For much of the evening, the Kodak Theatre seemed like the United Nations.
Until "No Country for Old Men" took the final two awards of the evening, it was beginning to look like the U.S. was "No Country for Oscar Winners."
In an Oscar convocation with the least xenophobic results in years, the Kodak Theatre seemed more like a meeting at the U.N. than an awards show.
It was a triumphant night for the French (
Marion Cotillard, the "La Vie En Rose" makeup artists, the live-action short winner "Le Mozart Des Pickpockets"); the Italians ("Sweeney Todd's" Dante Ferretti in art direction, Dario Marianelli for "Atonement's" music); the English (
Tilda Swinton,
Daniel Day-Lewis, numerous tech winners); the Irish ("Once" for song); the Austrians ("Counterfeiters" for foreign film); Spain (
Javier Bardem) and others we have probably overlooked.
In fact, the 80th Oscars nearly made history with four foreign-born acting winners drinking the milk shakes off their American counterparts by sweeping all four thesping categories (Cotillard, Day-Lewis, Swinton and Bardem) with Marion Cotillard following Sophia Loren to become only the second actress ever to win for a foreign-language performance.
The only other year that Oscar dug the foreign acting contingent as much was 1964, when Brits Rex Harrison, Julie Andrews, Peter Ustinov and Russian Lila Kedrova all grabbed the top acting honors.
There really were no huge surprises among the major winners, even though most pundits were predicting
Julie Christie to win for lead actress in "Away From Her." However, it became abundantly clear in talking to voters in the last week that "La Vie En Rose" was finally being seen in big numbers by the academy, which was translating into a surge of votes for Cotillard. The French star rode the wave of Golden Globe (for whatever that was worth this year) and L.A. Film Critics awards when Picturehouse decided she needed to come to L.A. and "work it" for a month during the key voting period.
She was everywhere. She did several Q&As which drew thunderous applause when she appeared in person at the end, a 32-year-old beauty who transformed herself (with the help of newly minted Oscar-winning makeup artists) into the essence of the great French chanteuse Edith Piaf, who died in her 40s looking like an 80-year-old woman.
Picturehouse chief Bob Berney helped engineer the same trick for Charlize Theron in 2003 when that 32-year-old stunner (less than two months older than Cotillard) deglammed and disappeared into the skin of serial killer Aileen Wournos and also won a best actress Oscar. That victory also toppled the plans of another veteran: Diane Keaton in "Something's Gotta Give," who like Christie was going for a second statuette in the category.
Come to think of it, we recall Theron telling us at her CineVegas tribute in June that if Cotillard didn't win the Oscar for "La Vie" (which she had just seen) there would be "no justice."
The season took several turns, and Christie emerged with a lot of precursor awards and front-runner status. But Cotillard's personal touch in the final weeks of the race helped turn the tide and get academy voters to watch.
The L.A. visit was key. It may only have been a few votes between them in the end.
She's had a hell of a run, winning BAFTA two weeks ago in Christie's backyard, and then grabbing the French Oscar -- the Cesar award -- Friday night in Paris.
When we caught up with her late Saturday night after she was being chatted up by Steven Spielberg, she seemed a radiant combination of joy and jet lag.
"I feel like I am just floating on a beautiful cloud right now," she told us.
Tonight "floating" turned into "soaring."
