How good were my guesses?

Last night was Oscar Night. Below pictures from our dinner are the results and how right/wrong I was.

We made Chicken with Cranberry Sauce and broccoli rabe for dinner. The chicken recipe is from Martha Stewart.

First I made a flavored butter with salt, thyme, and pepper and smeared it on the chicken breasts before they baked.


Then I made a sauce with grilled onions in butter, cranberries (we used sweetened dried ones), chicken broth, thyme, and salt and pepper.


Then we plated it with broccoli rabe and red peppers.


This was super yummy. The sauce was sweet and savory at the same time because of the onions and cranberries. The chicken was baked well. It might not have been as moist as it should because it was skinless, but it was still very good. Normally I don't like broccoli rabe but with the red peppers, it wasn't so bitter.

Then I made some chocolate chip (well, chunk) cookies for dessert. I'm getting pretty good at these. I finished them in about 40 minutes.


Onto Oscar viewing... We DVRed it so it only took about 2 hours to watch instead of 3.5 hours. I loved the kids from Slumdog Millionaire. How cute were they?

As for my Oscar predictions... out of 12 awards I guessed on, I got 50% right.

My results...

Performance by an actor in a leading role

• Richard Jenkins in “The Visitor”
• Frank Langella in “Frost/Nixon”
• Sean Penn in “Milk”
• Brad Pitt in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
• Mickey Rourke in “The Wrestler”

(wrong - Sean Penn)

Performance by an actor in a supporting role

• Josh Brolin in “Milk”
  
• Robert Downey Jr. in “Tropic Thunder”
  
• Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Doubt”
  
• Heath Ledger in “The Dark Knight”
  
• Michael Shannon in “Revolutionary Road”

(right - Heath Ledger)

Performance by an actress in a leading role

• Anne Hathaway in “Rachel Getting Married”
• Angelina Jolie in “Changeling”
  
• Melissa Leo in “Frozen River”
• Meryl Streep in “Doubt”
  
• Kate Winslet in “The Reader”

(right - Kate Winslet)

Performance by an actress in a supporting role

• Amy Adams in “Doubt”
  
• Penélope Cruz in “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”
  
• Viola Davis in “Doubt”
  
• Taraji P. Henson in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
  
• Marisa Tomei in “The Wrestler”

(wrong - Penelope Cruz)

Best animated feature film of the year

• “Bolt”
  
• “Kung Fu Panda”
  
• “WALL-E”

(right - Wall-E)

Achievement in directing

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, David Fincher
• “Frost/Nixon”, Ron Howard
• “Milk”, Gus Van Sant
• “The Reader”, Stephen Daldry
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, Danny Boyle

(right - Danny Boyle)

Best foreign language film of the year

• “The Baader Meinhof Complex”, Germany
• “The Class”, France
• “Departures”, Japan
• “Revanche”, Austria
• “Waltz with Bashir”, Israel

(wrong - Departures)

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, Alexandre Desplat
• “Defiance”, James Newton Howard
• “Milk”, Danny Elfman
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, A.R. Rahman
• “WALL-E”, Thomas Newman

(right - A.R. Rahman)

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)

• “Down to Earth” from “WALL-E”, Music by Peter Gabriel and Thomas Newman, Lyric by Peter Gabriel
• “Jai Ho” from “Slumdog Millionaire”, Music by A.R. Rahman, Lyric by Gulzar
• “O Saya” from “Slumdog Millionaire”, Music and Lyric by A.R. Rahman and Maya Arulpragasam

(wrong - "Jai Ho")

Best motion picture of the year

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
  
• “Frost/Nixon”
  
• “Milk”
  
• “The Reader”
  
• “Slumdog Millionaire”
  

(right - Slumdog Millionaire)

Adapted screenplay

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, Screenplay by Eric Roth, Screen story by Eric Roth and Robin Swicord
• “Doubt”, Written by John Patrick Shanley
• “Frost/Nixon”, Screenplay by Peter Morgan
• “The Reader”, Screenplay by David Hare
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, Screenplay by Simon Beaufoy

(wrong - Slumdog Millionaire)

Original screenplay

• “Frozen River”, Written by Courtney Hunt
• “Happy-Go-Lucky”, Written by Mike Leigh
• “In Bruges”, Written by Martin McDonagh
• “Milk”, Written by Dustin Lance Black
• “WALL-E”, Screenplay by Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, Original story by Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter

(wrong - Dustin Lance Black)

My Oscar Predictions...

The Oscars are tonight! FI and I will be doing some cooking and baking for the event, but otherwise it's a quiet evening in.

As part of the festivities, here are my Oscar predictions. Mind you, I haven't seen most of these movies. It's been a poor movie watching year. But based on what I've read in the entertainment blogs, articles in the Washington Post, Television Without Pity, and an article by Nate Silver, here are my picks in bold.

Performance by an actor in a leading role

• Richard Jenkins in “The Visitor”
• Frank Langella in “Frost/Nixon”
• Sean Penn in “Milk”
• Brad Pitt in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
• Mickey Rourke in “The Wrestler”

Performance by an actor in a supporting role

• Josh Brolin in “Milk”
  
• Robert Downey Jr. in “Tropic Thunder”
  
• Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Doubt”
  
• Heath Ledger in “The Dark Knight”
  
• Michael Shannon in “Revolutionary Road”

(I think this one is a given, but I really hope RDJ got the win cause he was hysterical in TT.)

Performance by an actress in a leading role

• Anne Hathaway in “Rachel Getting Married”
• Angelina Jolie in “Changeling”
  
• Melissa Leo in “Frozen River”
• Meryl Streep in “Doubt”
  
• Kate Winslet in “The Reader”
  

Performance by an actress in a supporting role

• Amy Adams in “Doubt”
  
• Penélope Cruz in “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”
  
• Viola Davis in “Doubt”
  
• Taraji P. Henson in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
  
• Marisa Tomei in “The Wrestler”
  

Best animated feature film of the year

• “Bolt”
  
• “Kung Fu Panda”
  
• “WALL-E”

(Loved, loved Wall-E. I wish it had been nominated for Best Picture. This is such a cop-out award.)

Achievement in directing

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, David Fincher
• “Frost/Nixon”, Ron Howard
• “Milk”, Gus Van Sant
• “The Reader”, Stephen Daldry
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, Danny Boyle
  

Best foreign language film of the year

• “The Baader Meinhof Complex”, Germany
• “The Class”, France
• “Departures”, Japan
• “Revanche”, Austria
• “Waltz with Bashir”, Israel
  

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, Alexandre Desplat
• “Defiance”, James Newton Howard
• “Milk”, Danny Elfman
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, A.R. Rahman
• “WALL-E”, Thomas Newman

(The music in Slumdog was off the wall. So pulse-pounding and totally captured the craziness of Mumbai.)

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)

• “Down to Earth” from “WALL-E”, Music by Peter Gabriel and Thomas Newman, Lyric by Peter Gabriel
• “Jai Ho” from “Slumdog Millionaire”, Music by A.R. Rahman, Lyric by Gulzar
• “O Saya” from “Slumdog Millionaire”, Music and Lyric by A.R. Rahman and Maya Arulpragasam
  

(Since I voted for Slumdog for best score, I'm going split my vote and give it to Wall-E for best song.)

Best motion picture of the year

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
  
• “Frost/Nixon”
  
• “Milk”
  
• “The Reader”
  
• “Slumdog Millionaire”
  

Adapted screenplay

• “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, Screenplay by Eric Roth, Screen story by Eric Roth and Robin Swicord
• “Doubt”, Written by John Patrick Shanley
• “Frost/Nixon”, Screenplay by Peter Morgan
• “The Reader”, Screenplay by David Hare
• “Slumdog Millionaire”, Screenplay by Simon Beaufoy

Original screenplay

• “Frozen River”, Written by Courtney Hunt
• “Happy-Go-Lucky”, Written by Mike Leigh
• “In Bruges”, Written by Martin McDonagh
• “Milk”, Written by Dustin Lance Black
• “WALL-E”, Screenplay by Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, Original story by Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter

(The thing about Wall-E was that half the movie was in silence. It's not writing dialogue that's hard, it's the description of the scene and then being able to recreate that.)

I'll post again on Monday with food pictures and a results tally of how well I did with my guesses.

My one-sentence review of Speed Racer...

From a google chat...

Caro: i'm afraid if i watch speed racer i'll have a seizure

me: oh it was pretty intense

it was like benjamin moore paints bred with a black light and their kids vomited everywhere

Caro: lol

Here he comes...

Thanks to my friend Calvin, we were able to catch a free screening of Speed Racer last night. As I waited in line to get into the screening, I learned some interesting things about setting up these events from the PR guy who was manning the line in front of me and chatting with some corporate invitees.

- Depending on the movie, they'll distribute passes to seats on a 2:1 ratio or a 3:1 ratio to ensure they get a full house. (I'm guessing for a movie like Speed Racer, they did a 2:1 distribution.)
- However, really good weather or really bad weather can cut the attendance way down. (That's what happened last night; the weather was really nice and the theater ended up being only 3/4 full.)
- They could only let 15 people in at a time, because we had to get our bags searched, any cameras or laptops checked, and get scanned by security. (It was pretty hardcore; I guess they were really trying to prevent bootleggers.)

The movie was visually stunning. I loved the costumes and set design. There's something very cool yet retro about the 50s to 70s era they were evoking. Which made it even cooler when it was combined with the futuristic and crazy technology.

I didn't realize it until the end but Rain was in the movie, which was probably why he was in town to have a dance-off with Stephen Colbert.

And I won't say anything more because my friend Steve said he'd kill me if I spoiled anything about it for him. :)