Oscars 2021 – live: Winners, acceptance speeches and highlights from the Academy Awards
Chloé Zhao wins Best Director while Frances McDormand earns Best Actress prize
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Your support makes all the difference.Road movie Nomadland won the top prize at the 93rd Academy Awards, which fulfilled many expectations but threw in a couple of surprise wins in an unusual ceremony.
The film’s director Chloe Zhao also made history, becoming the first woman of colour to win the award for directing, and the second woman in history — and the film scooped the Best Actress prize for its star Frances McDormand.
Sir Anthony Hopkins won the Best Actor Oscar — his first since The Silence of the Lambs in 1992 — for his performance in The Father, about a man slipping into dementia, defeating presumptive favourite Chadwick Boseman, who died last year aged 43 following a private four-year battle with colon cancer.
Daniel Kaluuya, who was born in London to Ugandan parents, is the first black British winner of the best Supporting Actor prize for his turn as community organiser and member of the Black Panther Party Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah.
There were a number of surprise wins. David Fincher’s Mank led the pack with 10 nominations, but ultimately won two.
Due to coronavirus, the Oscars moved out of their usual venue, the Dolby Theatre, and were based out of Los Angeles’s Union Station instead. The ceremony’s format was overhauled too, with attendees observing social distancing and some joining via video link from other parts of the world.
Nomadland had been a favourite to win Best Picture; it fulfilled that expectation, beating The Father, Judas and the Black Messiah, Mank, Minari, Promising Young Woman, Sound of Metal, and The Trial of the Chicago 7.
Minari actor Youn Yuh-jung also won over the crowd in her acceptance speech for Best Supporting Actress, which was presented to her by Brad Pitt. “Mr Brad Pitt, finally, nice to meet you!” she told him after making her way onto the stage. She then proceeded to acknowledge the ways in which her name has been mispronounced throughout the awards season, telling the crowd: “Tonight, you are all forgiven.”
With her win, Youn became the first Korean actor to take home an Academy Award.
Follow our liveblog for highlights from the ceremony and the buzz-worthy aftermath.
Winner alert: the team behind Sound of Metal has won the Academy Award for Best Sound!
As a native of France, I can only agree with this spot-on commentary from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey:
Chloé Zhao’s win as Best Director was a wonderful moment:
Two Distant Strangers, a short film about police brutality, wins Best Live-Action Short Film. Travon Free, who wrote and co-directed it, made a powerful statement on the red carpet earlier this evening:
Travon Free makes powerful statement about police brutality with Oscars outfit
Free’s sneakers were emblazoned with names including George Floyd’s and Breonna Taylor’s
Trophy alert! And the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film goes to... If Anything Happens I Love You, by Will McCormack and Michael Govier. The film tells the story of two parents grieving their daughter after she dies in a school shooting.
The Oscar was presented by Reese Witherspoon.
Witherspoon then presents the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film, which goes to... Pixar’s Soul! Director Pete Docter is accepting the award with producer Dana Murray.
Speaking of Soul – here’s an interview our film critic Clarisse Loughrey did with co-directors Pete Docter and Kemp Powers, composer Jon Batiste and producer Dana Murray:
Pixar’s Soul: ‘This film is really gonna heal a lot of things for people’
The animation studio is taking on life after death in its latest film, about a jazz musician who kicks the bucket. Clarisse Loughrey spoke to co-directors Pete Docter and Kemp Powers, composer Jon Batiste and producer Dana Murray about a production that fought to overcome the way “caricature has been weaponised against Black people” and replaced it with joy and compassion
Another win! Colette, about former French Resistance member Colette Marin-Catherine, wins Best Documentary Short Subject. The film’s subject couldn’t attend the ceremony but still dressed up for the occasion:
If you missed any part of the ceremony and want to make sure you’re up to date on winners, here’s our rolling list, which we are updating in real time throughout the evening:
Another Oscar alert! Netflix’s My Octopus Teacher wins Best Documentary Feature, defeating Collective, Crip Camp, The Mole Agent, and Time. The film, directed by Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed, tells the story of how filmmaker Craig Foster developed a relationship with an octopus in a kelp forest in South Africa.
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