Historic slave drama wins best film Oscar
Gravity
triumphs as the night’s top award-winner. Hollywood named the brutal, unshrinking historical drama 12 Years a Slave best picture at the 86th annual Academy Awards.
Steve McQueen’s slavery odyssey, based on Solomon Northup’s 1853 memoir, has been hailed as a landmark corrective to the movie industry’s long omission of slavery stories, following years of whiter tales like 1940 bestpicture winner Gone With the Wind.
The British director dedicated the honour to those past sufferers of slavery and ‘‘the 21 million who still endure slavery today’’.
‘‘Everyone deserves not just to survive, but to live,’’ said McQueen, who promptly bounced into the arms of his cast. ‘‘This is the most important legacy of Solomon Northup.’’
A year after celebrating Ben Affleck’s Argo over Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences opted this time for stark realism over more plainly entertaining candidates like the 3-D space marvel Gravity and the starry 1970s caper American Hustle.
Those two films came in as the leading nominee getters. David O. Russell’s American Hustle went home emptyhanded, but Gravity triumphed as the night’s top award-winner. Cleaning up in technical categories like cinematography and visual effects, it earned seven Oscars including best director for Alfonso Cuaron. The Mexican filmmaker is the category’s first Latino winner.
‘‘It was a transformative experience,’’ said Cuaron, who spent some five years making the film and developing its visual effects. ‘‘For a lot of people, that transformation was wisdom. For me, it was the colour of my hair.’’ To his star Sandra Bullock, the sole person on screen for much of the lost-in-space drama, he said: ‘‘Sandra, you are Gravity.’’
Host Ellen DeGeneres, in a nimble second stint that seemed designed to be an antidote to the crude humour of Seth MacFarlane last year, presided over a smooth if safe ceremony, punctuated by politics, pizza and photo-bombing. Freely circulating in the crowd, she had pizza delivered, appealing to Harvey Weinstein to pitch in, and gathered stars to snap a selfie she hoped would be a record-setter on Twitter (It was: Long before midnight, the photo had been retweeted more than 2 million times). One participant, Meryl Streep, giddily exclaimed: ‘‘I’ve never tweeted before!’’
But in celebrating a movie year roundly called an exceptional one, the Oscars fittingly spread the awards around. The starved stars of the Texas AIDS drama Dallas Buyers Club were feted: Matthew McConaughey for best actor and Jared Leto for best supporting actor.
McConaughey’s award capped a startling career turnaround, a conscious redirection by the actor to tack away from the romantic comedies he regularly starred in, and move toward more challenging films. He said he’s always chasing a better version of himself, his ‘‘hero’’: ‘‘Every day, every week, every month of my life, my hero’s always 10 years away.’’
‘‘It sort of feels like a culmination,’’ he said backstage.
Leto passed around his Oscar to members of the press backstage, urging them to ‘‘fondle’’ it. The long-haired actor, who has devoted himself in recent years to his rock band 30 Seconds to Mars, gravely vowed: ‘‘I will revel tonight.’’
Cate Blanchett took best actress for her fallen socialite in Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine, her second Oscar. Accepting the award, she challenged Hollywood not to think of films starring women as ‘‘niche experiences’’: ‘‘The world is
Director and producer Steve McQueen, right, celebrates after accepting the Oscar for best picture with Lupita Nyong’o, left, at the 86th Academy Awards in Hollywood, California.
Matthew McConaughey, right, best actor winner for his DallasBuyersClub, is congratulated by best actor nominee Best actress: Cate Blanchett speaks on stage after she won best actress for her work in round, people!’’ she said to hearty applause.
Draped in Nairobi blue, Lupita Nyong’o – the Cinderella of the awards season – won best supporting actress for her indelible impression as the tortured slave Patsey. It’s the feature film debut for the 31-year-old actress.
‘‘It doesn’t escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is thanks to so much pain in someone else’s, and so I want to salute the spirit of Patsy for her guidance,’’ said Nyong’o. She also thanked director Steve McQueen: ‘‘I’m certain that the dead are standing about you and they are watching and they are grateful, and so am I.’’
Best documentary went to the crowdpleasing backup singer ode 20 Feet From Stardom.
One of its stars, Darlene Love, accepted the award singing the gospel tune His Eye Is on the Sparrow: ‘‘I sing because I’m happy/ I sing because I’m free.’’
Disney’s global hit Frozen won best animated film, marking – somewhat remarkably – the studio’s first win in the 14 years of the best animated feature category. (Pixar, which Disney owns, has regularly dominated.) With a box-office that recently passed $1 billion globally, the film was sure to be the biggest hit to take home an Oscar on Sunday. The film’s Let It Go won best original song.
‘‘We’re all just trying to make films that touch people,’’ said co-director Chris Buck backstage. ‘‘Once in a while, you get lucky.’’
Though the Oscar ceremony is usually a glitzy bubble separate from real-world happenings, international events were immediately referenced.
In his acceptance speech, Leto addressed people in Ukraine and Venezuela.
‘‘We are here and as you struggle to make your dreams happen, to live the impossible, we’re thinking of you,’’ said Leto.
Italy’s The Great Beauty won the Oscar for best foreign language film. In accepting the award for his rumination on life and Rome’s decadence, director Paolo Sorrentino thanked his heroes, including Federico Fellini, Martin Scorsese and soccer star Diego Maradona.
In her opening, DeGeneres gently mocked Hollywood’s insularity, referring to the headlines that have swamped the Los Angeles area lately with a slightly less serious news event.
‘‘It has been raining,’’ said DeGeneres. ‘‘We’re fine. Thank you for your prayers.’’
ABC, which aired the ceremony, hoped the drama of the best-picture race would be enough to entice viewers.
The show last year drew an audience of 40.3 million, up from 39.3 million the year before when the silent-film ode The Artist won best picture.