And The Winners Are.....

The Academy Awards have just ended and The Shadow can tell you this was one of the better shows in the past few years.  But before we get into a final review of the show, here are the winners from tonight (as always, there were a few pleasant surprises):

• Best Picture - 12 Years A Slave
• Best Director - Alfonso Cuaron (Gravity)
• Best Actor - Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)
• Best Actress - Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)
• Best Supporting Actor - Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)
• Best Supporting Actress - Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years A Slave)
• Original Screenplay - Her
• Adapted Screenplay - 12 Years A Slave
• Animated Feature - Frozen
• Cinematography - Gravity
• Original Score - Gravity
• Original Song - Let It Go (Frozen)

Watching Ellen DeGeneres hosting tonight's awards was a breath of fresh air compared to last year's show.  Ellen took advantage of her relationship with many of the nominees to provide comedy relief during the show.  In one instance, she posted the following selfie with several A-listers which literally crashed Twitter briefly:

This pic has been retweeted more than 2 million times as of this writing, making it the most retweeted picture of all time.

Ellen's antics tonight were funny, in good taste, and made for a great show tonight.  We only have to wonder why it took seven years for her to come back to host the Oscars again.  We do hope to see her again soon.

Good night and good luck.

And The Oscar Goes To......

As has been tradition on this blog for years, The Shadow has now prepared his predictions for the 2014 Academy Awards.  This has been a difficult year, with nine pictures in the running for Best Picture.  Our picks are listed below:

• Best Picture - American Hustle
• Best Director - Alfonso Cuaron (Gravity)
• Best Actor - Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)
• Best Actress - Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)
• Best Supporting Actor - Bradley Cooper (American Hustle)
• Best Supporting Actress - Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)
• Original Screenplay - Blue Jasmine
• Adopted Screenplay - 12 Years A Slave
• Animated Feature - Frozen
• Cinematography - Gravity
• Original Score - Philomena
• Original Song - Let It Go (Frozen)

We are extremely pleased that the Academy has chosen Ellen DeGeneris to host this year's program.  After the disaster that Seth MacFarlane produced last year, Ellen will be a breath of fresh air and we are looking forward to this year's production -- which is now about 5 hours away at the time of this writing.

We will return at the end of the broadcast with the final winners list and our final thoughts on the year.

Good night and good luck.