From Ellen Degeneres’ selfie to Gwyneth Paltrow’s acceptance speech: Ten most memorable moments from Oscar history

The Hurt Locker triumphed the over the 3D blockbuster Avatar, directed by Bigelow’s former husband, James Cameron.

9. On March 5, 1973, Marlon Brando declined the Academy Award for Best Actor for his gut-wrenching performance as Vito Corleone in “The Godfather” – for a very unexpected reason.

On the eve of the 45th Academy Awards, Brando announced that he would boycott the ceremony and send Sacheen Littlefeather in his place. A little-known actress, she was then-president of the National Native American Affirmative Image Committee.

On the evening of March 5, when Liv Ullman and Roger Moore read out the name of the Best Actor award recipient, neither presenter parted their lips in a smile. Their gaze fell on a woman in Apache dress, whose long, dark hair bobbed against her shoulders as she climbed the stairs.
Moore extended the award to Littlefeather, who waved it away with an open palm. She set a letter down on the podium, introduced herself, and said:

“I’m representing Marlon Brando this evening and he has asked me to tell you … that he very regretfully cannot accept this very generous award. And the reasons for this being are the treatment of American Indians today by the film industry -”

The crowd booed. Littlefeather looked down and said “excuse me.” Others in the audience began to clap, cheering her on. She continued only briefly, to “beg” that her appearance was not an intrusion and that they will “meet with love and generosity” in the future.

Watch the scene unfold:

8. Sandra Bullock achieves something unique. The peppy actress won both a Razzie, for ‘All About Steve’, and an Oscar, for ‘The Blind Side’, in the same year, 2010.

7. In 2003, when Adrien Brody won Best Actor for his stunning performance in ‘The Pianist’, he took full advantage of his shining moment when he collected the statue and stole a 6-second long kiss from presenter Halle Berry.

6. In 2001, Halle Berry and Denzel Washington won the coveted award in the same year. While Halle Berry, who won the award for ‘Monster’s Ball’, became the first African American woman, Washington became the second African American actor to win best actor for his role in ‘Training Day’.

5. It was hard not to laugh when Jennifer Lawrence famously tripped over the stairs, attempting to get on stage to collect her Best Actress award for Silver Linings Playbook.

What was even more endearing was her response to the press later, when asked what was going through her head when she fell.

“What was going through my mind when I fell?

“A bad word that I can’t say, that starts with ‘f’!”

4. The 1998 Oscars saw an impressive statue sweep from James Cameron and his ridiculously successful film Titanic.

The director signed off by screaming that infamous Leo DiCaprio line… “I’m king of the world!”

3. In 2010, as soon as Jack Nicholson announced Gwyneth Paltrow had bagged Best Actress for her role in ‘Shakespeare in Love’, the actress burst into floods of happy tears and what happened next, see it for yourself:

2. In 1980, Dustin Hoffman accepted his coveted token with appropriate solemnity. He patiently endured an extended ovation, and spoke for just over three minutes, starting off with a pair of jokes and going serious from there on out and delivered one of the best acceptance speeches of all time.

1. This is the year when “selfie” entered Hollywood.

Oscar host Ellen DeGeneres gathered an array of A-Listers including Meryl Streep, Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, uploading it straight to Twitter.

By 6am it had been retweeted more than two million times and broke the record set by President Barack Obama as the most retweeted post EVER.

(With IANS Inputs)