OSCARS 2011: The King’s Speech and Colin Firth reign supreme, Natalie Portman wins best actress

By
Lizzie Smith and Baz Bamigboye
Last updated at 9:21 AM on 28th February 2011

• The King’s Speech wins best film and best director

• Christian Bale named best supporting actor for The Fighter

• Melissa Leo apologises after using F-word as she accepts best supporting actress for The Fighter

For once Oscars night belonged to a small budget, independent movie that was a labour of love.

The King’s Speech and its star Colin Firth were
the toast of Hollywood last night, winning best film, best actor, best director and
best original screenplay.

And while Natalie
Portman walked tears from her eyes as she celebrated her best actress
win, and Melissa Leo and Christian Bale both won for The Fighter, there
was no doubting the night belonged to the British film.

The Oscar winners: Best supporting actor Christian Bale, best actress Portman, best supporting actress Leo and best actor Firth celebrate backstage at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood

Few in the UK wanted to back The King’s Speech, but a band of
producers and film-makers slashed their usual rates to get it made.

With Film 4
and BBC Films both refusing funding, the UK Film Council put up a large
part of the money, along with London-based Momentum Pictures and Harvey
Weinstein’s Weinstein film company.

As Academy Awards host James Franco noted ‘The King’s Speech
has now become part of Oscar history’.

‘My career has peaked’: Colin Firth had the audience laughing as he picked up his Oscar for best actor

Kiss for the wife: Firth is congratulated by Livia, who he thanked for putting up ‘with my delusions of Royalty’

Firth was nominated last year for Tom Ford’s film A Single Man but lost to Jeff Bridges.

But now it was Firth’s turn to triumph over his once-again nominated rival.

‘I’ve a feeling my career’s just peaked,’ he joked.

Firth thanked, ‘all
the people who have been routing for me back home,’ and his wife,
‘Livia, for putting up with my fleeting delusions of royalty.’

The cast and crew of The King’s Speech: Iain Canning, Emile Sherman and Gareth Unwin, and the producers, celebrate their trophy for Best Picture

The crowd of Oscar nominees and winners watch as Firth gives his thank you speech

Although it was pretty much a given that Firth was going to collect an Oscar for his powerful portrait
of  King George VI, and that David Seidler would win for best
original screenplay,  the wins for best director and best film
weren’t as assured as people believed.

Seidler dedicated his award to ‘all
the stutterers around the world,’ and thanked ‘Her Majesty The Queen for
not putting me in the Tower for using the F word.’

Group effort: Geoffrey Rush congratulates Tom Hooper as he accepts the Oscar for best director

Great night for British film: Tom Hooper accepts
his Oscar for best director as David Seidler accepts best original
screenplay; both for The King’s Speech

Halfway through the ceremony when The Social Network
won for best editing, one of the King’s Speech team exclaimed, ’well
that’s it, we’ve lost it’.

That’s because the best editing win is often, but clearly
not always, seen as a signal to which film will win best film.

But as the evening
wore on Tom Hooper, The King’s Speech’s 38-year-old director, beat rival
David Fincher for best director.

I did it! Natalie Portman wipes away a tear as she accepts her Oscar for best actress for her role in Black Swan at the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles

Congratulations: Dancer Benjamin Millepied embraces his fiancé Natalie as her win is announced

He dedicated the
prestigious gong to his mother. It was she, he revealed, who first
suggested he make the movie, after watching a script read-through of the
stage version.

Hooper said backstage that he would
be out celebrating – but wanted to take it easy because he planned to ‘do’
various TV shows, including the Oprah Winfrey show, in the morning.

’I don’t want to be the first one to appear on the Oprah show drunk,’ he joked.

His win surprised many, who had predicted that David Fincher would win for The Social Network.

Now for her next role: With her first child on the way, Natalie said she wasn’t sure whether she would ever work on another movie like Black Swan

Later Gareth Unwin, one of the three producers
with Iain Canning and Emile Sherman, joked that it was his good luck
charm,  a Union Jack pocket square, that helped them win.

He admitted he ‘borrowed’ the silk
square from a table centre piece at the BAFTA awards in
London two weeks ago.

‘It felt lucky so I took it’, Unwin joked.

The King’s Speech didn’t achieve the sweep that
some had hoped, it was up for twelve Oscars,  but best picture is by anyone’s standards a
pretty nice trophy to take home.

Your honour: Melissa bows to Kirk Douglas as she joins the 94-year-old screen icon onstage

Black
Swan star Portman had showed off her bump in her flowing Rodarte gown
as she walked to the stage to give her acceptance speech.

‘I want to thank my parents,’ she said. ‘First and foremost
for giving me my life. And for the opportunity to work at such a young age.’

The pregnant
actress wiped away a tear as she also thanked her fiancé, who she met
while filming Black Swan, and with whom she is now expecting her first
child.

‘My
beautiful love Benjamin Millepied who choreographed the film and has now given
me my most important role of my life.’

No hard feelings: Amy Adams congratulates Melissa Leo after The Fighter star won the Oscar for best actress

Shock: Leo holds her face in horror after realising she has sworn onstage as Douglas holds her Oscar

Portman said backstage that she was ‘still in a dream-like state’.

She joked that the baby she is carrying started
kicking during the show when the nominated
songs were being sung.

Cross dressers: Anne and Franco swap outfits; Franco joked that he had received a text from Charlie Sheen

Someone asked her if she would be naming her baby
Oscar and she replied that most certainly would not be happening.

Asked how her pregnancy would affect her
future movie choices, she said: ’It’s one of the most exciting
things of being pregnant. I’m just accepting that I have
no idea, it’s accepting what people go through every day.’

Helena Bonham Carter missed out on the best supporting actress Oscar as Melissa Leo won for her work on The Fighter.

New haircut: A freshly shorn Scarlett Johansson and Matthew McConaughey walk on stage to present the Oscar for best sound mixing

The actress kept her disappointment in check as she applauded Leo, alongside fellow nominee, 14-year-old Hailee Steinfeld.

Leo’s
gong was presented to her by 94-year-old screen legend Kirk Douglas,
who happily eked out his moment in the spotlight, having never won
himself.

‘You pinch me?’ Leo asked him, not sure if she was dreaming.

Fellow Australians: Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman arrive on stage to present the Oscar for best original score

No Machine: British singer Florence Welch performs If I Rise from the motion picture 127 Hours, a nominee for best original song

Nominees: Mandy Moore and Gwyneth Paltrow perform tracks nominated for best original song

The Social Network took its first Oscar
for best adapted screenplay – handed to Aaron Sorkin for his adaptation
of the book The Accidental Billionaire by Ben Mezrich.

The film also picked up an
award for best original score, presented to Trent Reznor and Atticus
Ross by Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman.

Inception’s Gary A Rizzo & Ed Novick
won an Oscar for best sound mixing and the film also won for best sound
editing for the work of Richard King. The film took a third for best
cinematography, going to Wally Pfister.

The Oscar for best foreign film went to the movie In a Better World, from Denmark, while the Oscar for makeup went to The Wolfman.

Winner for best foreign language Film, Susan Bier accepts her award for her Danish movie In A Better World

The first award, for art direction, was presented by Tom Hanks to Robert Stromberg (production design) and Karen O’Hara (set decoration) for their work on the 3D movie Alice in Wonderland.

Hanks, a double winner himself, also presented the Oscar for costume design to Colleen Atwood, for her work on the Tim Burton directed movie.

The
winner for best animated short film was The Lost Thing, while the
animated film Oscar was awarded to the considerably bigger budget Toy
Story 3.

‘I’m a married man’: Presenters Russell Brand and Helen Mirren joke around onstage, with Brand implying that Mirren has a crush on him

Presenter Josh Brolin dances with fellow presenter Javier Bardem as they make their way onto stage

Toy Story also won original song for We Belong Together, Music and Lyric by Randy Newman.

Missing
out an an award was British graffiti artist Banksy, for his film Exit
Through The Gift Shop. Instead the Oscar for best documentary feature
went to Inside Job.

The show opened with co-hosts
Anne Hathaway and James Franco inserted into a montage scenes from
best-picture nominees, built as a series of dream sequences a la Oscar
contender Inception.

Hathaway and Franco joked about the criticism over their appointment as hosts.

‘You look so lovely and so hip,’ Anne told James. ‘You look very appealing to a younger demographic as well, ‘ he replied.

Presenter Steven Speilberg, Iain Canning, Emile Sherman and Gareth Unwin, producers of The King’s Speech

There was also some comic relief from the audience as Franco’s grandmother shouted out: ‘I just saw Marky Mark.’

She was of course referring to Mark
Wahlberg, nominated for an Oscar for his role in The Fighter.

The actor
has made every effort to distance himself from his cheesy past as an 80s pop star.

At one stage Franco appeared on stage dressed as Marilyn Monroe.

‘I just got a text message from Charlie Sheen,’ he remarked, referring to the troubled actor.

One to treasure: Rick Baker, left, and Dave Elsey pose with presenter Cate Blanchett after receiving the Oscar for achievement in makeup for The Wolfman

We’ve got Oscars! Lora Hirschberg, Ed Novick, Gary A Rizzo and presenters Matthew McConaughey and Scarlett Johansson pose backstage after Hirschberg, Novick and Rizzo win the Oscar for achievement in sound mixing for Inception