When it premiered just a year ago at the South by Southwest festival in the United States, no one thought that the crazy story mix of comedy, science fiction and kung-fu that tells Everything at the same time everywhere was going to sweep the gala of the awards. Oscar. But the risky, crazy and ambitious film about the multiverse of the independent studio A24 directed by Daniel Scheinert and Dan Kwan -the Daniels- has ended up making history in the 95th edition of the awards given by the Hollywood Academy after previously winning in the season of awards (Critics Choice, producers’ union, directors, screenwriters and actors…).
Of the eleven nominations with which the second feature film by these filmmakers forged in the video clip started, it has won seven statuettes: best film, direction, editing, screenplay, leading actress for Michelle Yeoh and actor and supporting actress for Ke Huy Quan and Jamie Lee Curtis, all very excited to collect their statuettes.
The one who was Stopper in Indiana Jones and the cursed tempo has cried at ease during his speech at the beginning of the ceremony. “They say that stories like this can only happen in movies. This is the American dream!” Claimed the interpreter born in Saigon 51 years ago who had been away from acting for more than two decades. Right after, her co-star, the scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis, held in her hands a statuette to which she aspired for the first time at 64 years of age, which she has dedicated to her family, and especially to her famous parents, Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, who were also nominated for the award and did not make it.
Angela Bassett, who competed with the actress of the Halloween saga with her queen Ramonda from Black Panther: Wakanda forever, has not been able to hide her discomfort in front of the cameras after the defeat. She would have been the first actress in the Marvel universe to win an Oscar. And doses of tears that delivered the Oscar for best actor to Brendan Fraser for his morbidly obese teacher in The Whale. Both that of Ke Huy Quan and that of the protagonist of George of the Jungle has been a full-fledged professional resurrection of those that are so popular in Hollywood. And they have been rewarded.
And the audience has risen to its feet to applaud Michelle Yeoh, the first Asian woman to win the Oscar for best actress, unseating the great favorite Cate Blanchett for her despot conductor of TÁR: “To all the boys and girls who look like me, this is a beacon of hope. Proof that you can dream big,” said the veteran Malaysian performer of Chinese origin. And she has dedicated the trophy to “all the mothers in the world because they are superheroines.”
Other favorites have left the Dolby theater empty, such as Los Fabelmans, by Steven Spielberg, which started with seven mentions; the Baz Luhrmann Elvis biopic, with eight; and the Irish Almas en pena de Inisherin, with nine. Neither has he been able to scratch anything TÁR, by Todd Field, nor The Triangle of Sadness, by the Swedish Ruben Östlund.
In addition to Everything at Once Everywhere, the other big winner of the night was Netflix’s German production on World War I, All Quiet on the Front, which triumphed at the Baftas and here has won four Oscars from the nine to which he opted: photography, production design, soundtrack and best international film, snatching the options of Argentina 1985, by Santiago Mitre, another of those who started with an advantage in this last category after winning the Golden Globe.
From Netflix is ??also the stop motion animated film Pinocchio by Guillermo del Toro, which has had no rival this season. “Animation is cinema, it’s not a genre just for kids, it’s a medium and it’s ready to go to the next level. Let’s keep animation in the conversation,” defended the filmmaker, who was the first to take the stage.
The ceremony has passed for just over three and a half hours in a pleasant and correct way, smoothly and not at all demanding as in other years, led by a Jimmy Kimmel who has appeared on the stage of the Dolby theater simulating landing by parachute like Tom Cruise in Top Gun: Maverick and has alluded to the magic of watching movies in the theater.
The comedian has not forgotten to remember, in a humorous tone, the slap that Will Smith gave Chris Rock, the presenter last year. “We want me to feel safe, so we have strict rules this time. If someone in this theater commits an act of violence during the gala, they will be awarded the Oscar for best actor,” he said, recalling the award that Smith won shortly after tipping The agression. And he warned the winners: “If you talk too much, you’re going to get beat up.”
Colin Farrell couldn’t take home the Oscar but he enjoyed watching his donkey Jenny, one of his companion animals in Martin McDonagh’s black comedy Banshees of Inisherin, on stage. It came as no surprise that Naatu Naatu won the best song Oscar for Indian period film RRR after winning all the previous awards. Her performance at the gala was a highly applauded show made in Bollywood display.
Nothing could be done by a Lady Gaga with a T-shirt and without makeup interpreting the romantic theme of the sequel to Top Gun, Hold my hand. Not a pregnant Rihanna with her beautiful ballad Lift me up, which she stood up to the entire audience, or the duo formed by the composer Diane Warren -perennial loser at the Oscars- and Sofia Carson with her Applause of her.
The actress, director and screenwriter Sarah Polley won the statuette for the adapted screenplay for her feminist drama Ellas hablan, an adaptation of the novel by Miriam Toews that was also up for best film, and marked a highly applauded moment at the ceremony.
Like the one that John Travolta introduced in the performance of Lenny Kravitz in the In Memoriam section with the actor completely broken before the images on the screen showed some of the dead artists in the last year, like his friends Olivia Newton-John, with whom he made the unforgettable Grease, and Kirstie Alley, co-star of the saga Look Who’s Talking, both died of cancer.
