Oscars 2022: how the night went (aside from Smith vs. Rock)
This year’s Oscars will be remembered as the one where Will Smith hit Chris Rock on the face – and then went on tearfully to win the best actor statuette. But the night contained other upsets, too. There had been predictions that Jane Campion’s homoerotic western, The Power of the Dog, would sweep the board, but in the event, Netflix’s film flipped just one of its 12 nominations into a win: Campion took best director, becoming only the third woman to do so. Sources reported that the film had been more admired than loved by the Academy’s members.
Belfast, which had received seven nominations, including best picture, also ended up with just one award: Kenneth Branagh won his first Oscar for the film’s original screenplay. Instead, best picture went to Apple TV+’s CODA, an earnest drama about a high-school student (Emilia Jones) who dreams of becoming a singer, though her parents are unable to hear her lovely voice. The film’s title is an acronym for Child of Deaf Adults, and while some deaf people have welcomed CODA’s success, the critics didn’t all love it. By contrast, the winner of the best international feature was widely acclaimed: Drive My Car is a Japanese film about a theatre director processing the death of his wife, partly by being driven around by his young chauffeur. “With its eddying, fluid score and judicious use of silence... this is a supremely confident piece of film-making,” said Wendy Ide in The Observer – albeit one that, at three hours long, will “require the right mindset”.