Well, now I really have to ask and risk looking like an ignoramus. Did the Coen's just non-chalantly skip over the big showdown at the motel or did my friendly neighborhood theatre projectionist miss a reel when I went to see "No Country"? If the former, then I'm disappointed it won Best Picture (bold narrative decision, but should only be done if it makes the movie more engaging, which I don't think it did). If the latter, I'll have to get a refund and/or see it again. Please advise. Thanks.

what an unmitigated piece of [profane]...the coen's had this look on their faces like, 'we screwed you idiots again!' just goes to show you, yet again, that the academy wouldn' know good film making if it came up and flatulated in their faces which is apparantly what it takes...ie...no country

i thought the movie was good what was your choice for best picture? everyone

not quite the headline you were imagining, but there's a YouTube video called No Country for Gold Men: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hu-D4SSimt8

no country was deserving..i think josh brolin and tommy lee jones should also have been nominated for their performances. the acting, pacing, ambiguity at the end was excellent.

As Henry Kissinger infamously once wrote to Harvey Pekar: "Sometimes intelligent men disagree." From my own voting experience (CMA Awards), unless viewing is somehow required, I wonder how many of the Academy members actually watch the movies they vote for. I don't see how they'd have the time to even watch the several dozen of the final nominees. If that's the case, I'd guess they vote for lots of reasons other than what they saw on a screen, which might explain how some better films don't fare as well as they should. To quote another famous writer: "So it goes." Last comment: I kept hearing over the last week or two that one film or another was "building up momentum" in the Oscar race? I don't know the details, but aren't all the ballots in at least a couple weeks before the broadcast? Once the votes are in, how can there be any momentum or groundswell? I guess they were referring to Oscar predictions, but that isn't what they were saying. Much more of that and they better move the telecast to ESPN. Thanks Keith.

Was anyone besides me surprised that Tilda Swinton won Best Supporting Actress? She's a great actress and all, but I figured it would be between Amy Ryan and Cate Blanchett, which by the way, I'm glad Blanchett did not win. Also, I figured the Best Actress category would be between Ellen Page, Marion Cotillard, and Julie Christie, but I was hoping Page or Christie would get it.

I gazed at a glass. It was cut and fine as it laid in my hand; flawlessly blown as if carved of ice. It was clear, so much so that it almost did not betray its form as a cup but blended with the water it held seamlessly as if it were invisible. Only the carvings appeared which shimmered as diamonds as I drank looking on the inside of it. Things like these cannot be made by man; it is not that they should not be but rather that they cannot. A hand would fail when trying to create the caveats of its mass; a mind could conceive it yet this cup could not be made by fingers or lungs no matter how nimble or skilled. Surly if it was tried while blowing the glass the heat would fail; true the fire would crack and hiss birthing something similar, a vague resemblance, yet not, in reality, the cup that I behold. It is the work of machines to do what men cannot and in this the machine mimics the divine. Men have always been given to building idols, while the shape varies the concept remains as they turn to a thing made of their hands to do what they cannot in the hopes that God can. The idols of modern man are not recognized as divine; they are not in the form of birds and trees and forces which cannot be understood. Rather they are things which build cups and force us to accept a reality which is at least a step removed from real.

I'm here because I thought the headline is a clever one, but want to add a comment that could be titled "FROM A RECOVERED OSCAR GROUPIE." In fact, a few years ago, I hosted a "Dialing for Dollars" TV program in North Texas and, in the mid-'70s, wrote movie reviews for a Salt Lake City talk station on which I was a co-host. My approach was such that I still wonder if a majority of movie critics have any fun at the movies. My reviews began with what the filmmakers intended to create. Unlike most contemporary critics, I didn't demand that they produce the film I wanted. As a result, many of my friends thought I was "too easy" on them. If the goal was a comic book on film, I didn't use CITIZEN KANE, GONE WITH THE WIND, or DUCK SOUP for comparison. At the same time, I've stopped having as much fun at the movies myself. The Oscars are no longer relevant to me. I can no longer be sure if awards (except in the technical categories) are given for artistic or political reasons. Perhaps it began the year Marlon Brando sent an ersatz American Indian to accept his award. My wife, an enrolled member of the Chickasaw Nation, who is fed up with the way the Left uses American Indians as fodder for political correctness. To understand, read the works of award-winning author Sherman Alexie, a Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Indian, or Tony Hillerman’s addendum in “Hunting Badger,” one of his highly-regarded Navajo Police mysteries. This year’s statuettes will bring not a sizable boost at the box office for those already deemed unworthy by the public, but will eventually have value (perhaps) on eBay or in a pawn shop somewhere. A profoundly anti-American movie like THERE WILL BE BLOOD (whose writers betrayed an abysmal ignorance of history and economics) will continue to be studiously avoided; JUNO, with its sweetness of heart, will go on winning new audiences. As an Alzheimer’s caregiver (keeping my wife at home so far), I’d like to see AWAY FROM HER fare well and Gordon Pinsent receive greater critical acclaim. Since I’m now one of only a handful of critics I heed, and since the Academy Awards voters have made themselves a laughingstock outside their incestuous little industry with its media hangers-on, I’m even more impressed by a clever turn of phrase like “Gold Men for No Country.” I would merely apply the thought more literally, to communicate the idea that all winners , from any country, received little men with no real value any more.

I was so happy that Jon and the academy allowed marketa irglova back on stage to say thank you.Those two deserve everything they could possibly win. Their music is brilliant and their film only proves you don't need millions and big studios behind you to make great pictures. Congratulations to them both!