Since I was a little girl I have been utterly, utterly fascinated with the Oscars, and the movie industry in general. It's mostly my Dad's fault. He is a BIG movie buff, and he brought me up on a steady diet of musicals, Barbra Streisand and the occasional classic (The Godfather etc).
What you've gotta understand, dear reader (particularly any of you born after 1980), is that when I was growing up, there were only three TV channels for a very long time, and video players didn't really arrive until I was a tween. So on a rainy Saturday afternoon, we could either go to the movies or watch what was on TV (Of course once videos came out, Dad bought musicals, Barbra Streisand and the occasional classic, so I still had to make do). But the thing is, all these movies were AWESOME! Because we didn't know any better. We couldn't log onto IMDB or Rotten Tomatoes to see what other people thought or wait for Jim to post his review on Facebook ;)
Simpler times?
But despite the apparent lack of good cinematic fare, I did manage to become a bit of a buff myself (to be fair to my poor dad, he did have good taste in movies, and he did introduce me to some good ones, as well as the musicals, Barbra Streisand and the occasional classic, I just wanted to tease him a little).
So Oscar night was always a BIG DEAL. We maintained media silence for most of the afternoon, and if anyone dared tell Dad who had won something, look out! Of course, I picked up this attitude after a while, too. We'd write out our predictions and tick them off as each award was given out, and for 3 or so hours felt like we were part of it all. I must admit I had gone off it all in the past few years: perhaps too much god-thanking, and there were a few awards that seemed set up or a little bit political.
**Confession Time**
For a very long time I wanted to win an Oscar. I went through a quite serious acting phase, discovered I probably wasn't as great at it as some of the others in my drama class/group. Then I thought I'd maybe direct or even edit. Working in a cinema probably didn't do anything to dampen those thoughts.
So, back to the telecast. As I've mentioned before, I haven't done a lot of crying about Sam. In fact, I've found it quite difficult at times. But not on Monday night. I don't know what it was (and no, it wasn't hormones), but there were many times that things happening in the show made me cry. Some of it was 'I wish that was me', and some of it was Samuel-related:
- When they screened the 'In Memoriam' part (all the movie types who had died during the past year), I thought of Samuel. No surprises there.
- When Sandra Bullock thanked all the mums. I wonder how many other mums reacted to that?
- Every time a good-looking young man came onstage, I thought about how that could have been Sam one day.
Somewhere around here, I have a photo of me with an Oscar. If I can find it I'll post it. It's kinda cute. In the meantime, here's Oscar.
