Our contributors have watched the Oscars, looked at the winners, and have decided to share with you their thoughts of Sunday night’s ceremony and results. Before we get to our contributors’ thoughts, let’s look at how they did at predicting this year’s Oscars.

In a very tight race, Thomas came out on top with 21 correct predictions and 2 runner-up predictions, placing in each of the 23 categories. Wesley was second with 20 correct predictions and 2 runner-up predictions, for a total of 22 of 23. Tripp was in third with 19 correct and 2 runners-up, or 21 total. Peter comes in fourth with 16 winner predictions and 5 runners-up for a total of 21 ball park predictions.

This year, every category had at least one correct prediction with our weakest performance being Live Action Short Film where only Thomas correctly predicted the result and Peter picked the runner-up. The four of us correctly predicted fourteen categories: Actress, Actor, Directing, Documentary Feature, Original Screenplay, Costume Design, International Feature, Supporting Actor, Animated Feature, Visual Effects, Cinematography, Supporting Actress, Makeup & Hairstyling, and Sound. There were no categories where we agreed on the winner and something else triumphed.

Now that we’ve gone over the statistics, let’s hear what everyone had to say.

Wesley Lovell

The Academy started out this Oscar season with one controversial decision after another. ABC demanded awards be cut from the live telecast and effort made to keep things short and sweet while also delivering higher ratings than last year’s dismal broadcast performance. The eight awards cut from the telecast were edited (the irony that film editing was one of the awards, isn’t lost on anyway) into the show largely as back-from-commercial filler. It almost worked except they cut the speeches unnecessarily and saved minimal amounts of time by doing so. On top of that, the show ran three hours and forty minutes, which is far longer than ABC likely wanted. Regardless, it was almost a return to tradition. Almost.

How did the Academy try to curry favor with audiences who don’t really care about the Oscars anymore? Bringing on figures popular among “younger” audiences and trying to encourage them to participate in online polls for the best movie moment and best movie of the year. The results were spectacularly disappointing with Spider-Man: No Way Home placing second in one contest and fourth in the other. It also included Johnny Depp and Jack Snyder fans coming out of the woodworks to recognize films that shouldn’t have been anywhere near the Oscars: Minimata in Depp’s case and Army of the Dead and Snyder’s director’s cut of Justice League on the Snyder side of the ledger. It was a colossal failure that the Academy rightly relegated to brief snippets later in the show when they had stripped any suspense out of them.

Back again were the performer clips along with clips from each Best Picture nominee and the tradition of prior winners coming back was partly met with Frances McDormand a no-show and Daniel Kaluuya being forced to present with H.E.R., last year’s winner for Best Original Song. She could have solo presented this year’s song award, but had to be put with Kaluuya because they were associated with the same film as the previous year. Meanwhile, Yuh-jung Youn was back and endearing in her presentation of Best Supporting Actor.

The opening “monologue” from hosts Amy Schumer, Regina Hall, and Wanda Sykes was strong, but they largely split up the night to do individual routines in most situations with Schumer coming off much better than the others. Sykes is a hilarious comedienne, but she didn’t get much opportunity to show that. Hall had one amusing bit where she was looking for COVID testees who are single, but was otherwise uninspired. I wouldn’t mind a Schumer-only show in the future, but considering the banal evenings Jimmy Kimmel and several other hosts have done in recent years back before they decided to go hostless, it was at least a mild improvement.

Overall, the show moved at a brisk pace until the second hour when it seemed to slow down significantly. Their terrible decision to bring three sports personalities on to present the James Bond tribute, but then not bring out the living Bonds (George Lazenby, Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan, and Daniel Craig) was a huge missed opportunity. Then, their other big tribute that most of us knew was happening was for The Godfather‘s 50th anniversary, which was disserved by briefly bringing out Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and Francis Ford Coppola and doing nothing exciting with them. They also had presenter matchups for strange anniversaries for the likes of White Men Can’t Jump and Pulp Fiction and those didn’t go particularly well either. This is a show about the movies and the producers went all out to try and minimize that and then unexpectedly leaving it to Kevin Costner to tell the most genuine story about his first time at the movies and the inspiration it provided.

Of course, the talk of the evening wasn’t the late surge of CODA to win Best Picture over the masterpiece that is The Power of the Dog, but rather an incident involving Chris Rock and Will Smith. Rock came out to present Documentary Feature and decided to take the opportunity to punch down with a joke about Jada Pinkett-Smith and G.I. Jane 2. Apart from the fact that you had to get the joke to understand why it could have landed, the problem was that Jada suffers from a hair loss condition called Alopecia (patchy hair loss) and had shaved her head to attend the festivities. Being a rather crass and hurtful joke, it was what followed that has the internet up in arms. Will Smith stomped up to the stage and slapped Rock across the face before returning to his seat where he proceeded to hurl expletives at Rock before Rock recovered and moved on with the presentation. It was not an appropriate joke and Rock should be ashamed for it, but how Smith reacted was entirely inappropriate. Physical assault is never an acceptable defense.

Rock already announced he wouldn’t file charges, but the damage is certainly done. What Smith should have done in his acceptance speech later in the evening was take full responsibility for his actions and apologize, not to the Academy, which he did, but to Rock. The apology came late into the speech, a carefully rehearsed one, and felt out of place. That he seemed like he was about to complete the apology and then went rambling on with the rest of his speech, talking about love and family, felt disingenuous to say the least.

For many, the curveball settled over the festivities like a cloud. Schumer, who was the first host to appear after the incident, did a masterful job defusing the situation with an adroit quip that the crowd clearly loved. It was at that moment that I wanted to see Schumer back again some day.

The less said about the winners the better as I cannot be unbiased in my approach. The Power of the Dog is cinematic perfection. It was the most honored film of the year and yet it went home with a single award to its director Jane Campion. It’s the first time since Mike Nichols won Best Director for The Graduate back in 1967 that a director winning was the only award the film received. Before that, it was George Stevens for Giant in 1956. Prior to that, you have to go back to the Academy’s first decade to find such an instance previously. Meanwhile, CODA managed to set several historical milestones, but will be forever tainted by the win in such a highly charged race. Fair or not.

Once again, the In Memoriam segment struggled to succeed. They started out with Tyler Perry voicing a tribute to Sidney Poitier before going into the rest of the figures. It paused briefly twice more with Bill Murray hailing Ivan Reitman and Jamie Lee Curtis recognizing Betty White. The gospel accompaniment wasn’t a disservice, but the producer and director were so entranced by them that you could barely make out the rest of the names in the scroll, which was notably missing the likes of Ed Asner, Monica Vitti, and Arlene Dahl. Asner almost makes sense, since he was well known for his television work, but the other two were celebrated actors, even if minor actors, of their day.

While the glitz was nearly back, the glamor seemed diminished still. This is a ceremony that celebrates its excess. What they should consider is locking in major talent as early as possible and then having them sign exclusivity agreements to present at the Oscars. Make it certain that they won’t be seen anywhere else beforehand. It won’t entirely sell the show to the disinterested, but what they’ve been doing so far hasn’t worked, so it’s time to shake it up.

Peter J. Patrick

This was the worst Oscars ever both in terms of wins and presentation.

In the ninety-four-year history of the Academy Awards, I only agreed once with all six major winners, and that was back in 1963, so I was prepared not to agree with all the wins, but four out of the top six wins went to performances and a film that I would not have even nominated. That’s never happened before.

It’s not that CODA isn’t a good movie. It might be good compared to some of the Hallmark and Lifetime movies I’ve seen from time to time, but it wasn’t much more than that. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not a good representation of the deaf community. Last year’s Sound of Metal and this year’s documentary short, Audible, were that, not this contrived nonsense with an over-abundance of cussed signing.

Jessica Chastain deservedly won Best Actress in a tight race with Penélope Cruz and Olivia Colman. Ariana DeBose was fine but didn’t bring anything new to a long familiar character. Troy Kotsur was okay at best in CODA, but he really won to put a spotlight on the deaf which isn’t a bad thing. Will Smith won for playing a questionable real-life character made into a hero in his film.

Jane Campion could have won for Best Directing, Adapted Screenplay, and Picture, and thankfully did win for directing. Kenneth Branagh finally won an Oscar for his screenplay for his autobiographical Belfast.

Dune, this year’s best film in the technical categories won its fair share of prizes, although some of its wins might just as easily have gone to other films.

As to the presentation, it started off on the wrong foot with Beyoncé performing in Compton instead of on the stage of the Dolby Theater.

The hosts were actually funny for the most part, but the show went on too long despite having shunted eight awards off to the pre-televised portion of the awards.

There were too many “fan favorite” clips of idiotic films that would never have gotten close to an Oscar nomination in any other year.

The tributes to James Bond at 60 and The Godfather at 50 were awkwardly handled. The “surprise” appearance of Liza Minnelli to present Best Picture with Lady Gaga may have been inspired, but poor Liza seemed overwhelmed.

Worst of all, though, was Will Smith leaving his seat, walking on stage, and physically assaulting Chris Rock for a tasteless, if harmless, joke about his wife. Then, instead of apologizing for his action when called to the stage to accept his Best Actor award, he tearfully dug down and defiantly presented himself as a misunderstood hero just like the character he won for playing.

Tripp Burton

In the end, the awards ended up being sadly predictable and the awards show ended up being painfully unpredictable. It might have been the worst Oscars telecast that I have ever seen — even without the slap — and one completely devoid of any love of movies whatsoever. Which is sad, because it was also a night filled with lovely speeches. I think at this point, though, everyone just needs a break.

Thomas La Tourrette

I’m trying to figure out what to say about the night.

It was a serviceable, fairly entertaining, evening. The awards were fairly predictable and the hosts were funny, if surprisingly sharp at times. It mostly ran smoothly, though will probably be most remembered for a truly awkward moment. I never expected to see violence at the Oscars, but Will Smith’s slap of Chris Rock will be the most talked about moment of the night. It was a surprising moment, and one that seemed too strong a reaction to a joke about Smith’s wife’s lack of hair. ABC might have been better served cutting away from it all as it went from feeling like a staged moment to the realization that they were angrily yelling at each other afterwards. Taking a break before handing out the next awards would have been a good thing. I am still not certain what to make of Smith’s long, rambling acceptance speech minutes later. Kudos to Amy Schumer for addressing the uncomfortableness later in the evening.

I started the evening disgruntled, still mad at the Academy bowing to ABC’s wishes to streamline the show and not air live eight categories. They did at least fit them in throughout the evening, but except for the time it takes to introduce the presenter and have the winners walk to the podium, it did not feel like it saved any time. It demeans those awards, and some, like score, production design, and editing, are crucial to how a movie turns out. True, a lot of people may not care about the shorts or sound or makeup, but it was a terrible decision to leave them out of the broadcast. And what replaced them was nothing better. The Twitter awards were just plain silly, with some movies that no one had even heard of making the top five of each. The celebration of 60 years of James Bond movies fizzled. The Godfather at 50 got a standing ovation but did not add anything to the evening. While the dancing of “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” was colorful and lively, I am not sure why it was included in the evening since it was not even nominated. It is the biggest hit on Spotify, but I would still rather have had the eight categories back live. And the show still ran late, so this all seems for naught.

CODA was one of the most enjoyable movies of the year, though perhaps not the best made one. I won’t quibble with it winning, but it will be interesting to see how its win will be viewed in a few years. It did become the first film since 1935’s Grand Hotel to win best picture with three of fewer nominations, especially with neither being director or film editor. The feel-good story of using deaf actors is something to be triumphed. Jane Campion’s solo win for best director of The Power of the Dog marked the first time since 1967 when The Graduate also only won for direction. Starting with 12 nominations, it was a surprise that it only took the one award home. The wins for Ariana DeBose for West Side Story and Troy Kotsur were deserved, and I enjoyed their acceptance speeches, which talked about their stories of how they got there. Though I was sorry that Marlee Matlin from CODA wasn’t nominated with her co-star, and that Kodi Smit-McPhee could not share a victory for creating a very distinctive character.

Dune was the big winner of the night with six awards out of 10 nominations. It will be interesting to see how the second half of the film does next year. Will it sweep the technical awards again or will the Academy feel that it was honored enough? Jessica Chastain deserved her award, though I do wish it had been for a better movie. It is surprising that only Dune, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, and CODA received more than one award, that does not seem typical. Flee unfortunately did not win any of its three noms, but sadly that was expected. It would have been nice to see Nightmare Alley win something, or West Side Story get more love. I am glad that Kenneth Branagh finally has an Oscar, though he should have won for Henry V instead.

I would say that 2021 was a reasonable year for movies. Neither the Oscars ceremony nor the movies it celebrated will be remembered for years to come. Perhaps the glitz and glamor of the Academy Awards will never be what it was back when movies were the main form of entertainment. And I understand wanting to tweak the awards, but I do not think they have hit on the correct formula yet. Dropping categories from the televised ceremony and adding Twitter ones was not the way to do it. It will be interesting to see what the ratings are and how they do things next year, because they do need to readjust. It was not a bad show, better than some recent ones, but it could be improved.