Los Angeles (dpa) – The Artist scooped best picture, best actor and best director Academy Awards Sunday night, after the black-and-white independent film with hardly a spoken word won over the critics at nearly all of the world's major award shows. The film portrays the experience of a silent movie star in 1920s Hollywood whose world crumbles with the introduction of talkies. It also won awards for costume design and original score. Martin Scorsese's Hugo won five early trophies, taking an initial lead over the pre-show favorite The Artist. The children's adventure story set in a Paris railway station picked up Academy Awards for art direction, cinematography, visual editing, sound editing and sound mixing. It had been the leading nominee with 11 nods, though The Artist, with 10 nods, had been widely tipped for the major prizes. Iran's A Separation was named best foreign language film, whose director Asghar Farhadi, dedicated the movie to the Iranian people. “At a time of talk of war, intimidation and aggression is exchanged between politicians, the name of their county, Iran, is spoken here through her glorious culture, a rich and ancient culture that has been hidden under the heavy dust of politics.” Best original screenplay went to Woody Allen for Midnight in Paris while The Descendants won for adapted screenplay. Meryl Streep won the best actress Oscar for her portrayal of British former prime minister Margaret Thatcher in the biopic The Iron Lady. Octavia Spencer was named best supporting actress for her role in The Help, while Christopher Plummer won the award for best supporting actor for playing an elderly gay man in The Beginners. At the age of 82, he was the oldest actor ever to win an Oscar. Rango was named best animated feature. Before the first trophies were handed out, Hollywood's superstars paraded down the red carpet, turning out in their high-fashion finery for the US movie industry's biggest night of the year. The haute couture aspect of the cavalcade was only undermined by the appearance of British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, who arrived dressed as the lead character of his upcoming movie The Dictator, the megalomaniac ruler of a fictional Middle East country. Oscar producers had originally threatened to revoke his tickets but reversed their decision amidst a storm of publicity. Hosted by veteran comedian Billy Crystal, the Oscar ceremony was broadcast to more than 200 countries, with movie fans around the world eager to see snared Hollywood's top prizes. Sunday's Oscar night was a showcase of nostalgia, after cinema's domination in recent years by digital advances and 3D movies. The cavernous theater was redecorated to look like an old-time movie hall, while many of the best-picture contenders harked back to past times. The Artist is set in 1920s Hollywood, as the film industry transitions from silent movies to talkies. Hugo, Martin Scorsese's first children's film and first 3D film, is set in the Paris of the early 20th century, and tells the story of an orphan whose quest to honor his dead father inspires a cinematic pioneer to rediscover his passion. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/loAi2 Tags: Academy Awards, Hollywood, Hugo, The Artist Section: Entertainment, Latest News, Movies News
