With every year comes the inescapable Academy Awards ceremony, intended to celebrate each year’s films and honor the cast and crew that made the movies we saw possible. The 95th Oscars ceremony, which occurred Sunday, March 12th, had to play it safer this year, smartly, in order to avoid another infamous “slap” or Twitter mob making fun of the Oscars’ unnecessary in-between actual awards “bits” that dragged the show on for over 3 hours. Hosted by a familiar face, Jimmy Kimmel, who still played his usual shtick, this year’s Oscars still ended up with mixed results in an otherwise straightforward, tame awards environment.

The projected winner for most awards was Daniels’ “Everything Everywhere All at Once”, which had a great night and ended up winning the highly sought after Best Picture award. Ke Huy Quan won Best Supporting Actor for his performance in the movie and probably gave the most heartfelt and endearing speech of the night. His acclaim and support for his part in “Everything Everywhere” is well-deserved, as the film would simply not carry the emotional weight it did without his place in it. For the counterpart, Best Supporting Actress, however, it is hard to say the same. Controversially, and rather comically, Jamie Lee Curtis took the award for her part in the same movie. Out of the nominees, Jamie was probably the least expected to win, as her role in the movie was small, and was not a very significant or special performance in general.

It was an odd choice for a winner in a diverse set of nominees too. Angela Bassett received praise for her performance in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”, and Stephanie Hsu had a much considerable major role and exceptional performance in “Everything Everywhere” as well. It was most likely given to Curtis due to Academy members feeling she was indebted to an Oscar at this point in her career, regardless of the performance, which is typical of the Oscars and a bit frustrating when looking at the other nominees’ stellar jobs on their respective films.

For Best Animated Feature it went to “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” which was expected. The fan-favorite to win however was Dreamworks’ “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish”, which may have been unlikely, but had achieved a cult following rooting for it nevertheless. Personally speaking, “Marcel the Shell with Shoes On”’ was my favorite out of the nominees, and was cool to see a nomination for even though it stood no chance.

“All Quiet on the Western Front” ended up taking Best Original Score, Best International Feature Film, Best Cinematography, and Best Production Design, over some deserving and underrepresented nominees. In my Oscars watch-party experience, hearing the tedious, blaring score for the film blast from the TV with every win became frustrating when more original stories were being overshadowed by a technically impressive but unoriginal film.

Best Original Score had the opportunity to award Babylon, a mixed-reviewed 3-hour epic, for its interesting and memorable score, or another John Williams’ staple for “The Fabelmans”, a sentimental and moving Spielberg flick that got absolutely no recognition by the Academy this year, even with its solid screenplay and story-structure. Best International Feature Film was guaranteed to go to “All Quiet” but would’ve been great to see go to “EO”, a disheartening and visually exciting drama about a donkey’s life journey.

A lack of variety in films awarded became apparent, with just a few films in the lead receiving heaps of awards. My favorite movie of the year, “TÁR” walked away with nothing, despite its fantastic cinematography, screenplay, and direction from Todd Field. Another critically acclaimed and film-fan pick, “The Banshees of Inisherin”, had a spectacular screenplay with career-defining performances from Colin Farrell and cast alike. Although it unfortunately didn’t have a great awards season, it didn’t win a single Oscar either.

On the subject of screenplays, “Everything Everywhere All At Once” won Best Original Screenplay, and Sarah Polley’s “Women Talking” won for Adapted Screenplay, alongside nominees like “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery”, and “Top Gun: Maverick.” As for some more technical award snubs, “The Batman” received nothing for its great sound and effects, and even “Elvis”, a movie I happened to honestly enjoy a lot, received nothing, being nominated for Best Costume Design, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Production Design, Best Picture and more.

As for Best Actor and Actress, Michelle Yeoh added another “Everything Everywhere” trophy to the pile for her performance in the flick. Alongside Ke Huy Quan, Michelle was incredible in the movie, so it is an understandable and respectable pick. She became the first Asian actress to win the award, which is monumental. Brendan Fraser had his Oscar in the bag for his role in “The Whale”, a deeply harrowing and tough-to-watch performance in the Darren Aronofsky film. Both decisions here were pretty obvious ones, but are still commendable nonetheless.

With an “Everything Everywhere All At Once” sweep, The 2023 Oscars proved themselves to be simultaneously entertaining, overlong, and cautious. Although a lot of amazing films were nominated, most could not override the popularity and all-around love for Daniels’ Best Picture-winning movie. With some ups and downs, and run-of-the-mill winning picks, this year’s Oscars overall showed that while excellence in filmmaking is still celebrated, the influence of popular appeal cannot be denied.