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The Coen brothers completed their journey
from the fringes to Hollywood's mainstream on Sunday, their crime
saga "No Country for Old Men" winning four Academy Awards,
including best picture, in a ceremony that also featured a strong
international flavor.

      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, including one
at the Minneapolis airport called "Henry Kissinger: Man on the
Go."

      "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."

      As a raging, conniving, acquisitive petroleum pioneer caught up
in California's oil boom of the early 20th century, Day-Lewis won
for a part that could scarcely have been more different than his
understated role as a writer with severe cerebral palsy in 1989's
"My Left Foot."

      "My deepest thanks to the academy for whacking me with the
handsomest bludgeon in town," Day-Lewis said.

      The Coens missed out on a chance to make Oscar history - four
wins for a single film - when they lost the editing prize, for
which they were nominated under the pseudonym Roderick Jaynes.

      "The Bourne Ultimatum" won the editing Oscar and swept all
three categories in which it was nominated, including sound editing
and sound mixing.

      Past winners for their screenplay to 1996's "Fargo," Joel and
Ethan Coen joined an elite list of filmmakers to win three Oscars
in a single night, including Francis Ford Coppola ("The Godfather
Part II"), James Cameron ("Titanic") and Billy Wilder ("The
Apartment").

      Cotillard, the first winner ever for a French-language
performance, tearfully thanked her director, Olivier Dahan.

      "Maestro Olivier, you rocked my life. You have truly rocked my
life," said Cotillard, a French beauty who is a dynamo as Piaf,
playing the warbling chanteuse through three decades, from raw late
teens as a singer rising from the gutter through international
stardom and her final days in her frail 40s.

      "Thank you, life; thank you, love. And it is true there (are)
some angels in this city."

      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.

      With a heartbreaking turn as a woman succumbing to Alzheimer's
in "Away From Her," Christie had been expected to win her second
Oscar. She won best actress 42 years ago for "Darling."

      Heavies ruled the first acting prizes. Along with Day-Lewis'
greedy oilman, Bardem played an unshakable executioner in "No
Country" and Swinton played a malevolent attorney in "Michael
Clayton."

      "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.

      Bardem won for his fearsome turn 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.

      Host Jon Stewart joked that Bardem's haircut in the film
combined "Hannibal Lecter's murderousness with Dorothy Hamill's
wedge-cut."

Gallery

Arts and Culture

It was a big night at the Academy Awards for
St. Louis Park natives Joel and Ethan Coen.

Former residents score big at the Oscars

Go Deeper.

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