Every thing In all places All At Once entered the 2023 Oscars on Sunday with a number one 11 nominations and took home seven after an intense awards season, and a night far faraway from the drama-filled one last yr.
The German anti-war drama All Quiet on the Western Front — one other ambitious epic, albeit of wildly different stripe — was second with essentially the most Academy Award wins with 4.
During an era of streaming domination, Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel nodded to the movie-going experience in his monologue on the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Calif. He congratulated the evening’s nominees for “the movies you worked so hard to make, the way in which you intended them to be seen — in a theatre.”
After last yr’s chaotic show was overshadowed by best-actor winner Will Smith slapping comedian Chris Rock on stage, this yr’s event was driven by the personalities of every category during a comparatively muted evening.
First-time nominees ruled the acting categories, with best-actor winner Brendan Fraser winning for The Whale and Michelle Yeoh triumphing as best actress for her performance in Every thing In all places All At Once.
In case you’re wondering in regards to the elephant within the room, Kimmel pulled no slaps — er, punches — while not directly addressing the Smith-Rock controversy. Smith slapped Chris Rock, who was presenting the Oscar for best documentary feature, after the comedian made a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Later within the show, Will Smith was named best actor for King Richard.
In reference to the slap, Kimmel deadpanned Sunday: “If anyone on this theatre commits an act of violence at any point through the show, you might be awarded the Oscar for best actor and permitted to present a 19-minute-long speech.”
Several of the yr’s most acclaimed movies went home empty-handed, notably The Fabelmans, Elvis and The Banshees of Inisherin, which were all nominated for best picture and failed to select up wins in other categories.
Emotional acting wins for Every thing In all places
An emotional moment got here early as Every thing In all places All at Once‘s Ke Huy Quan, widely accepted because the front-runner for best supporting actor, won after an intense awards season during which he often referenced the challenges he faced working in Hollywood after a decade of kid stardom.
When his profession tapered off, he feared he’d never work as an actor again — until Every thing In all places got here along almost 40 years later.
“Mom, I just won an Oscar,” Quan said during his acceptance speech, weeping as he addressed his 84-year-old mother, who was watching from home. The actor had loads of Oscars acceptance speech practice over the past yr, having won the Golden Globe, the Screen Actors Guild Award and the Critics Alternative Award, and other major and critics circle awards.
“They are saying stories like this only occur in the flicks,” Quan said during his big moment Sunday. “I cannot consider it’s happening to me. That is the American dream.”
His co-star, Malaysian actor Michelle Yeoh, took the award for best actress after a decent race against heavyweights like Cate Blanchett (Tár) and Michelle Williams (The Fabelmans).
While Yeoh has had a successful profession in Hong Kong cinema, she has spoken of her struggle to realize acceptance in Hollywood, turning down stereotypical roles for Asian women, and facing racism and ageism. Every thing In all places stars Yeoh as a struggling Chinese immigrant mother who’s thrown right into a wild multiverse where only she will be able to save humanity’s existence.
“That is proof that dreams dream big, and dreams do come true. And ladies, don’t ever let anybody inform you you are past your prime,” said Yeoh, the first woman of Southeast Asian descent (and the second-ever woman of color behind Halle Berry in 2002) to win the best-actress award. Yeoh kissed her golden statuette.
Jamie Lee Curtis, who won best supporting actress for Every thing In all places (beating out co-star Stephanie Hsu), yelled, “Shut up!” in surprise after her name was called out. She got emotional as she dedicated the win to her parents, movie stars Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis.
“My mother and my father were each nominated for Oscars in several categories,” Curtis said, looking up with tears in her eyes. “I just won an Oscar.”
An enormous night for Team Canada
The massive Canadian Oscar winners included actor Brendan Fraser, director Sarah Polley, prosthetics designer Adrien Morot and documentary filmmaker Daniel Roher.
Fraser’s awards success has been partly driven by his remarkable Hollywood comeback story. The actor, a movie star through the Nineties and early 2000s, has alleged he was sexually assaulted by the previous president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association in 2003 after which blacklisted from the industry.
It wasn’t until The Whale that Fraser made a high-profile return to filmmaking. During his speech, he thanked director Darren Aronofsky “for throwing me a creative lifeline and hauling me aboard the nice ship The Whale.”
“I began on this business 30 years ago and things didn’t come easy to me,” Fraser told audience. “There was a facility that I didn’t appreciate on the time until it stopped, and I just wish to say thanks for this acknowledgment since it couldn’t be refrained from my solid.”
During her acceptance speech, Polley, who won best adapted screenplay for Women Talking, a screen version of the 2018 novel by Canadian writer Miriam Toews, thanked Toews for writing “a vital novel a couple of radical act of democracy.”
Toronto director Daniel Roher won best documentary film for Navalny and Montreal prosthetics designer Adrien Morot took an Oscar for his work on The Whale.
While Canadian director James Cameron didn’t attend the ceremony — “you already know a show is just too long when even James Cameron cannot sit through it,” Kimmel joked during his monologue — his visual effects team thanked him while accepting the award for Avatar: The Way of Water.
Naatu Naatu in highlight before songwriter’s win
Every awards show must have an iconic dance break, and this yr’s was supplied by RRR, the Telugu-language Indian blockbuster that blew away audiences from around the globe with its massive scope, vibrant design and epic storytelling.
The explosive centrepiece performance of Naatu Naatu, which won the Oscar for best original song and have become a viral hit, was performed on the stage with dancers snapping their suspenders as they executed the movie’s high-concept choreography.
The moment was a refreshing and electrifying taste of South Asian cinema at the Oscars. Not long after, the film won best original song, resulting in certainly one of the night’s most memorable speeches as songwriter M.M. Keeravani sang his acceptance speech to the tune of the Carpenters’ Top of the World: “RRR has to win, pride of each Indian and must put me on the highest of the world.”