Oscars 2006: The Winners and Losers

Well, the Oscars have come and gone quicker than a patron paying to see Date Movie. Another year of hype and controversy. From Gay cowboys to Geisha's and their memoirs, there was little terrain this year's pick of the litter didn't cover or explore.

And the results are in...

Our big hope, Heath Ledger, unfortunately was trumped as the Aussie of the moment, with only one win for our nation to drool our collective film going mouths over. The relatively unknown Queenslander Dion Beebe took home our only Oscar for the night with Achievment in Cinematography for Memoirs of a Geisha.

Beebe has been steadily working in Hollywood for the last few years, displaying her wares on the Tom Cruise hit Collateral (2004) and the Oscar hit musical Chicago (2002).

The night opened extravegantly with host Jon Stewart (The Daily Show) in fine form, and the nights first winner - former TV doctor George Clooney taking out the Best Supporting Actor for Syriana. In his acceptance speech, Clooney was once again the prince of modesty when talking of his new title:

"There's alot of weight that comes with an Oscar...It's a title that will attach itself to my name..."Oscar Winner George Clooney"...Sexiest Man Alive 1997 and Batman".

Peter Jackson's box office sleeper King Kong swept up the technical awards for Visual Effects and Sound. No doubt this won't be the last we see of the Lord of the Rings director at the Oscars. While Jackson may often steal the limelight with his gorilla's and hobbits, Memoirs of a Geisha proved to be one of the surprise packets of this year's proceedings taking out three statues including Costume Design, Art Direction, and of course our new favourite Aussie pal Dion Beebe for Cinematography.

Fans of those two cheese loving claymation puppets Wallace and Gromit wern't dissapointed and neither was their creator Nick Park, who took home the gong for best animated film of the year, whose smile was about as permantly fixed to his face as his puppet pal Wallace. 

Another star with an unbreakable grin was surprise Best Actress winner Reese Witherspoon who won for her performance as country singer June Carter in the Johnny Cash biopic Walk The Line.

However, the reason the kids tune in are for the big three.  And never has the competition been so fierce, with a bitter tug of war between outright favourite Best Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman and Aussie Heath Ledger. And on this occasion, the little cowboy that could didn't stand a chance against an all conquering Hoffman who has taken a clean sweep of awards this season for his portrayl of troubled writer Truman Capote taking out Best Actor for Capote.  

However Brokeback Mountain didn't go home empty handed, with Best director going to Ang Lee finally winning back the respect of the critics after his widely panned efforts on the 2003 big budget flop, Hulk. Unfortuantely for Ang, Brokeback Mountain wasn't strong enough to take out the Best Picture statue, although it was widely tipped to do so.

In fact, it was the story of racial backgrounds colliding in Crash, which took the honours as the best film of 2006. But how could you not expect a film which has Miss Congieniality's Sandra Bullock spraying racial slurs like a lawn sprinkler sprays water to win?

Another fine year, some fine performances... And now it all starts again!

THE WINNER IS...

Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

George Clooney

SYRIANA

Achievement in Visual Effects

Joe Letteri, Brian Van't Hul, Christian Rivers and Richard Taylor

KING KONG

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year

Nick Park and Steve Box

WALLACE & GROMIT IN THE CURSE OF THE WERE-RABBIT

Best Live Action Short Film

Martin McDonagh

SIX SHOOTER

Best Animated Short Film

John Canemaker and Peggy Stern

THE MOON AND THE SON: AN IMAGINED CONVERSATION

Achievement in Costume Design

Colleen Atwood

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA

Achievement in Makeup

Howard Berger and Tami Lane

THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE

Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

Rachel Weisz

THE CONSTANT GARDENER

Best Documentary Short Subject

Corinne Marrinan and Eric Simonson

A NOTE OF TRIUMPH: THE GOLDEN AGE OF NORMAN CORWIN

Best Documentary Feature

Luc Jacquet and Yves Darondeau

MARCH OF THE PENGUINS

Achievement in Art Direction

John Myhre (Art Direction); Gretchen Rau (Set Decoration)

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA

Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Score)

Gustavo Santaolalla

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

Achievement in Sound Mixing

Christopher Boyes, Michael Semanick, Michael Hedges and Hammond Peek

KING KONG

Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Song)

Music and Lyric by Jordan Houston, Cedric Coleman and Paul Beauregard

"IT'S HARD OUT HERE FOR A PIMP" FROM HUSTLE & FLOW

Achievement in Sound Editing

Mike Hopkins and Ethan Van der Ryn

KING KONG

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year

South Africa

TSOTSI

Achievement in Film Editing

Hughes Winborne

CRASH

Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

Philip Seymour Hoffman

CAPOTE

Achievement in Cinematography

Dion Beebe

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA

Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

Reese Witherspoon

WALK THE LINE

Adapted Screenplay

Screenplay by Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

Original Screenplay

Screenplay by Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco; Story by Paul Haggis

CRASH

Achievement in Directing

Ang Lee

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

Best Motion Picture of the Year

Paul Haggis and Cathy Schulman

CRASH