The Oscars are held at the end of a long and gruelling awards season. Hollywood’s power elite reserve their finest for the televised ceremony. The 97th Academy Awards, as the Oscars are formally known, didn’t disappoint.
The hotly contested awards saw old and new stars fill the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday night. The ceremony was streamed live on JioHotstar and JioCinema.
Conan O’Brien hosted the event. Sean Baker’s Anora swept the Oscars, winning in the coveted Best Picture, directing, original screenplay and editing categories.
Mikey Madison won her first Oscar for playing the lead role in Anora, about a stripper who gets involved with a wealthy young Russian man. Adrien Brody picked up his second statuette for playing a Holocaust survivor in Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist.
In the supporting actor categories, Zoe Saldana won for Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez and Kieran Culkin for Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain.
No Other Land, a collaboration between Israeli and Palestinian filmmakers, won in the Best Documentary Feature category. Ironically, the documentary has not yet been commercially released in the United States.
James Mangold’s Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, starring Timothee Chalamet, had eight nominations, but didn’t win a single award.
Demi Moore, who starred in Coralie Fargeat’s body horror film The Substance, lost the best actress award to Mikey Madison.
The musical Wicked, starring Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, won two Oscars for costume design and production design.
Conan O’Brien’s opening monologue saw him spliced into a scene from The Substance, in which he emerges out of Demi Moore’s body. The gimmick led Moore, who was sitting in the front row, to mouth “Awkward.”
Wicked actor Bowen Yang gave Conan O’Brien a run for his money with his smooth on-stage patter.
Fashion trends included jewellery worn by men, such as Andrew Watt’s pearl necklace.
Male brooches were prominent too.
The Brutalist actor Guy Pearce wore a Free Palestine pin.
A seriously under-dressed Adam Sandler appeared in a skit during the ceremony.
Other actors compensated – and overcompensated – for Sandler’s appearance. Here are some of the most striking clothes worn by the presenters and guests.
Also read:
Sean Baker’s ‘Anora’ sweeps the Oscars, winning Best Picture, Directing and Writing awards
‘Flow’ review: A sublime journey of survival and hope
‘The Brutalist’ review: The limits of architecture in building a new home
