LOS ANGELES — The Coen brothers completed their journey from the fringes to Hollywood’s mainstream Sunday, their crime saga “No Country for Old Men” winning four Academy Awards, including best picture.
Javier Bardem won for supporting actor in “No Country,” which earned Joel and Ethan Coen best-director, best- adapted-screenplay and the best- picture honor as producers.
Accepting the directing honor alongside his brother, Joel Coen recalled how they were making films since childhood.
“What we do now doesn’t feel that much different from what we were doing then,” Joel Coen said. “We’re very thankful to all of you out there for continuing to let us play in our corner of the sandbox.”
Daniel Day-Lewis won his second best-actor Academy Award, for the oil-boom epic “There Will Be Blood,” while “La Vie En Rose” star Marion Cotillard was a surprise winner for best actress, riding the spirit of Edith Piaf to Oscar triumph over Julie Christie, who had been expected to win for “Away From Her.”
All four acting prizes went to Europeans: Frenchwoman Cotillard, Spaniard Bardem, and Brits Day-Lewis and Tilda Swinton, the supporting-actress winner for “Michael Clayton.”
“My deepest thanks to the academy for whacking me with the handsomest bludgeon in town,” said Day-Lewis, who played a raging, conniving, acquisitive petroleum pioneer caught up in California’s oil boom of the early 20th century.
Cotillard, the first winner ever for a French-language performance, tearfully thanked her director, Olivier Dahan. A relatively fresh face in Hollywood, Cotillard has U.S. credits that include “Big Fish,” “A Good Year” and the upcoming “Public Enemies,” featuring Johnny Depp and Christian Bale.
“I have an American agent who is the spitting image of this,” said Swinton, fondly looking at her Oscar statuette.
“Really, truly, the same shape head, and it has to be said, the buttocks. And I’m giving this to him, because there’s no way I’d be in America at all, ever, on a plane if it wasn’t for him,” said Swinton, who played a malevolent attorney in “Michael Clayton.”
Bardem won for his fearsome turn as an unshakable executioner in “No Country.”
“Thank you to the Coens for being crazy enough to think I could do that and for putting one of the most horrible haircuts in history over my head,” said Bardem, referring to the sinister variation of a page-boy bob his character sported.
Comedian and Oscar host Jon Stewart joked about this year’s crop of “Oscar-nominated psychopathic killer movies.”
“Does this town need a hug? What happened? ‘No Country For Old Men,’ ‘Sweeney Todd,’ ‘There Will Be Blood?’ All I can say is, thank God for teen pregnancy. I think the country agrees,” Stewart said, referring to best-picture nominee “Juno.”
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