Liveblogging the 83rd Annual Academy Awards

Hold onto your hats and (martini) glasses. Mark your ballots. We're liveblogging the Oscars.

8:41 Party on, Hollywood.

8:40 Since "Gone With the Wind" opened us (1939) it's nice to have "The Wizard of the Oz" close us (1939). Now all the winners are coming out...It's a little school assembly, but also pretty cool. They all did just win Oscars, after all.

8:39 It's nice to know Anne and James had a really great time hosting. I'm guessing it was their last, too.

8:36 Best Picture...."The King's Speech." Time to pay up, or collect. And, surely by someone's rules: DRINK.

8:32 Translation of Steven Spielberg's lovely, short intro: It IS an honor just to be nominated. Now onto the 10 flicks up for Best Picture. Last chance to shout out your pick.

8:29 Fingers crossed: Looks like this is the last commercial break of the telecast. Up next: Best Picture, singing schoolkids. Pee now, or hold it till the bitter end, guys.

8:25 If you raised your hand a minute ago, tsk, tsk. Come on now. We knew Firth had this one locked down. Firth says he is experiencing "stirrings" that could prompt him to burst into dance. Based on our Twitter readership, a number from "Newsies" would be very well received.

8:22 Raise your hand if you think Colin Firth WON'T win Best Actor.

8:16 And the Oscar goes to Natalie Portman. If anyone wants to talk about how simultaneously psychologically interesting yet totally campy and ridiculous "Black Swan" was, let's meet up for drinks sometime.

8:15 Close up on the ghost of Mia Farrow in "Rosemary's Baby." Oh, wait: That's Michelle Williams.

8:12Time for the big acting awards. This is the home stretch, kids.

8:08 And now, three guys so important we gave them their own party ages ago and we're only going to show you a bit of it, but we made them come tonight and wear a tux and carry their statuettes, so clap for them, monkeys!

8:03 Wait, did they skip ahead to make up time for all the wind-bag speeches? Best Director goes to Tom Hooper of "The King's Speech," and, perhaps, just perhaps, the end is near. The end of the show, people...not the world.

7:52 Time to remember the dead people. Despite the fact that Celine Dion is singing, I'll abstain from snark. For now.

7:47 No offense to Randy Newman, but I'm guessing this year when voters picked the "Best Song" winner they went for the one that was the least horseshitty. #worsethanthegrammys

7:43 Song singing time. Someone on Twitter said they think we're drunk. We are not. But now it's time to drink. Make it a double, since Gwyneth "Goop" Paltrow has the mic.

7:35 People I'd rather sit and be entertained by tonight for the next 2 hours: Jude Law, Robert Downey Jr, Bob Hope, and the Short Subject Documentarian with the awsm hair.

7:27 The whole audience, in the vain hope he was taking over for Hathaway and Franco, give Billy Crystal a standing ovation.

7:21 "Inside Job" gets the Best Documentary nod. Banksy totally wasted the tailoring costs for getting a hoodie to look like a tuxedo so he could maintain his anonymity.

7:20 OMG OPRAH IS BANKSY. (Sorry, trying to jazz things up with a rumor.)

7:19 Ladies & gentlemen, it's Ooooooooooprahhhhhhh! Hand blenders & cashmere sweater sets for everybooooooody!

7:18 Maybe if I were as high as James Franco I would find this making-musicals-out-of-movies thing funny.

7:16 "Uhhh, I should have gotten a haircut" says the guy with, clearly, the BEST hair of the night. (Sorry, white-haired ponytail makeup man, you've been usurped.) Thank you for your hair, sir. It has been the most interesting thing about this show in the last 7 minutes.

7:10 From the LAist inbox: "Probably one of the dullest in broadcast history. This is the first time I have felt compelled to comment on a television show. Switching to 60 Minutes to liven things up around the house." Ouch, Oscars. You hurt.

7:02 Kevin Spacey can do no wrong. Well, except for K-PAX. Okay, and maybe Pay it Forward. Fine. Whatever. Just don't tell me he's gay. I don't want to believe it. (Oh and Randy Newman is singing. Yay?)

7:00 The Alice in Wonderland costumes lady by rights should have begun with "Once upon a time," because lordy, that was a tale.

6:56 Cate Blanchett ad-libs that "The Wolfman" is gross. Then she announces they win for makeup. One of the winners has the most amazing mane of white hair! Is this the hair category?

6:54 The Sci-Tech Oscars, or 27 dudes and Marisa Tomei grin awkwardly.

6:48 Something about SOUND. And MUSIC. Trent Reznor seems...calm. So against type, no? (Okay, fine, we were editing photos and eating salsa during the last two awards.)

6:40 OH LOOK IT'S HUGH JACKMAN.

6:39 Academy big wig says the show has renewed its vows with ABC. Proof to all those Prop 8 supporters that gay marriage was just a gateway for marriage between people and ANYTHING.

6:32 Christian Bale wins Best Supporting Actor for "The Fighter." It was nice of him to shave for the occasion. "I'm not going to drop the f-bomb like Melissa," says Bale. "I've done enough of that before." Wouldn't it be fun if they showed clips of "Newsies" behind him? No? Okay, fine.

6:25 If the only reason we had to endure Anne Hathaway's useless sad sack song about Hugh Jackman was so James Franco could show up dressed like Marilyn Monroe and make a Charlie Sheen joke, well, I'll concede it MAY have been worth it. MAY.

6:24 CAN SOMEONE PLEASE EXPLAIN THE OSCARS' OBSESSION WITH HUGH JACKMAN?

6:19 Sorry lesbians, dream-travelers, and aging single Brits...this year screenwriting's best is one for the stutterers! (Oh, "The King's Speech" wins Best Original Screenplay.)

6:12 Quick nod to the across the street Hollywood Roosevelt, but it doesn't really go anywhere. Aaron Sorkin wins Best Adapted Screenplay for The Social Network. Or, the So-So Network, as said by Javier Bardem.

6:09 So far so boring, or what?

6:04 Do you have to be really short to win in the Short Animation category?

6:02 First Banksy joke of the night. Justin Timerberlake says "Hi, I'm Banksy." 9 LAist readers chuckle. Another 9 roll their eyes.

5:59 let the record show: first f-bomb of the night goes to Melissa Leo.

5:58 A much-deserved standing o for Kirk Douglas. He's hitting on Anne Hathaway, but it's totally okay. Time for one of the acting awards: Best Supporting Actress. Hold on--Kirk Douglas is making fun of Hugh Jackman? Douglas drops that fancy-ass envelope on the floor. Stalls some more. This is priceless...these five broads look like they are about to rush the stage and knock over Douglas with his cane. Melissa Leo is the winner, and she seems shocked.

5:47 "These envelopes are works of art themselves," says Hanks, giving a nod to the first-ever "prettied-up" envelopes for the Oscars. See, paper isn't dead. Now, how about a drinking game rule where every mention of Facebook or Twitter you take a shot? Speaking of...first commercial. Time for a cocktail.

5:43Is it okay if I say Tom Hanks looks a little long in the tooth? Why are we talking about "Titanic"? Looks like we're talking production design. "Titanic" was the best example? Oscar goes to "Alice in Wonderland." Quick shot of Helena Bonham Carter. Who does her production design? She always looks 14 years back in style.

5:40 Things took a turn for the High School talent show a little quickly with the "Hi Mom" bit. #awkward

5:37 I don't want to IMDB Franco & Hathaway to see old they were when "Back to the Future" came out.

5:32 Opening montage. Drumroll. Anne Hathaway and James Franco are going into Inception to get tips from Alec Baldwin for tips to hosting the Oscars. Morgan Freeman is narrating, as per Baldwin's preference. Okay, this is pretty cute so far. Anne's wink at Colin Firth in "The King's Speech" is adorbs. I may enjoy the "Black Swan" spoof more than "Black Swan," which, turns out, despite my perception wasn't a spoof itself. (Seriously, people, "Black Swan"?)

5:25 PM Hey kids! Got your cocktails? Or your other cocktails? Hopefully you've carefully sliced your smoked salmon and other finger foods in the shape of the iconic golden statuettes that are about to get handed out to Hollywood's most deserving (wink, wink) power players, stars, and movie-makers at the 83rd Annual Academy Awards.

Last minute preparations are sooooo last minute, and the red carpet long rolled out, at what could go down as the coldest Oscars on record--and we're talking temperature, not McCarthy-style politics. But will politics invade the gushing of the gliteratti tonight as they thank their maker (their agents) and their god (their director) for their big badass award? Will our boob tubes be graced with a nip slip? We know who is wearing who...and depending on whose writing the schtick for hosts Anne Hathaway and James Franco, we might know who is doing who. Well, probably not.