The 2011 Academy Awards, a night that looked like being one the most by-the-book of recent years, ended with one or two surprises. **The King's Speech **collected four Oscars, including Best Film, Best Actor for Colin Firth, Best Original Screenplay and the night's closest-thing-to-a-shock, Best Director for Tom Hooper.
Otherwise, the gongs were evenly distributed. Inception monopolised the technical categories; **The Social Network **had only Aaron Sorkin's Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Score and Best Editing to show for its heavy backing, and Natalie Portman, Melissa Leo and Christian Bale won their respective acting categories.
Whether any of this came a surprise depends on how you saw the buzz around The King's Speech. It came out of the blocks at a gallop around the time of the Toronto Film Festival, but seemed to lose ground to The Social Network. But not at the Academy. David Fincher's Facebook origin story looked likely to snag Fincher his first Oscar, but Hooper it was who walked away with the golden man.
The Londoner looked a little less surprised than the rest of us - we're putting that down to the British sang-froid which he exudes by the bucketload - as he waxed lyrical about "the triangle of man-love that was Colin Firth, Jeffrey Rush and me" (a movie we definitely wouldn't like to see in 3D). In a true aw-bless moment, he also thanked his mum for introducing him to the stage play of The King's Speech in the first place.
Colin Firth's ascension to the firmament has been longer in arriving. He was astonishing in A Single Man last year and unlucky to come up against Jeff Bridges at the officially designated Jeff Bridges Moment. He gave a typically funny and understated speech, too, thanking, among others, Harvey Weinstein for "taking me on 20 years ago when I was a mere child sensation". Not just one of the funniest line of the night, but a reminder of Weinstein's influence in getting The King's Speech over the line.
Natalie Portman, meanwhile, was a popular and gracious (and tearful) Best Actress for her terrific, graft-filled turn in Black Swan, thanking director Darren Aronofsky, Mike Nichols and Luc Besson, among others, in her speech.
To no-one's massive surprise Bale took home the Best Supporting Actor award for his performance as The Fighter's wiry ex-boxer Dicky Eklund. Bale's generous and moving speech shared the spotlight with the real Eklund, watching on from the balcony above, as well as his wife and young daughter. There *was *one minor grumble, though: with The Dark Knight **Rises **shooting soon, here's hoping he gets to a decent barber. Bruce Wayne's not going to get into any of those chi-chi parties looking like Worzel Gummidge.
Christopher Nolan, unlucky to be overlooked in the Best Picture category, got plenty of vicarious appreciation from the stage. **Inception **won three technical awards (Visual Effects, Sound Mixing and Sound Editing). It's still a surprise that the man who oversaw all that technical innovation wasn't deemed worthy of a nomination, but Nolan's time is clearly still ahead.
Academy love for The Social Network was surprisingly limited to Best Editing and Best Score for Trent Reznor and Ross Atticus' edgy, atmospheric soundtrack.
No great surprise in the Best Documentary category where Inside Job, giving Charles Ferguson a chance to lambast the SEC, the FSA and the other toothless regulators who've failed to prosecute corrupt bankers. "Not a single executive has gone to jail," he thundered (politely), "and that's wrong". If there was an Oscar for serving it to the godless, we'd give him that too.
The complete list of winners are below:
Best Picture
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King’s Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter’s Bone
Best Director
David O. Russell – The Fighter
**Tom Hooper – The King’s Speech **
David Fincher – The Social Network
Joel And Ethan Coen – True Grit
Darren Aronofsky – Black Swan
Best Actress
Natalie Portman – Black Swan
Annette Bening – The Kids Are All Right
Jennifer Lawrence – Winter's Bone
Michelle Williams – Blue Valentine
Nicole Kidman – Rabbit Hole
Best Actor
Javier Bardem – Biutiful
Jeff Bridges – True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg – The Social Network
Colin Firth – The King's Speech
James Franco – 127 Hours
Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams – The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter – The King’s Speech
**Melissa Leo – The Fighter **
Hailee Steinfeld – True Grit
Jacki Weaver – Animal Kingdom
Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale – The Fighter
John Hawkes – Winter's Bone
Jeremy Renner – The Town
Geoffrey Rush – The King's Speech
Mark Ruffalo – The Kids Are All Right
Best Original Screenplay
Another Year - Mike Leigh
The Fighter - Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy, Eric Johnson, Keith Dorrington
Inception - Christopher Nolan
The Kids Are All Right - Lisa Cholodenko & Stuart Blumberg
The King's Speech - David Seidler
Best Adapted Screenplay
127 Hours - Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy
The Social Network - Aaron Sorkin
Toy Story 3 - Michael Arndt, John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton & Lee Unkrich
True Grit - Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Winter's Bone - Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini
Best Animated Film
Toy Story 3
The Illusionist
How To Train Your Dragon
Best Foreign Film
Biutiful (Mexico)
Dog Tooth (Greece)
In A Better World (Denmark)
Incendies (Canada)
Outside the Law (Algeria)
Best Score
How to Train Your Dragon – John Powell
Inception – Hans Zimmer
The King's Speech – Alexandre Desplat
127 Hours – A.R. Rahman
The Social Network – Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross
Best Song
Coming Home from Country Strong – Music and Lyric by Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey
I See the Light from Tangled – Music by Alan Menken Lyric by Glenn Slater
If I Rise from 127 Hours – Music by A.R. Rahman Lyric by Dido and Rollo Armstrong
We Belong Together from Toy Story 3 – Music and Lyric by Randy Newman
Best Cinematography
Black Swan – Matthew Libatique
Inception – Wally Pfister
The King's Speech – Danny Cohen
The Social Network – Jeff Cronenweth
True Grit – Roger Deakins
Best Costume Design
Alice in Wonderland – Colleen Atwood
I Am Love – Antonella Cannarozzi
The King's Speech – Jenny Beavan
The Tempest – Sandy Powell
True Grit – Mary Zophres
Best Art Direction
Alice in Wonderland – Robert Stromberg, Karen O'Hara
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 – Stuart Craig, Stephenie McMillan
Inception – Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias and Doug Mowat
The King's Speech – Eve Stewart , Judy Farr
True Grit – Jess Gonchor, Nancy Haigh
Best Visual Effects
Alice in Wonderland –Ken Ralston, David Schaub, Carey Villegas and Sean Phillips
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 – Tim Burke, John Richardson, Christian
Manz and Nicolas Aithadi
Hereafter – Michael Owens, Bryan Grill, Stephan Trojanski and Joe Farrell
Inception – Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb
Iron Man 2 – Janek Sirrs, Ben Snow, Ged Wright and Daniel Sudick
Best Sound Editing
Inception – Richard King
Toy Story 3 – Tom Myers and Michael Silvers
Tron: Legacy – Gwendolyn Yates Whittle and Addison Teague
True Grit – Skip Lievsay and Craig Berkey
Unstoppable – Mark P. Stoeckinger
Best Sound Mixing
**Inception **
The King's Speech
Salt
The Social Network
True Grit
Best Documentary Feature
Exit through the Gift Shop
Gasland
Inside Job
Restrepo
Waste Land
Best Live Action Short Film
The Confession
The Crush
God Of Love
Na Wewe
Wish 143
Best Animated Short Film
Day & Night
The Gruffalo
Let's Pollute
The Lost Thing
Madagascar
Best Documentary Short Subject
Killing In The Name
Poster Girl
Strangers No More
Sun Comes Up
The Warriors Of Qiugang
Best Editing
Black Swan
The Fighter
The King's Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network
Best Make-up
Barney's Version
The Way Back
**The Wolfman **