Disney’s Searchlight studio takes top Oscar

Walt Disney Co’s Searchlight Pictures won the best picture trophy for “Nomadland” at the Oscars on Sunday, the fourth time in eight years the studio has collected the film industry’s most prestigious honor.

The victory for “Nomadland” left Netflix Inc without the top Academy Award for the third straight year. Two of its movies, “The Trial of the Chicago 7” and “Mank,” had been nominated for best picture in a year when pandemic-sheltered audiences turned to streaming services for entertainment.

Netflix, which eclipsed rivals ahead of the ceremony with 36 nominations, took home a leading seven statuettes including best documentary for “My Octopus Teacher.” “Mank,” a black-and-white film about the writing of movie classic “Citizen Kane,” won for production design and cinematography.

“Nomadland,” the story of van dwellers who travel from job to job to make ends meet, also claimed the best director honor for Chloe Zhao and best actress for Frances McDormand.

The movie debuted in theaters in February and was also streamed on Disney-owned Hulu as many cinemas remained closed.

As she accepted her award, McDormand made a plea for audiences to head back to theaters as soon as they can.

“One day, very soon, take everyone you know into a theater, shoulder to shoulder in that dark space, and watch every film that’s represented here,” she said on the Oscars stage.

For Searchlight, its success in the top category has been unmatched since 2014, the year it won best picture for “12 Years a Slave” followed by “Birdman” in 2015 and “The Shape of Water” in 2018.

No other studio has claimed the prize more than once during that time.

Disney acquired Searchlight in 2019 when it bought most of the film and TV businesses owned by Rupert Murdoch’s 20th Century Fox. Some Hollywood filmmakers have worried that Disney, which focuses on big franchises such as Marvel and Star Wars, might not remain committed to the adult dramas that are Searchlight’s specialty.

But Disney Executive Chairman Bob Iger recently told The New York Times that the company plans for Searchlight “to play a big part in supplying content” for theaters and Disney’s streaming platforms. Longtime Searchlight executives Steve Gilula and Nancy Utley announced their retirement last week.

Also on Sunday, Disney’s Pixar studio received two awards for “Soul” including best animated movie.

“Sound of Metal,” offered by Amazon Prime, won two awards.

Warner Bros., owned by AT&T Inc, took three awards including two for “Judas and the Black Messiah.”

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Reinvented Oscars hands ‘Nomadland’ win on diversity-packed night

Nomadland,” the story of van dwellers in America, won the best picture Oscar and two other Academy Awards on a triumphant night for women that also saw a return to Hollywood glamour after a long pandemic shutdown.

In a major upset, Britain’s Anthony Hopkins won the best actor trophy for his role as a man battling dementia in “The Father.” The Oscar had been widely expected to go to the late Chadwick Boseman for his final film, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.”

China native Chloe Zhao was named best director for Searchlight Pictures’ “Nomadland,” making her the first Asian woman and only the second woman ever to take home the trophy. Kathryn Bigelow was the first in 2010.

Zhao thanked the nomadic community for “teaching us the power of resilience and hope and reminding us what true kindness looks like.”

Frances McDormand, one of the few professionals in the film in which several people played versions of themselves, won her third Oscar.

Social distancing forced a rethink of the ceremony, moving it to Union Station in downtown Los Angeles.

After strict COVID-19 testing and quarantine protocols, nominees and their guests walked the red carpet, mostly maskless. They sat in a cabaret-style room inside the Mission Revival-style rail station or chatted in an outdoor courtyard.

The prospect of all four acting honors going to people of color for the first time was not realized. But 15 women won a record 17 Oscars, the Film Academy said, including for sound (“Sound of Metal”), production design (“Mank”), original screenplay (“Promising Young Woman”) and documentary feature (“My Octopus Teacher.”)

The national reckoning about systemic racism in the United States was also a theme following the murder conviction last week of a white police officer who knelt on the neck of Black man George Floyd.

“As a mother of a black son, I know the fear that so many live with, and no amount of fame or fortune changes that,” said Regina King, who directed “One Night in Miami,” about four black icons at the height of the 1960s civil rights movement.

Youn Yuh-jung, 73, won the best supporting actress Oscar for her role as a cantankerous grandmother in immigrant tale “Minari.”

Youn, the first South Korean actor or actress to win an Oscar, joked about people mispronouncing her name.

“Tonight you are all forgiven,” she said. “Me being here, I cannot believe it.”

The ceremony for the highest honors in the movie business took place after a turbulent year for the industry that shuttered production and movie theaters for months and saw studios delay the release of some blockbusters by more than a year.

“This was indeed a hard year for everyone, but our love for movies helped to get us through it,” said presenter King, opening the ceremony, which had no host for the third straight year.

McDormand made a passionate plea for people to return to theaters.

“One day, very soon, take everyone you know into a theater, shoulder to shoulder in that dark space, and watch every film that’s represented here,” she said.

Britain’s Daniel Kaluuya was named best supporting actor for his role as 1960s Black Panther activist Fred Hampton in “Judas and the Black Messiah.”

The movie “Soul,” the first from Disney’s Pixar to feature a black lead character, won best animated feature, while Denmark’s “Another Round” took the prize for best international feature.

The winners were chosen in a secret ballot by the 9,000 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

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Source: Reuters