With Slumdog Millionaire sweeping the Academy Awards — eight Oscars including best picture — and Kate Winslet taking best actress for The Reader, only Sean Penn's best actor win for Milk managed to surprise.

[A worker prepares an Oscar statue that had lost its luster during a year in storage to gleam outside the Kodak Theatre tonight; pic via Getty]

In this video that was "leaked" yesterday by the show's producers, Hugh Jackman talks about how hard he's working and why it's so very important to not make an ass out of yourself. And you get a glimpse of some of the numbers the show's producers — Bill Condon and and Laurence Mark, who last collaborated on the film version of Dreamgirls — have come up with. So, yes, not much of a mystery that the show will borrow a lot from Broadway.

[Slumdog Millionaire's Rubina Ali received a kiss yesterday from a neighbor before heading to the Mumbai airport to catch a plane to Los Angeles for the Oscars; pic via Getty]

All the major Oscar categories are pretty much locked up. Slumdog, Winslet, Ledger, etc. So where will Oscar pools be won and lost? In the tiny, shitty categories. Let's attempt a lesser categories betting guide.

Entertainment Weekly's recent article on The Reader's Oscar chances featured a funny/sad quote by Harvey Weinstein, in which he compared himself to Billy the Kid. It's been a popular quote! Because it's very silly.

Every year someone starts moaning about the Academy Award voting procedures, saying they're unfair. This year it's the Wall Street Journal. They imagine a terrible alternate past in which Ishtar wins Best Picture.

The producers of this year's Oscars would really like you to watch the awards ceremony. Especially you, easily-marketed-to young men. They've even convinced your God, Judd Apatow, to do a short film!

Oscar front-runner Slumdog Millionaire has received some criticism of late for cultural insensitivity. Are these legitimate complaints, or are they accusations trumped-by by rival films trying to chip away at the Slumdog's awards buzz?

[Tina Fey and Jane Krakowski from "30 Rock" winning beautiful awards at the SAGs last night; image via Getty]

Why was Kate Winslet—so likable usually—all wheezy and deeply humbled and annoying as she accepted her Screen Actors Guild award last night? Because that's how actresses and actors (especially black ones) audition for Academy Awards.

The Gay Superbowl nominations have been announced. Let's go category by category (well, only for the big ones) and take a look at the surprises and, if we can make such predictions, the likely winners.

The Oscar nominations are being announced! We expect Vantage Point and My Best Friends Girl to dominate in all categories. I'll give my reactions, live, after the jump.

All of a sudden Slumdog Millionaire, Danny Boyle's "love letter" (ugh) to Mumbai, is the frontrunner to take the top award at next month's Academy Oscars Awards for Movies and Things. Bet on it!

All the major movie awards nominations, with the exception of those for the Oscars, have been announced. So we can make a pretty good guess about what will get nods come January 22nd.

Not a fan of Jon Stewart or Ellen DeGeneres hosting the Oscars? Well, here's something completely different for you then: Hugh Jackman as a no-jokes-making Academy Awards emcee. Possibly with singing and/or dancing!