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Oscars 2011: highs and lows Of course, the high point of the Oscars night was the success of The King’s Speech. Out of 12 nominations the British film one four, including Best Picture. coach purses Colin Firth won his first Oscar for his role as King George VI, “I have a feeling my career has just peaked,” he said with typically deadpan delivery. He dedicated the award to his wife, Livia, “for putting up with my fleeting delusions of royalty,” he added. Tom Hooper won Best Director and talked again of the “triangle of man love” he has formed with Firth and Geoffrey Rush. Hopper made a touching speech about his mother - who attended a fringe theatre reading of an unknown play called The King’s Speech in 2007. She rang Hooper when she got home and said, “Tom, I think I’ve found your next film.” The British presence on the red carpet provided a few less earnest moments too: Dame Helen Mirren’s curves; Russell Brand who bought is mother, “Babs”; Christian Bale’s cockney accent and Helena Bonham Carter’s devil-may-care attitude to the whole affair. “I thought it would be nice to celebrate film rather than fashion,” Bonham Carter said of the constant scrutiny of her red carpet fashions this awards season. Unfortunately she lost out the Best Supporting Actress award to Melissa Leo (The Fighter), who dropped the f-word spectacularly during the live telecast. 2011 coach outlet “Bloody hell... what the hell am I doing here,” said Christian Bale after winner Best Supporting Actor also for The Fighter. Best screenplay went to David Seidler of The King’s Speech, “My father always said I would be a late bloomer, I believe I am the oldest person to win this award,” he said. (He was born in 1937). Natalie Portman, heavily pregnant, won the Best Actress award for her role as a psychologically disturbed ballerina in Black Swan. James Franco and Anne Hathaway, the youngest ever Academy Awards hosts, fell flat with their opening monologue in which they entered Alec Baldwin’s dreams to learn the secret to hosting the awards. It seemed Baldwin wasn’t eager to give it up. At one point, Franco appeared on stage in drag, as Marilyn Monroe, in pink taffeta: “I just got a text message from Charlie Sheen,” he said. But there’s no getting away from the fact that it was a turgid, more than three hour-long slog through the year’s best movies. It was rumoured Banksy (his documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop, was nominated but didn’t win) was going to turn up in a gorilla suit: now, that would have been worth waiting up for. coach outlet 2011