Well folks, the 2006 year is now officially over now that the Oscars honoring films from that year have come to an end. It was an exciting and unusually unpredictable ride -- a bunch of films like All the King's Men tanked early, the no-doubt-about-it-lock Dreamgirls got snubbed for a Best Picture nomination, and the film that took home the top prize was supposed to be a non-Oscar-baiting popcorn flick.

Other fond memories of the year? Little Miss Sunshine got picked up at Sundance for a near-record ten million dollars near the beginning of the year; of course, at that point, no one had any idea for the road that lay ahead of it. Then at the Cannes Film Festival, Oscar hopeful Marie Antoinette got famously booed. The studio did some quick damage control and blamed it on the hard-to-please French audience, but the film was met with something even worse stateside: complete indifference. Hey, at least it managed to pick up the Oscar for costume design.

Into the fall season, pricey period crime dramas bombed at the box office, squelching their chances of Oscar attention: Hollywoodland and The Black Dahlia. (Luckily, both failures were overshadowed by the complete ravaging that All the King's Men took.) Then a present-day crime drama killed -- The Departed, of course. Other high-minded fare opened to various results but got surprising cold shoulders from the awards groups -- movies like The Painted Veil, The Good Shepherd, and The Good German. Even the mighty Clint Eastwood fell victim to the bad box office of Flags of our Fathers, even though he still had Letters from Iwo Jima up his sleeve.

Which leads us to the Oscar ceremony itself. Sunday night ended with my joy at The Departed walking away the winner (it was my #1 film of the year) being heavily mixed by my severely wounded pride. Yes, I had my worst-ever predictions year by FAR, which is so painful I almost don't even want to talk about it. But I guess I have to tell you...I went 12 for 24. A whopping fifty percent. In other words...



Still. All is not lost. I did, after all, correctly predict the most unpredictable category of them all, and also the most important: Best Picture. But so many mistakes...fine, here's the chart:

CATEGORIES	MY PREDICTIONS	THE WINNERS
Picture	The Departed	The Departed
Director	Martin Scorsese	Martin Scorsese
Actor	Forest Whitaker	Forest Whitaker
Actress	Helen Mirren	Helen Mirren
Supporting Actress	Jennifer Hudson	Jennifer Hudson
Supporting Actor	Eddie Murphy	Alan Arkin
Original Screenplay	The Queen	Little Miss Sunshine
Adapted Screenplay	The Departed	The Departed
Animated Feature Film	Cars	Happy Feet
Foreign Language Film	Pan's Labyrinth	The Lives of Others
Documentary	An Inconvenient Truth	An Inconvenient Truth
Film Editing	Babel	The Departed
Original Score	The Queen	Babel
Original Song	"Listen," Dreamgirls	"I Need to Wake Up," In. Truth
Cinematography	Children of Men	Pan's Labyrinth
Art Direction	Pan's Labyrinth	Pan's Labyrinth
Costume Design	Marie Antoinette	Marie Antoinette
Makeup	Pan's Labyrinth	Pan's Labyrinth
Visual Effects	Pirates 2	Pirates 2
Sound Mixing	Dreamgirls	Dreamgirls
Sound Editing	Pirates 2	Letters from Iwo Jima
Live-Action Short	Eramos Pocos	West Bank Story
Animated Short	The Little Matchgirl	The Danish Poet
Documentary Short	Two Hands	The Blood of Yingzhou District

Yup. 12 for 24. 50%. And yes, it still hurts. But you can bet I'll be bragging about Best Picture for as long as possible. Heck, costume design was a wide-open category too, and I nailed it. Yes.

Just for the record, here are the tallies of each film to win more than one award:

The Departed - 4 (Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing)
Pan's Labyrinth - 3 (Art Direction, Cinematography, Makeup)
Little Miss Sunshine - 2 (Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay)
Dreamgirls - 2 (Supporting Actress, Sound Mixing)
An Inconvenient Truth - 2 (Documentary, Original Song)

As for the ceremony itself, it was overall a fun night. I wrote a lengthy piece at TheCinemaSource that was specifically on the ceremony; you can read the full article here. But here's most of it:

The night got off to a good start with host Ellen DeGeneres appearing as always completely relaxed. After a brief movie reel of many of the nominees being interviewed (the highlight was Eddie Murphy blankly staring at the screen silently), the ceremony was off and running with Ellen's monologue. She didn't necessarily kill; her jokes seemed more designed to put the audience at ease. Well, except for her remark toward the nominees: "It’s my job to relax you, to make you forget that it’s a make or break night, for you...and there's a billion people watching." Her suggestion that acceptance speeches should include made-up tales of a childhood spent living out of cars in the Bronx was great, though.

Unlike in previous years, the Best Supporting categories were held off until later in the ceremony, supposedly to boost late viewership. It didn't necessarily work: everyone's tired by the second half of the broadcast anyway, and clip-montage after clip-montage got a bit old. Yes, folks, this was another long night at the Oscars. For my money, they could've especially done without the pointless "American movies" montage assembled by director Michael Mann. The screenwriters-in-film montage was much better, although really, just as superfluous. Why restrict most speeches to 45 seconds and then cram in as many pointless tributes as possible? And speaking of speeches, the Sherry Lansing tribute was nice, until we had to listen to her recite the driest speech imaginable.

Still, the ceremony had its moments - plenty of them. Early on we were treated to a Will Ferrell/Jack Black duet about how comedians never get nominated for Oscars. It was funny enough when they were catcalling nominees: "Ryan Gosling, you're all hip and now -- but I'm going to break your hip, right now!...Mark Wahlberg! Where are you! I won't mess with you. You're actually kind of badass...Helen Mirren! You're just hot. What party are you going to?" It became even more riotous, however, when John C. Reilly joined the song from the audience, proclaiming they still have a chance, because "I've been in both Boogie AND Talladega Nights." It was a definite high point.

Other nice touches -- that sound effects choir ensemble? Incredible. Jack Nicholson's inexplicable bald head? Nice. And then there was the funniest moment of the night. Before a commercial break, backstage host Chris Connelly was running one of his pointless segments when Tom Hanks, fresh from presenting an award, wandered through the back of the shot. Immediately, Connelly thrust the mike in Hanks's face: "More fun to come, right?" Without missing a beat, in the drippiest sarcasm possible, Hanks shouted "You bet, Chris, more fun!"

Another theme at this year's Oscars? Al Gore. Lots and lots of Al Gore. His film, An Inconvenient Truth, picked up awards for Best Documentary and Best Original Song. But then there was also a special salute to him in which Leonardo DiCaprio thanked him for his work on global warming, to raucous applause. It was the biggest "look-at-liberal-Hollywood" moment of the night.

As for the awards themselves, it didn't take long for some big surprises to rear their heads. First, sentimental favorite Alan Arkin won Best Supporting Actor over Eddie Murphy. Then, the acclaimed Pan's Labyrinth, which had been racking up the technical awards, lost the Best Foreign Language Film category to The Lives of Others.

Late into the night, it was still unclear which frontrunner would emerge. Babel picked up the Best Original Score statue, implying that it may have deep support, but then lost the pivotal Film Editing category to The Departed. After that it was a heavy Departed night. Many suspected Martin Scorsese would finally land his much-awaited Oscar, but the Best Picture win made it clear that that was no sympathy vote. It was a resounding win.

That about wraps it up except for one thing: talk of next year. Yes, at this point it's completely futile and will be 95% wrong; nonetheless, here's some random movies to look out for:

Charlie Wilson's War. A political drama starring Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Written by Aaron Sorkin and directed by Mike Nichols. Frankly, how could this not be a major contender? (We'll see.)

Sweeney Todd. Another Tim Burton/Johnny Depp pairing, this time to make the famous musical. It co-stars Helena Bonham Carter (of course), Alan Rickman, and Borat himself, Sacha Baron Cohen. Musicals are always incredibly hit-and-miss when it comes to audience and critical reception; remember the one-two punch of The Producers and Rent?

Hairspray. Another musical based on a stage show; this one stars John Travolta in drag, along with plenty of other stars. Either hugely successful or hugely embarrassing. (Or in between?)

Things We Lost in the Fire. Probably not a Best Picture contender, but watch out for the performances in what could be one of those "small human drama" successes. (I read an early version of the screenplay.) It stars Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro, both no strangers to Oscar.

The Savages. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman star as a bizarre married couple in this hit from Sundance. Also making a splash at Sundance was Grace is Gone, which John Cusack got great notices for.

In the Valley of Elah. Paul Haggis wrote and directed this -- yeah, the guy responsible for Crash and the screenplay to Million Dollar Baby. Pedigree cast? Check. (Tommy Lee Jones, Susan Sarandon, Charlize Theron.) Important Themes? Check. (The investigation of an Iraq War veteran who went AWOL upon his return to the US.) Oscar contender? You'll just have to wait.

Onward!