Top

Academy Award Winners 2012

February 28, 2012 by · Comments Off on Academy Award Winners 2012 

Academy Award Winners 2012, “The Artist” won the Academy Award for best motion picuture on Sunday. Meryl Streep joined a very exclusive club, winning her third acting Oscar for her role as a strident Margaret Thatcher in “The Iron Lady.”

Streep played the British prime minister as a senile retiree, as well as a hectoring, dominant figure who instilled fear and respect in her own cabinet. At the film’s pinnacle, Streep as Thatcher is the backbone of a nation that goes to war over the distant Falkland Islands after Argentina invades in 1982.

Streep, 62, won best actress for her 17th Oscar nomination, the most times any performer has been nominated by the Academy.

Her third win put her in a category with other three-time Oscar winners Jack Nicholson, Walter Brennan and Ingrid Bergman. Only Katharine Hepburn with four wins had more.

Jean Dujardin has earned the best-actor Academy Award for “The Artist,” becoming the only performer to win an Oscar for a silent-film role since the first year of the awards 83 years ago.

Dujardin became the first Frenchman to win an acting Oscar. French actresses have won before, including Marion Cotillard and Juliette Binoche.

The film’s creator, Michel Hazanavicius, won the directing Oscar. Claiming Hollywood’s top-filmmaking honor Sunday completes Hazanavicius’ sudden rise from popular movie-maker back home in France to internationally celebrated director.

The supporting-actor prize Sunday went to “Beginners” co-star Christopher Plummer, who became the oldest acting winner ever at 82. Veteran bit player Octavia Spencer earned the supporting-actress prize for her breakout role in “The Help.”

Hazanavicius had come in as the favorite after winning at the Directors Guild of America Awards, whose recipient almost always goes on to claim the Oscar.

But his win remained uncertain given the lineup of established filmmakers he was up against: past winners and nominees Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, Terrence Malick and Alexander Payne.

Bottom