Critics' Choice Awards Wrap Up

Kristen Chenoweth hosted the 15th Annual Critic’s Choice Movie Awards last week and I just watched the broadcast. She was hilariously adorable. Kristen kicked off the night with a parody of Inglorious Basterds and then proceeded to charm the audience with a song entitled, “I Should Have Been in That Movie”. She’s funny and cute and has a magnificent voice so this got the ceremony off to a fun start. She continued with movie parodies and (what I thought were) funny one-liners throughout the night.

About a third of the way through, John Krasinski and Amy Poehler came out to pay homage to John Hughes. It was actually very funny, but something just wasn’t landing in the room. I wonder if the “audience” had trouble hearing or seeing them, which led to them missing the funny. Despite the lackluster reaction, I thought the bit and the montage was very nice. Jason Reitman did, too, because when he accepted his award for best adapted screenplay, he began by mentioning how moving he thought the tribute was.

All in all, in it was neatly packaged night of awards and speeches; a nice aperitif for the rest of the season (even though I watched it after the Globes!)

Here are the nominees, with the winners bolded:

• Best Acting Ensemble - Star Trek; Nine; Precious; Up in the Air; and Inglorious Basterds
  


• Best Supporting Actress - Mo’nique, Precious; Marion Cotillard, Nine; Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air; Julianne Moore, A Single Man; Samantha Morton, The Messenger; and Anna Kenrick, Up in the Air
  


• Best Action Movie - Avatar; District 9; The Hurt Locker; Inglorious Basterds; and Star Trek
  


• Best Young Actor or Actress - Jae Head, The Blind Side; Max Records, Where the Wild Things Are; Bailee Madison, Brothers; Saoirse Ronan, The Lovely Bones; and Kodi Smit-McpHee, The Road
  


• Best Supporting Actor - Matt Damon, Invictus; Woody Harrelson, The Messenger; Christian McKay, Me and Orson Wells; Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones; Alfred Molina, An Education; and Christoph Waltz, Inglorious Basterds
  


• Best Comedy - The Hangover; (500) Days of Summer; It’s Complicated; The Proposal; and Zombieland
  


• Best Song - All is Love, Where the Wild Things Are; The Weary Kind, Crazy Heart; Almost There, The Princess and the Frog; I Want to Come Home, Everybody’s Fine; and Cinema Italiano, Nine
  


• Several winners announced at once:
  
• Best TV Movie - Grey Gardens
• Best Foreign Language Film - Broken Embraces
• Best Score - Up
• Best Costume Design - The Young Victoria
• Best Make Up - District 9
• Best Art Direction, Visual Effects, Sound, Cinematographer and Editing - Avatar
• Best Animated - Up
  


• Best Adapted Screenplay - Fantastic Mr. Fox; District 9; Precious; A Single Man; An Education; and Up in the Air, Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner
  
  
• Best Original Screenplay - The Hurt Locker; A Serious Man; (500) Days of Summer; Up and Inglorious Basterds, Quentin Tarantino
  


• Joel Siegel Award (lifetime achievement) - Kevin Bacon, presented by Meryl Streep [See Kevin Bacon's six degrees.org site.]
  


• Best Director - Clint Eastwood, Invictus, James Cameron, Avatar, Lee Daniels, Precious; Up in the Air; Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker; and Quentin Tarantino, Inglorious Basterds
  
  
• Best Actor - George Clooney, Up in the Air; Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart; Viggo Mortensen, The Road; Colin Firth, A Single Man; Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker; and Morgan Freeman, Invictus
  


• Best Actress - Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side; Emily Blunt, The Young Victoria; Saoirse Roana, The Lovely Bones; Gabourey Sidibe, Precious; Carrie Mulligan, An Education; Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia [tie winners]
  


• Best Picture - Avatar; An Education; Inglorious Basterds; Up in the Air; Up; A Serious Man; The Hurt Locker; Precious; Nine; and Invictus