The Oscars aka The 96th Academy Awards, took place in the Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles on the morning of 11th March (IST), with Oppenheimer wiping off the awards by bagging wins in 7 categories along with Poor Things winning 4 awards, bagging the second position. The thriller movie led the Oscars with 13 nominations, along with the dark comedy, Poor Things with 11 nominations. It was observed as a sigh of relief and cinema’s win as fan favourites Cillian Murphy and Robert Downey Jr won their first ever Oscars. The awards were hosted by the infamous Jimmy Kimmel for the fourth time and many past winners of their respective categories were seen giving off awards. Oppenheimer, the three-hour biopic directed by Christopher Nolan, won the prestigious best picture prize. Cillian Murphy, the protagonist who played J. Robert Oppenheimer , rightly won the best actor. The best actress award went to Emma Stone for Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things. Oppenheimer also won awards for Best Director and Best Supporting Actor. The Zone of Interest received two awards and Killers of the Flower Moon didn’t even bag one, despite getting nominated in 10.
The Oppenheimer team, after winning, offered their thanks by saying , “I think any of us who make movies know that you kind of dream of this moment. You know you do, right? He is singular, he is brilliant, and I’m so grateful,” said Emma Thomas. The film portrayed the race to create the first atomic bomb by scientist, J Robert Oppenheimer. It was competing with the movie Barbie and became one of the best movies of the year.Christopher Nolan, through his acceptance speech of being the best director, paid tribute to the history of cinema acknowledging the fun he had while making the movie. He was first nominated in 2002 for Memento under the Best Original Screenplay category. He also gave special thanks to his wife Emma Thomas, “producer of all our films and all our children”. “The awards also witnessed a sensational moment when John Cena came to the stage to present the award for best costume design, ALMOST NAKED !! Politics remained a topic of discussion at the awards as well. This year, in lieu of the ongoing Isreal-Palestine conflict, there was alot of traffic and blockage by the angry pro-Palestinian protesters. Jonathan Glazer once again used his platform to speak out against Israel’s war in Gaza.
