Quick, no thinking, right off the top — name last year’s four Oscar winners in the acting categories. Not coming, is it? Okay, name the Best Actor winner. Uhmm…yeah, wait a minute…takes a few seconds, doesn’t it? Daniel Day-Lewis won for Best Actor in There Will Be Blood, Javier Bardem won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for No Country for Old Men, La Vie en Rose‘s Marion Cotillard won the Best Actress Oscar and…wait, oh yeah…Tilda Swinton won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Michael Clayton. Anyone who says they knew these four names cold without thinking or blinking is a liar.
The most easy-to-recall Oscar moment for me over the last two or three years was Alan Arkin‘s Best Supporting Actor win for Little Miss Sunshine, because it meant that the ogre Eddie Murphy had lost…yes!