Dear Jason Reitman: Nice Rose, Sorry About the Oscar. Love, Movieline

You know which nominee is awfully hard to find on the post-Oscar photo wires this morning? One guess...

That would be Up in the Air writer-director Jason Reitman, the prohibitive favorite (with Sheldon Turner) for Adapted Screenplay heading into the big night. Instead of collecting his final, most coveted statuette of the season, however, he watched as Precious screenwriter Geoffrey Fletcher made his way past the standing, gracious Turner and mosey to the stage as the dark-horse winner. For whatever reason, the Oscarcast director spared Reitman the indignity of a reaction shot (though, come to think of it, ego deflation does look pretty hideous on live TV); aside from the Best Director close-up and a few others intercut around the show, Reitman was something of an Oscar ghost following the upset and his film's overall 0-for-6 performance Sunday night.

But! We at Movieline prefer to remember the rosier times -- literally, as Reitman was celebrated late last week at a luncheon honoring Canadian Oscar nominees. While it's impossible to know what he's thinking here -- no doubt some smooth, confident hybrid of "I've got this thing locked up" and "License and registration, ma'am" -- it's the Jason Reitman we'll always cherish from a season when it seemed like we just couldn't get enough. Sucks about the outcome, but come on. He didn't want to share that shit anyway.

[Photo: Getty Images]