the other hand, the willingness to talk openly about the problems of contemporary American society (rather than the world as a whole, as was the case last year) has mainly drawn attention away from the inability to address those problems beyond writing a touching song about them (Lady Gaga) or making a high-quality film about them. Though it fit into the overall concept of “Hollywood and liberals for each other” (the words of Adam McKay, a supporter of the far-left Bernie Sanders, aimed at the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, added variety), Joe Biden’s unacceptable performance can be considered the most promising step toward the effective combining of the world of art with the world of politics. Rich white people hurled admonishments from the stage, but pretty much only in the context of friendly banter and pre-arranged bits, and they mainly took home almost all of the hardware. For me, the compromising nature of the evening is best characterised by the speech given by the Academy’s president, who expressed remorse for the lack of diversity in the decisions made by the current member of the Academy, but of course failed to promise any specific changes for the future. In any case, Chris Rock handled his hosting duties with honour, and his jabs were at least aimed in a specific direction thanks to the #OscarsSoWhite movement and were mostly thematically coherent (as opposed to Ricky Gervais’s equal-opportunity insults at the Golden Globes). Louis C.K. highlighted the issue of class differences in line with the content of his stand-up routines, and Ali G hinted at the tone that the whole event should have had (cheeky and to the point, but with a lot of humour). With the exception of the traditional in-memoriam segment, there were no pace-killing collages, the songs served only for variety rather than being performed out of an obligation to introduce everyone (since not everyone was introduced) and the only thing that slowed the evening’s relatively brisk pace was the clips of the nominated films, which were needless for the people who had seen the films and too brief to tell anything to the people who hadn't. With respect to the aspects that were (obviously) prepared in advance, I found the show satisfying. I’m not rating the quality of the Academy’s voting or the accompanying commentary and simultaneous translation of the live broadcast on ČT 2. (02/29/2016)

(I don’t factor in the results, with which I am generally satisfied). Is this supposed to be a celebration of film? A below-average effort on the part of the screenwriters and Chris Rock, the host. A response to the pseudo-controversy started by Will Smith's wife and Spike Lee was to be expected, but Chris Rock did not handle it very well. Fine, the opening monologue was okay, maybe the second or third skit, but build a whole ceremony around it? When I compare this year's Oscars with this year's Golden Globes, the difference is abysmal. Simply put, the whole show was clearly sewn with a hot needle and resulted in simplistic or even zero skits. Anyway, the American audience is always the same (which might eventually be a good thing, because otherwise, instead of artificial laughter, the night would be filled with an alarming amount of awkward silences) and will clap for practically anything that corresponds to the current liberal, politically correct American mainstream. So, in terms of bragging about saving the society, races, minorities and the world in general, the evening worked great. In terms of entertainment and a celebration of the very best of the film industry, the writers and the host failed miserably. Here’s something for those who want a taste of a completely opposite approach of the host, unrivalled as far as entertainment goes. (03/02/2016)

Chris Rock took a gamble, bet it all on a single card – and if such a thing were possible, would even have lost his own pants. After the opening monologue, stitching into the black and white issues of the past weeks stopped being funny, and even potentially strong moments (Lady Gaga) sadly faded away due to collective guilt; in the worst case scenario, it even reeked of parody. Combined with the fact that the film Mad Max: Fury Road, which I personally do not like, got a chance to become the most successful film of the evening, I ended up surprisingly often being quite annoyed. Thanks at least for the well-deserved statue for Leonardo DiCaprio, my nerves will finally get some rest with each of his nominations. (03/03/2016)

Thank you Czech Television for taking on this task, even though the trio of gentlemen who simultaneously translated and moderated the evening often ruined the experience - to be honest, at times I felt like I was watching three madmen who had escaped from an asylum. Overall, the evening was quite traditional and focused heavily on the racial "issue", but it did recognize those who deserved it, except perhaps for Slye, who unfortunately did not win. Ennio Morricone deserved an Oscar a long time ago. (03/01/2016)