Insta-Celebrity Portraits from Vanity Fair's 2015 Oscar Party
The 2015 Academy Awards happened this past weekend, and it was as star-studded and glamourous as ever. The annual Hollywood spectacle awarded Oscar winners in both triumph and upset, and although viewer ratings fell to a six-year low, social media was flooded with clips and snapshots of celebrities and their fashion choices. With such change in times with the impact of social media and Instagram, in particular, Vanity Fair cleverly created an instant photobooth at their Oscar Party to connect a live feed for their followers.
The rather elaborate photo booth was set up in collaboration by photographer Mark Seliger, Vanity Fair, and Instagram, and allowed party goers to pass through without missing a portrait. Going even further, they shared behind-the-scenes shots and video of the studio set up. The idea proved to be a success as each posting on Instagram reached thousands of likes and new followers. With viewer ratings switching popularity from television to social media, I would say this is just the beginning of similar ideas to come in the following years.
Take a look at some of most popular "Insta-Celebrity Portraits", and find more here.
The 86th Academy Awards Winners
An Oscar is undoubtedly the biggest honor any filmmaker could receive for their hard work in creating a cinematic work. While I may hear amongst many of the people in my life just how much they don't care about the evening's victors, I treat my viewing of the Academy Awards almost like the average American treats the Super Bowl. Growing up in an extremely small town, a lot of the nominated films weren't accessible to me and my predictions really reflected my sheltered viewings. Now that I'm in actual civilization, I've been able to catch a lot of the films, and I must say that I have become quite a professional at guessing who will be taking home the big prize of the evening. Last Friday I wrote a post on my predictions for the major categories of the evening, and I am proud to say I was pretty much eight for eight with my guesses. Perhaps I should say 7.5 for reasons of my Best Picture award, but I highly doubt anyone cares too much about that. With that said, here are this year's winners...
The 86th Academy Awards Winners Predictions
The early months of any year are full of awards and recognitions for all of those filmmakers who worked hard in the previous year to produce a form of entertainment that will have the capability to transcend the decades. While a variety of these award nights seem to take precedence throughout these first few weeks of the year, they all seem to merely be leading up to the largest of filmmaking honor ceremonies: The Academy Awards. The night on which the golden Oscar is distributed seems to always be the hype, and these smaller ceremonies just add to the predictions that film fanatics everywhere are making for the late winter celebration. 2013 brought a lot of excitement for filmgoers around the world, and this Sunday could be the test of whether a viewer's favorite film executed just the right amount of excellence for the Academy to spread cheer. So, without further blabber on my part, here is what I think will be receiving each honor this weekend.
Multiple Recent Deaths Puts Extra Pressure On Academy
The Oscars are a time in which not only great achievements of acting, directing, writing, and other filmmaking aspects are recognized, but also a period in which reflection takes place. The event is a cause for great celebration for the films that have been able to ascend above the other productions in the past year, and overall it can be looked upon as a fantastic gathering and honorable evening. While filmmakers may be so good at their craft that they may come across as invincible walks of life, the improbable fortune of death faces us all as humans, and the recent deaths of many cinematic greats has the Academy scrambling for the In Memoriam portion of the Academy Awards.
Early 2014 has brought a whole lot of misfortune to filmmakers. Just in the past two months Philip Seymour Hoffman, Shirley Temple, Tom Sherak, and Harold Ramis have left this earth for the great unknown. Many people are expecting their talents to be recognized in this highly regarded segment of the Oscars, and these names alone are not including other deaths from the past year such as James Gandolfini, Peter O’Toole, Deanna Durbin, Joan Fontaine, Roger Ebert, Ray Dolby, Ray Harryhausen, Paul Walker, and Elmore Leonard.
There is only so much time that can be dedicated to this portion of the awards ceremony, and the order of sequence in which these names will appear for viewers and even the simple fact of the matter of who will make the cut has people biting their nails. It's an emotional sequence of the ceremony, and a lot of people find that certain selections of applause and silence when names flash on the screen make it unfair and almost like a celebrity popularity contest. While the distribution of the little golden statues should be of utmost importance for the Academy, it seems that these deadlines may be the cause of controversy with the awards handed out this year.
[via Variety]
86th Annual Academy Awards Nominations Announced
The conclusion of the Golden Globes usually leads to the revved anticipation of the Academy Awards. Announced Thursday morning, the 86th annual Oscar nominations only increased the anxiety of film addicts everywhere.
Considered to be one of the best films of the year, American Hustle takes much dominance in the categories. Sharing the lead with Gravity with 10 nominations, the film is represented amongst some of the largest categories including best director (David O. Russell), best actor (Christian Bale), best actress (Amy Adams), best supporting actor (Bradley Cooper), best supporting actress (Jennifer Lawrence), and the highly coveted best picture.
Gravity seems to share a lot of the similar glory as Hustle does in its 10 category nominations as well. With more representation for the film’s technical aspects, it represents itself for best picture, best actress (Sandra Bullock), and best director (Alfonso Cuaron).
However, 12 Years A Slave makes a very dominant second place representation with the film being nominated in nine different categories including best actor (Chiwetel Ejiofor), best supporting actor (Michael Fassbender), best supporting actress (Lupita Nyong-o), best director (Steve McQueen), and best picture.
The other six best picture nods go to Captain Phillips, Dallas Buyers Club, Her, Nebraska, Philomena, and The Wolf of Wall Street.
While The Wolf of Wall Street seemed to get a lot of mixed reviews from critics with its release, it still has some decent representation in 5 categories. Jonah Hill will receive his second Oscar nomination in 3 years with this year’s being for best supporting actor. Perhaps the nomination to really be talked about is Leo’s nomination for best actor. He delivered such an incredible performance, but the competition is fierce in his pool.
Dallas Buyers Club actually beat Scorsese’s hit-or-miss film with 6 total nominations. Earning much acclaim at the Golden Globes, it can only be wondered if it will be able to repeat those feats a second time.
The glitz and glamour of the Oscars will be telecast live on ABC March 2, 2014 at 7 PM Eastern time.
[via Oscars]