Whether you love the Academy Awards or hate them, tonight is the big night. They’re either about to begin or finally – FINALLY – about to be over. The 86th Annual Academy Awards will be given out tonight beginning at 5:30pm PST (8:30pm PST), or earlier if the red carpet is part of your yearly ritual, and CraveOnline is going to be here, holding your hand throughout the night revealing which films won, what that means, and then probably going to sleep afterwards because it’s going to be a long show.
If you love the Academy Awards as much as we do, it’s been one hell of a build-up, with several highly competitive categories including – for once – Best Picture, which pundits still say is a neck-and-neck race between the historical drama 12 Years a Slave and the inspirational crowdpleaser Gravity. Some even think that American Hustle, which tied Gravity for the most nominations overall, still has a chance to sneak in if 12 Years a Slave and Gravity split the vote. Other hard to predict races include Best Supporting Actress (which at this point could easily go to either Lupita Nyong’o for 12 Years a Slave, Jennifer Lawrence for American Hustle or June Squibb for Nebraska), Best Documentary (a close call between the devastating The Act of Killing and the less controversial, but more entertaining 20 Feet from Stardom), and Best Original Song (which could go to anything really except hahaha we’re just kidding it’s going to “Let It Go” from Frozen).
CraveOnline has a lot riding on these Academy Awards. Yours truly, William Bibbiani, challenged Melissa Howland of We Are Movie Geeks to an Oscar Predictions showdown (watch Part 1 and Part 2 now); on Monday, whichever one of us gets the most predictions wrong will have to take “The Peeps Challenge,” and eat 24 Marshmallow Peeps in under 5 minutes without throwing up. Over at The B-Movies Podcast, my co-host Witney Seibold and I have another wager going that could have a catastrophic effect on future episodes of the show.
While you’re getting ready, you may want to avail yourself of CraveOnline’s Oscar coverage from throughout the previous month, including our multi-part series The OTHER Oscars, in which Witney Seibold and Brian Formo revealed the inner workings of the less popular awards and the most important films to have ever won them, The Best Best Picture Ever, in which Luke Y. Thompson of Topless Robot joined the CraveOnline critics to vote for the best film to ever win the big prize (readers get to vote as well), our list of the Toughest Best Picture Races Ever, a look back at 14 of the Best Oscar Also Rans in recent years, The Top 20 Blockbuster Best Pictures, in which we dispel once and for all the myth that the Academy doesn’t like popular movies, and our exclusive interview with Oscar nominee June Squibb.
We will return at 5:30pm PST to cover the 86th Annual Academy Awards LIVE, right here at CraveOnline. Until then, get your dart guns ready.
[Oscar Showdown Update: William Bibbiani defeated Melissa Howland with his Oscar predictions, accurately predicting 16 categories to her 13. Come back to CraveOnline in 24 hours to see her take the Peeps Challenge!]
And the winners are…
BEST PICTURE:
12 Years a Slave wins Best Picture despite losing Best Director. (Exactly as I predicted, incidentally.) Brad Pitt wins his first Oscar, albeit for producing. The end to an impressive night of awards, but was it a good program overall? We’ll get back to you on that tomorrow. Congratulations to all the winners!
BEST ACTOR:
Alright, alright, alright. Matthew McConaughey wins Best Actor for Dallas Buyers Club, gives an epic speech, beats his chest, tells us to just keep livin’. Everything we hoped for.
BEST ACTRESS:
“Sit down! You’re too old to be standing!” Cate Blanchett calls out as she accepts her second Academy Award, and first for Best Actress, for Blue Jasmine. She uses her time on stage to give mad props to her fellow nominees and speak out to the industry about the need and demand for more films focusing on women. Great job, Cate!
BEST DIRECTOR:
Alfonso Cuaron wins Best Director for Gravity, making him the first Latin American director to ever take home the award. The race was considered to be a close one between Cuaron and Steve McQueen, who would have been the first black person to when Best Director at the Oscars. But apparently we’ll have to wait a little longer.
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY:
Spike Jonze wins his first Academy Award for his screenplay for Her. Jonze is a critical darling for his many acclaimed music videos, commercials, and feature films. This was his fourth nomination, and third for Her. (He was previously nominated for Best Director for Being John Malkovich.)
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY:
John Ridley wins the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for 12 Years a Slave, based on the writings of the film’s protagonist Solomon Northup. It’s his first nomination. Congrats, John!
BEST ORIGINAL SONG:
The composers of “Let It Go” from Frozen, Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, rhymed and sung their Oscar acceptance speech. With this win, Robert Lopez joins the illustrious list of EGOTs, having won a Daytime Emmy, a Grammy, Tony and now… an Oscar. Congratulations Robert!
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE:
Stephen Price wins Best Original Score for Gravity. It’s the composer’s first nomination, first win, and only third film as a composer, after Attack the Block and The World’s End. That’s a cool track record.
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN:
Never mind about that sweep. Gravity loses Best Production Design to The Great Gatsby, making this the second Oscar of the night for Catherine Martin (and her fourth overall). She’s joined on-stage by Beverley Dunn, who earns her first Oscar for Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation of the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel.
BEST EDITING:
Alfonso Cuaron wins his very first Academy Award, alongside Mark Sanger, for Best Editing. Gravity is in the middle of a sweep, folks. Can it keep up the momentum?
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY:
Emmanuel Lubezki finally wins an Academy Award, after decades of stellar work and five previous nominations for A Little Princess, Sleepy Hollow, The New World, Children of Men and The Tree of Life. Lubezki of course wins for Gravity, the film that has thus far won every category in which it has been nominated.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS:
Lupita Nyong’o wins the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, despite a last-minute surge in popularity for Jennifer Lawrence, for 12 Years a Slave. This marks the first win tonight for 12 Years a Slave, and Lupita Nyong’o’s first Oscar win, first nomination, and first feature film appearance ever.
Read CraveOnline’s exclusive interview with Lupita Nyong’o.
BEST SOUND EDITING:
Gravity also wins for Best Sound Editing. Again, because duh. Again.
BEST SOUND MIXING:
Gravity wins Best Sound Mixing. Again, because duh.
BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FEATURE:
Italy’s Oscar entry, The Great Beauty, has won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Feature. In the acceptance speech, the filmmakers thanked Federico Fellini, whose work inspired every single frame of The Great Beauty, to the delight of many, and the frustration of most of the critics at CraveOnline.
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE:
Morgan Neville wins the Academy Award for his Documentary Feature 20 Feet from Stardom, a film about the unsung backup singers who were instrumental to many of the most popular pop songs in history. The film overtakes critical favorite The Act of Killing, an upset that’s bound to upset many who found Joshua Oppenheimer’s inventive documentary to be the best film of the year. That said, no one can deny that Darlene Love rocked the acceptance speech with an impromptu performance.
Read CraveOnline’s exclusive interview with 20 Feet from Stardom director Morgan Neville.
Read CraveOnline’s exclusive interview with 20 Feet from Stardom subject Darlene Love.
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT:
The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life, this year’s documentary about the Holocaust, wins the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. The film features the oldest living Holocaust survivor, Alice Herz Sommer, who takes us through her remarkable life before and after World War II. Tragically, Sommer died just one week ago, at the age of 109.
BEST LIVE-ACTION SHORT:
Helium, a tearjerker about a hospital janitor who invents a new afterlife to inspire hope in a boy dying from cancer, wins the Academy Award for Best Live-Action Short. Anyone who has actually seen the competing film Just Before Losing Everything is weeping right now at the injustice of it all.
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS:
Gravity wins the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. Duh.
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE:
Frozen wins the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, the way that everyone expected it to. Some of us were really hoping for The Wind Rises to take home this award, but we’ll just have to let it go.
BEST ANIMATED SHORT:
Mr. Hublot wins the Academy Award for Best Animated Short. The CGI-animated film is about a clockwork agoraphobe who comes out of his shell after adopting a robotic dog that won’t stop growing. Mr. Hublot wins this award over audience favorite Get a Horse!, which starred the original voice of Walt Disney in the role of Mickey Mouse.
BEST MAKEUP & HAIRSTYLING:
Dallas Buyers Club wins the Academy Award for Best Achievement in Makeup & Hairstyling. Oscar winners Adruitha Lee and Robin Mathews, each winning their first Academy Award, famously had a budget of $250 for the whole movie. Will this set a dangerous precedent for makeup and hair styling budgets throughout the industry? Eh… probably not.
BEST COSTUME DESIGN:
Catherine Martin just won her third Academy Award, and second for costuming, for The Great Gatsby. Although American Hustle was strongly favored by many to win this particular award, it’s hardly a surprise. All of Baz Luhrmann’s films are sumptuously designed, mostly because they’re all designed by Catherine Martin.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:
Jared Leto takes home the first Oscar of the night, for his supporting performance in Dallas Buyers Club. It is his first win, and his first nomination. Leto has been a runaway for this award from the start of the awards season, winning Best Supporting Actor at most awards ceremonies, including The Golden Globes, the Screen Actors Guild Award and The Independent Spirit Award. Also, his hair looks fabulous tonight, and we admire him for going with a white tuxedo and red bowtie.
William Bibbiani is the editor of CraveOnline’s Film Channel and co-host of The B-Movies Podcast. Follow him on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
