The 2025 Oscars Showed How To Do A Long Ceremony Right

The Oscars ostensibly exist to celebrate movies, but whether or not they succeed in that mission each year is debatable. Usually, the host is someone who, if I'm being honest, doesn't even seem like they like movies all that much! I've been watching this awards ceremony for years (for better and for worse), and even I can admit that it's usually sort of a slog; I tend to force my friends to sit through the whole ordeal. This year, though? One of the friends I bribed with pizza to keep me company said, unprompted, "This is one of the best awards shows I've seen in a while." The people have spoken.

The reason for this is sort of obvious: this year, the Academy Awards made a brave choice to actually care about movies. Yes, the awards show dedicated to movies should ostensibly care about movies every year, but typically, cinephiles the world over are forced to sit there and listen while some blowhard who hates movies whines about how all of the best picture nominees are boring and long. That did not happen this year. Host Conan O'Brien — who, according to his red carpet Letterboxd interview, genuinely loves cinema, based on the fact that he picked "Citizen Kane" and "Duck Soup" as two of his all-time favorite films — did a phenomenal job opening the show, and from that point on, the telecast dedicated itself to actually celebrating movies. Allow me to explain.

Something felt different and unique about the way the Academy Awards used its time during the 2025 Oscars ceremony, and it all came down to one thing: the show honored a lot of the craft that goes into the cinematic experience. (I should say that, originally, the acting categories would have each featured five presenters introducing each of the nominees, but it does seem like, after "Emilia Pérez" star Karla Sofía Gascón's complete social media fiasco, that was shelved in favor of simply showing clips of each performer.) For multiple awards, including Best Costume Design and Best Screenplay, stars from the various nominees lined up on the Dolby Theater stage to praise the artists who worked on their films, giving a specific focus to each person who made the movies spectacular.

This was a great use of the telecast's time, particularly because it began early and ended before 11 P.M. on the East Coast (which is pretty early, all things considered), and it actually honored the projects that earned nominations. Now, I'm not saying that every choice made during this telecast kept things running smoothly or was beneficial to the ceremony's pacing. Indeed, there's one glaring exception.

Look, I love spectacle as much as anyone else. I also love Margaret Qualley — who, by the by, is a trained dancer who once studied as an apprentice at the American Ballet Theatre and previously showed off her moves in the music video for Bleachers' "Tiny Moves" — and featuring her in any capacity is a good thing in general. Still, I need to be clear about one thing: the pacing during the 97th Oscars was largely on point, but the "James Bond" tribute brought the entire thing to a screeching halt.

Putting aside the fact that the "James Bond" tribute felt particularly clunky after we received news that the entire intellectual property is now owned by Amazon (which leads one to believe that, perhaps, Jeff Bezos will make an announcement any day now that he's chosen himself as the next 007), it also had nothing to do with anything that happened throughout the rest of the night. While a musical number (performed by Queen Latifah) honoring the late, great Quincy Jones made perfect sense, a random "James Bond" tribute added nothing, and had the rest of the ceremony suffered from poor pacing, the entire thing would have earned bad reviews across the board. Thankfully, the remainder of the ceremony was well-paced despite being long because it paid tribute to the magic of this season's best movies, not a franchise that now has an uncertain future ahead of it. 

In summation? The Oscars were actually enjoyable this year — to the point where one too-long dance number couldn't even drag it down.