‘Oppenheimer,’ Stone, Murphy top the Oscars
LOS ANGELES — “Oppenheimer,” a solemn three-hour biopic that became an unlikely billion-dollar box-office sensation, was crowned best picture at a 96th Academy Awards that doubled as a coronation for director Christopher Nolan.
After passing over arguably Hollywood’s foremost big-screen auteur for years, the Oscars made up for lost time by heaping seven awards on Nolan’s blockbuster, including best actor for Cillian Murphy, best supporting actor for Robert Downey Jr., and best director for Nolan.
In anointing “Oppenheimer,” the Academy of Motion Pictures did something it hasn’t done for more than a decade: hand its top prize to a widely seen, big-budget studio film. “Oppenheimer” brought droves of moviegoers to theaters with a complex, fission-filled drama about J. Robert Oppenheimer and the creation of the atomic bomb.
“For better or worse, we’re all living in Robert Oppenheimer’s world,” said Murphy in his acceptance speech. "I’d like to dedicate this to the peacemakers.”
As a film heavy with unease for human capacity for mass destruction, “Oppenheimer” also emerged — even over its partner in cultural phenomenon, “Barbie” — as a fittingly foreboding film for times rife with cataclysm, manmade or not. Sunday’s Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood unfolded against the backdrop of wars in Gaza and Ukraine, and with a potentially momentous US election on the horizon.
The most closely watched contest of the Academy Awards went to Emma Stone, who won best actress for her performance as Bella Baxter in “Poor Things.”
In what was seen as the night's most nail-biting category, Stone won over Lily Gladstone of “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Gladstone would have become the first Native American to win an Academy Award.
Instead, Oscar voters couldn’t resist the full-bodied extremes of Stone’s “Poor Things” performance. The win for Stone, her second best actress Oscar following her 2019 win for “La La Land,” confirmed the 35-year-old as arguably the preeminent big-screen actress of her generation. The list of women to win best actress two or more times is illustrious, including Katharine Hepburn, Frances McDormand, Ingrid Bergman, and Bette Davis.
“Oh, boy, this is really overwhelming,” said Stone.
Nolan has had many movies in the Oscar mix before, including “Inception,” “Dunkirk,” and “The Dark Knight.” But his win Sunday for direction is the first Academy Award for the 53-year-old filmmaker.
In his acceptance speech, Nolan noted cinema is just over a hundred years old.
“We don’t know where this incredible journey is going from here,” said Nolan. “But to think that I’m a meaningful part of it means the world to me.”
Protest and politics intruded on an election-year Academy Awards on Sunday, where demonstrations for Gaza raged outside the Dolby Theatre.
Sunday’s broadcast, hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, had plenty of razzle dazzle, including a sprawling song-and-dance rendition of the “Barbie” hit "I'm Just Ken" by Ryan Gosling, with an assist on guitar by Slash. A sea of Kens swarmed the stage.
Though not quite the clean sweep that some expected, “Oppenheimer” was overpowering all competition — including its release-date companion, “Barbie” — winning awards for its cinematography, editing, score, and Downey’s supporting performance.
Downey, nominated twice before (for “Chaplin” and “Tropic Thunder”), notched his first Oscar, crowning the illustrious second act of his up-and-down career.
“I’d like to thank my terrible childhood and the Academy, in that order,” said Downey.
“Barbie,” last year’s biggest box-office hit with more than $1.4 billion in ticket sales, didn’t win an award until almost three hours into the ceremony. It won best song (sorry, Ken) for Billie Eilish and Finneas’s “What Was I Made For?” It’s their second Oscar, two years after winning for their James Bond theme, “No Time to Die.”
Jonathan Glazer, the British filmmaker whose chilling Auschwitz drama “The Zone of Interest” won best international film, drew connections between the dehumanization depicted in his film and today.
“Right now, we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people, whether the victims of October the 7 th in Israel, or the the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims, this dehumanization, how do we resist?”
The war in Gaza was on the minds of many attendees, as was the war in Ukraine. A year after “Navalny” won the same award, Mstyslav Chernov’s “20 Days in Mariupol,” a harrowing chronicle of the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, won best documentary. The win, a first for the Associated Press and PBS’s “Frontline,” came as the war in Ukraine passed the two-year mark with no signs of abating.
Mstyslav Chernov, the Ukrainian filmmaker and AP journalist whose hometown was bombed the day he learned of his Oscar nomination, spoke forcefully about Russia's invasion.
“This is the first Oscar in Ukrainian history,” said Chernov. “And I’m honored. Probably I will be the first director on this stage to say I wish I’d never made this film. I wish to be able to exchange this [for] Russia never attacking Ukraine.”
In the early going, Yorgos Lanthimos’s Frankenstein-riff “Poor Things” ran away with three prizes for its sumptuous craft, including awards for production design, makeup and hairstyling, and costume design.
The night’s first award was one of its most predictable: Da’Vine Joy Randolph for best supporting actress, for her performance in Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers.” An emotional Randolph was accompanied to the stage by her “Holdovers” costar Paul Giamatti.
“For so long I've always wanted to be different,” said Randolph. “And now I realize I just need to be myself.”