How Jenny Beavan won the Oscars

Tim here. I watched the Oscars this year completely without the aid of social media of any sort – absolutely worth doing, if you haven't recently. It lets you enjoy the ceremony for the ceremony.

What that means is that I didn't realize for two whole days that there was quite a furor over my very favorite visual from the whole night, Jenny Beavan's outstanding outfit that she wore on the way to collect her Best Costume Design award for Mad Max: Fury Road. It turns out that there were quite a few people who did not share my view that it was the night's clear highlight. Several of them were sitting right inside the Kodak Theater with her, in fact, rather visibly failing to be delighted by her attire. That's especially true of an epically grumpy Alejandro González Iñárritu. He and several other conspicuous non-clappers were the subject of a Vine that went viral on the spot.

The internet has obligingly and appropriately pushed back, including a magnificent Paddy Considine tweet that I dare not show here on account of the very curt language Considine fired off in Beavan's defense, but it's very much worth checking out.

I did not come to rehash all of that, but to take us back to the outfit itself.

What was buried in the clapping controversy was that Beavan was wearing just about the coolest outfit to have graced the Oscars this decade. It's an instantly classic entry in the annals of "Costume designers just do not give a crap" alongside Milena Canonero's form fitting Victorian men's suit in 2007, and Lizzy Gardiner's 1995 American Express dress (another controversial outfit that many people hate but remains one of the greatest things anyone has ever worn). Just look at it! 

All other considerations aside, that is badass. And it's also really on-point. The inherent ruggedness of (fake) leather, the heightened cartoon gaudiness of having a sequined image on the back, the fact that the image is a sort of cult identity marker, the way that her accessories suggest scavenging. She is, in effect, wearing the movie on her body, and taking it up to win the Oscar with her. More importantly, it's a way to put her own personality on display during a moment that should be entirely about here. And there is far more of Beavan the human being in that moment than any stock Hollywood figure wearing stock evening wear – this is a woman whose primary medium of expression is clothing, after all. As she put it backstage:

I don't do frocks and absolutely don't do heels, I have a bad back. I look ridiculous in a beautiful gown… I just like feeling comfortable and as far as I'm concerned I'm really dressed up."

And as far as we're concerned, she won the whole Oscar ceremony.

What next for our Oscar winners?

From Anne Hathaway in Bride Wars, Charlize Theron in Aeon Flux, Jamie Foxx in Stealth, to Eddie Redmayne in Jupiter Ascending, Oscar winners always ride the momentum of their award glory to the next prestige film. 

So what's next for our Oscar winners?

Leo finally won so he can crawl back into the bear (supermodel) cave (mansion) and never work again right? Unlikely, although he has absolutely nothing on his slate at the moment except for staring at his Oscar muttering "the way of the future... the way of the future....". I would genuinely love to see Leo in a movie where he plays a unlucky in love animal services employee who keeps stealing Kathryn Heigl's dog so he can give it back to her and appear the hero, that gets 36% on Rotten Tomatoes. Lighten UP Leo! There are rumours of another Scorcese collaboration about a serial killer. Just the light material we're looking for.

Brie, Alicia, and Mark after the jump...

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Tribeca Drops First Half of Festival Program, Chocked Full of Potential Discoveries

Daniel Crooke here, salivating over today’s first wave of films from the 2016 Tribeca Film Festival’s line-up. While the Spotlight, Midnight, and Special Sections programs won’t drop until March 8, the US Narrative, International Narrative, and World Documentary Competitions, and Viewpoints showcase hit the internet today and there’s plenty to buzz about. Scanning the films, you’ll find an embarrassment of riches hiding in the programming, plot details, and cast lists. Here are some personal points of interest:

US Narrative Competition

Ingrid Jungermann’s webseries F to 7^th was an astutely, hysterically observed slice of queer life in New York, giving voice to a uniquely cutting female perspective in the process, so her feature debut Women Who Kill shoots straight to the top of the list. The Fixer sounds intriguing in a small-town-with-secrets kind way, James Franco as an “eccentric local” a little less so. Queens of charting the path from comfortable malaise to all-out soul-search, Amy Landecker and Melanie Lynskey – who, in particular, is quietly giving the best lead performance on television – pop up in Dreamland and Folk Hero & Funny Guy. Current faves Keith Stanfield (Short Term 12, Straight Outta Compton) and Dan Stevens (The Guest) will star in Live Cargo and The Ticket.

International Narrative Competition

It’s hard to ignore the promise of a collection of short films from the likes of Chilean shaggydog provocateur Sebastian Silva and actors Mia Wasikowska and Gael Garcia Bernal in Madly, sounding like an I Love You, anthology movie but if the city were Relentless. Argentine Cinema had the international stage last year with the raucous Wild Tales – although Lucretia Martel eternally has her own platform in my heart – so fingers crossed for another cross-hemispheric success with The Tenth Man (El Rey Del Once) and its culturally and generationally intersectional premise.

World Documentary Competition & Viewpoints

Documentary-wise, Betting On Zero positions Herbalife as a pyramid scheme, Do Not Resist exposes the military-industrial nature of America’s police culture, and LoveTrue boasts the wacko cred of (my Northeast Los Angeles neighbor) Flying Lotus on score and Shia LaBeouf as executive producer. Equals with Kristen Stewart and Nic Hoult premieres in the Viewpoints program, along with raunchy R-rated animation Nerdland (trend-chillin’ with Anomalisa and Annapurna’s Sausage Party) and the divisive British class flick High-Rise.

You can view the list of released Tribeca titles here – what catches your eye?

The New Actor Hierarchy: Oscar's Most Beloved Male Stars

Leonardo DiCaprio is now an Oscar winner but where does he stand in history?

If you're feeling celebratory -- and we've all lived through his rise into cinematic legend so why shouldn't we? -- you really need to check out this cute video of Leo getting his Oscar engraved or this silliness of a party of bros celebrating his win like mad men (hey it's better than the bro-ness of the pussy posse reuniting) or the once mocking memes that have turned into odes to Leo Joy. Good funny stuff.

Even if you weren't enamored with The Revenant (*raises hand*) or find it downright suspect, his filmography is so loaded with memorable films that surely anyone can find one therein to direct all their feelings towards in this momentous week for the 41 year old superstar. I'm choosing to view the Oscar as a career achievement Oscar for specifically prompted by Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, and The Departed... love them all!) 

Last year when Julianne Moore won her long-awaited Oscar for Still Alice we quickly tabulated the All Time Oscar Actress Hierarchy; movement in the ranks at last!  Given that DiCaprio waited even longer for his eventual statue, nabbing his first nomination at the dewy age of 19 for What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), four years before Julianne Moore's first nomination, it seemed only right to do the same thing for the men in the wake of Leo's coronation. 

What follows is Oscar's 32 All Time Favorite Actors !
It's restricted to men with 5 or more nominations. Only the acting statistics are accounted for so George Clooney, for example, is not (yet) ranked. If you counted non-acting nominations, you'd also see DiCaprio jump a rank as he was nominated for producing Wolf of Wall Street two years ago and Brad Pitt would also factor in since he won Best Picture for 12 Years a Slave. Now that many major stars are involved in producing these types of extra nominations stats are likely to make Oscar lists of the future progressively murkier so we're opting not to include them for now. 

If you'd like to see how the ranks were determined (it's not as simple as basic addition or there would be many ties) that's at the bottom of the post.

OSCAR'S FOUR KINGS
And 28 other Royals 
after the jump 

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Beauty Break: Greatest Photos from Hollywood's High Holy Night

We'll promise to wrap the coverage on the 88th Academy Awards tomorrow but there's still a few things to discuss. Consider this is a catch all place for beauties we didn't otherwise write entire posts on. There's much to parse, celebrate or just plain gawk at in this collection of photos starring Todd Haynes, Tom Hardy, Cate Blanchett, Alicia Vikander, and more after the jump...

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