It turns out that putting movies like Avatar for Best Picture and having teen stars Miley Cyrus and Taylor Lautner present awards really does pay off for the Academy. Or maybe it was having Neil Patrick Harris do that opening number (everyone loves NPH!). Either way, despite having one of the most boring red carpets we've seen in awhile, the ratings for the Oscars this year were the highest they've been since 2005. But we think we know why. (more...)

While our counterparts at Mediaite have been dutifully liveblogging every last moment of this year's 82nd Annual Academy Awards, we at Styleite gave up before the show even started; we were in it for the red carpet, clearly. Thankfully, this year's pre-show fashion fest served up no shortage of sartorial sins, rewarding risks, and, predictably, the usual snoozefest offenders. The Hits:
Meryl Streep won tonight's best dressed award, hands down. While our first guess pegged her dress as Valentino, kudos goes to Project Runway alum Chris March for designing such a standout, knockout, all-around stunning dress. Meryl Streep outshone Oscar himself. Period.

Diane Kruger's cream and black feathered gown was undeniably, iconically, and gorgeously Chanel. Featuring a halter neck, no small amount of Chanel camelias, and a bias cut that would make most actresses run for the hills, Kruger's dress was a elegant and inspired choice for the red carpet.

Carey Mulligan looked whimsically chic for her first Academy Awards red carpet appearance in a black bedazzled Prada gown.  While many consider black to be a bit drab for the Oscars, Miuccia Prada's design looked perfect against her pale skin and platinum blonde boyish haircut.  Accented perfectly with impeccably sized chandelier earrings by Fred Leighton, Mulligan's dress most definitely earned the actress a place among Hollywood's "Best Dressed."

Vera Farmiga's fucshia Marchesa gown was reminiscent of Diane Kruger's Christian Lacroix Golden Globe's dress.  The ruffled fanning that spanned from the upper bodice down to the bottom was a unique and perfectly executed accent, which was refreshing considering the red carpet's surprising lack of originality tonight.  The color choice was daring and divine and the gown fit her body like a glove.

Zoe Saldana's Givenchy gown sets a prime example for what red carpet fashion could and should be. Exquisitely styled and arguably the evening's most creative, Zoe's dress was purple, ruched, ruffled, and huge. Also: it had a sparkly top. Good for her for pulling it off, but more importantly, for having the courage to wear it in the first place.

Up next: The Misses...

video After 95 episodes, the epic failure known as The Jay Leno Show airs its final episode tonight. Of course, Leno himself will be back after the Olympics, comfortably at 11:35pm all over again. Which was pretty much the problem to begin with - the 10pm offering started as a similar product to the Tonight Show, and only became more like the old format as time went on. (more...)

updated I really, really wish this didn't exist. And I can't be the only person who clicked on this hoping it was some sort of made-in-bad-taste hoax. Alas. Miley Cyrus' younger sister Noah, who is nine years old, is apparently launching a lingerie line for children. Or someone legally in charge of Noah Cyrus, who is NINE, is reportedly promoting a lingerie line for children using both Cyrus and her friend Emily Grace: (more...)

The People's Choice Awards were this evening, and I gotta say, the People made some surprising choices. How is it that the People pick Twilight, Inglorious Basterds, The Big Bang Theory and Katherine Heigel in the same night? The People seem very inconsistent (but then again, the People know more than me because I, confused, said "Miley Cyrus was in a movie?" (She won Favorite Breakout Movie Actress - and I guess the Hannah Montana Movie counts, though that hardly counts as breaking out.) (more...)

This has been making the rounds, and for good reason — it's a catchy, boppy new yet familiar song that sums up the last year not only in mashing up some of the biggest hits of 2009 but in doing so in auto-tune, which was one of the distinctive, hallmark sounds of the year. (It even got its own parody, "Blame It On The Auto-Tune.") (more...)

the aughts This week, the New York Times Magazine was dedicated to their newly traditional Year In Ideas thinkpiece. It's always a fantastic collection of new discoveries, shifts in ways of thinking, and products that we're likely to hear more about in years to come. It tries, in many ways, to be predictive; to isolate still-germinating concepts that will shape the world. I thought, therefore, that it made sense to see how they did. In the spirit of the end of the decade, I looked back at their first Year In Ideas released in December of 2001. Heavy on concepts that emerged following the terrorist attacks (such as "American Imperialism, Embraced") and the Internet ("Populist Editing"), the series was born at a fascinating moment in American history. (more...)

The Aughts Oh, I know you love a good scandal. How do I know this? Because everyone does. A good scandal amuses us, indulges our schadenfreude and distracts us from other more ‘real' and depressing news stories. And as someone who studies trends and fashion news all day long, I can tell you the fashion world has some good ones. So as the first decade of the 21st century comes to a close, I decided to make a list of my top 10 favorite fashion-related scandals. I’ve included any story involving clothes or relating to the fashion industry. Many of these stories were ridiculous, but they got the headlines and we couldn’t get enough of them. And the decade’s not even over — we've got a few more weeks to discover this decade’s own ‘blue dress’! (more...)

video Now that Miley Cyrus has shocked and saddened the world and deleted her Twitter account, by way of YouTube rap video of course, where are her fans going to go to get up-to-the-second Miley news? How about her Dad. Now he's put out a video as well, urging her fans to follow him instead. Or rather, Jimmy Fallon did. (more...)

In 2000, Britney Spears shocked VMA viewers when she grinded up against the stage in a nude ensemble dusted with sparkles, proving she was far from innocent.  From a distance, Spears looked like a naked teenager.  She was nineteen years old.  And still, she said, a virgin. (more...)

The September Issue: it’s not just the title of the highly anticipated R.J Cutler documentary about Anna Wintour, it's also what every magazine-loving fashionista anxiously awaits. September enters our mailboxes like a warm Thanksgiving feast -- it's bicep-flexing heft comes packed with Chanel’s newest ads, Testino’s freshest fashion shoots, and Glenda B.’s most thoughtful Fall advice -- a welcome antidote to the malnourished August issue. And of course, there’s the cover: the ultimate seal of approval for the model who lands it. But this year? Not so much. (more...)

Women's fashion magazine covers typically fall somewhere between sexy and sophisticated. But finding a spot on that continuum for your cover girl is a little bit trickier when she is still counting the days until her 20th birthday. This month, women's fashion mags across the globe dipped into the young, supple crop of up-and-comers. Will putting tarted-up teens on the cover help attract younger readers? (Any readers at all?) Or will this month's covers just fall flat and lose their way? (more...)

What would happen if a bunch of fancy-free media-types put their heads together and ranked the most influential movers and shakers in the media industry by relevance? (more...)

Had Law and Order's Olivia Benson and Eliot Stabler picked up the August issue of Elle magazine, they would have known from the first paragraph of the Miley Cyrus feature that something wasn't right:

“There are giant oatmeal cookies, thick, chewy brownies, and milk chocolate bonbons galore; sugar sweet cereals, buckets of Twizzlers, hot buttered popcorn, and more; strawberry shortcake with baseball-size berries and homemade whipped cream to explore…”

Seriously, a poem? (more...)