// March 8th, 2010 // No Comments » // Film & Script Reviews
By reinstituting 10 best picture nominees, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences set out to shake up its 82nd annual awards show and, in the process, ended up making history.
Summit’s “The Hurt Locker,” with just $14.7 million in domestic grosses, captured a leading six Oscars on Sunday night and defied the odds to emerge as best picture — defeating five movies that had grossed more than $100 million each domestically, including Fox’s “Avatar,” the top-grossing movie of all time.
In fact, though the 10 nominees brought a number of studio movies to the party, the indies still ruled with Fox Searchlight’s “Crazy Heart” and Lionsgate’s “Precious” also winning key awards.
As part of “Locker’s” triumphant night, Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to receive a directing Oscar, which was presented to her by Barbra Streisand, who appeared to savor the envelope-opening since her own efforts to break down barriers for female directors had been ignored by the Academy in an earlier era.
“There is no other way to describe it, it’s the moment of a lifetime,” Bigelow said, drawing a deep breath as she accepted her trophy.
“Locker’s” success was all the more dramatic given that Hollywood’s previous efforts to portray the war in Iraq had drawn mixed critical responses.
Bigelow made a special point of dedicating her directing win to “the women and men in the military who risk their lives on a daily basis in Iraq and Afghanistan and around the world. And may they come home safe.”
Eleventh-hour controversies — some real, some manufactured — had surrounded “Locker.” The Academy even took the unprecedented step of banning financier Nicolas Chartier from the awards after he sent out e-mails urging others to ignore “Avatar” and vote “Locker.”
Here are the nominees again in
Best picture
“Avatar”
“The Blind Side”
“District 9″
“An Education”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”
“A Serious Man”
“Up”
“Up in the Air”
Best actor
Jeff Bridges, “Crazy Heart”
George Clooney, “Up in the Air”
Colin Firth, “A Single Man”
Morgan Freeman, “Invictus”
Jeremy Renner, “The Hurt Locker”
Best actress
Sandra Bullock, “The Blind Side”
Helen Mirren, “The Last Station”
Carey Mulligan, “An Education”
Gabourey Sidibe, “Precious”
Meryl Streep, “Julie & Julia”
Best supporting actor
Matt Damon, “Invictus”
Woody Harrelson, “The Messenger”
Christopher Plummer, “The Last Station”
Stanley Tucci, “The Lovely Bones”
Christoph Waltz, “Inglourious Basterds”
Best supporting actress
Penelope Cruz, “Nine”
Vera Farmiga, “Up in the Air”
Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Crazy Heart”
Anna Kendrick, “Up in the Air”
Mo’Nique, “Precious”
Best director
James Cameron, “Avatar”
Kathryn Bigelow, “The Hurt Locker”
Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”
Lee Daniels, “Precious”
Jason Reitman, “Up in the Air”
Best foreign-language film
“Ajami,” Israel
“El Secreto de Sus Ojos,” Argentina
“The Milk of Sorrow,” Peru
“Un Prophete,” France
“The White Ribbon,” Germany
Best adapted screenplay
Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, “District 9″
Nick Hornby, “An Education”
Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche, “In the Loop”
Geoffrey Fletcher, “Precious”
Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner, “Up in the Air”
Best original screenplay
Mark Boal, “The Hurt Locker”
Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”
Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman, “The Messenger”
Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, “A Serious Man”
Bob Peterson, Pete Docter and Tom McCarthy, “Up”
Best animated feature film
“Coraline”
“Fantastic Mr. Fox”
“The Princess and the Frog”
“The Secret of Kells”
“Up”
Best art direction
“Avatar”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine” “Sherlock Holmes”
“The Young Victoria”
Best cinematography
“Avatar”
“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“The White Ribbon”
Best sound mixing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”
Best sound editing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Up”
Best original score
“Avatar,” James Horner
“Fantastic Mr. Fox,” Alexandre Desplat
“The Hurt Locker,” Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders
“Sherlock Holmes,” Hans Zimmer
“Up,” Michael Giacchino
Best original song
“Almost There” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman
“Down in New Orleans” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman
“Loin de Paname” from “Paris 36,” Reinhardt Wagner and Frank Thomas
“Take It All” from “Nine,” Maury Yeston
“The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)” from “Crazy Heart,” Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett
Best costume design
“Bright Star”
“Coco Before Chanel”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine”
“The Young Victoria”
Best documentary feature
“Burma VJ”
“The Cove”
“Food, Inc.”
“The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers”
“Which Way Home”
Best documentary short
“China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province”
“The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner”
“The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”
“Music by Prudence”
“Rabbit a la Berlin”
Best film editing
“Avatar”
“District 9″
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”
Best makeup
“Il Divo”
“Star Trek”
“The Young Victoria”
Best animated short film
“French Roast”
“Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty”
“The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte)”
“Logorama”
“A Matter of Loaf and Death”
Best live-action short film
“The Door”
“Instead of Abracadabra”
“Kavi”
“Miracle Fish”
“The New Tenants”
Best visual effects
“Avatar”
“District 9″
“Star Trek”
