‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’ triumphs at the Oscars with seven awards, including best film and directing | This is how we covered the ceremony

Michelle Yeoh, Hollywood's franchise woman

Two actors from The Mummy have won Oscars for Best Lead Actor. This has been a year that has brought back stars who have been in Hollywood for a long time, albeit on the sidelines, both inside and outside of franchises. The most notable is Michelle Yeoh, who has two characters in the Marvel universe, premiered The Witcher series last year, had a starring role in Star Trek: Discovery (and a possible spin-off in its future), stars in The Minions, was a Bond girl (who also wanted to give her own saga) and will appear in the upcoming Avatar, Transformers and Kenneth Branagh's Poirot. A career that has given so much that even had a role in the Netflix sequel to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Also coming soon: American Born Chinese, on Disney+, and with much of the cast of Everything Everywhere at Once: Key Hu Quan, Stephanie Hsu and James Hong.

'Everything Everywhere All at Once' makes it seven out of eleven on the night with Best Picture

Everything Everywhere All at Once is confirmed as the big winner of the 2023 Academy Awards. It won the final award of the evening, Best Picture, which was presented by Harrison Ford, who couldn't be accompanied by Glen Close on this occasion.

Michelle Yeoh wins the Oscar for best actress

Michelle Yeoh wins the Oscar for Best Actress for her role in Everything Everywhere All at Once, becoming the first Asian and second non-white woman to win this category. The statuette was given to her by Halle Berry with whom she shares this honor. After 40 years of career, the actress embarks on this film playing Evelyn, a middle-aged woman who turns out to be the salvation of the multiverse.

Brendan Fraser, best leading actor for 'The Whale'

Brendan Fraser has won the Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role for The Whale. The entire quintet of nominees were making it to the Oscars for the first time. "I wasn't that far away, I'm still here. It's not so easy to get rid of me," he said in Venice, where he won the Volpi Cup for best performance. Decades ago, he was the actor of The mummy, and was not nominated for supporting actor (at the time he deserved it) for Gods and Monsters.

The Daniels, Oscar for best direction with 'Everything Everywhere All at Once'

Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, for their work for 'Everything Everywhere All at Once', won the award for best direction. As much as someone remembers that Spielberg has not won it for 24 years, this was not his edition either. Not since 2017 had an American filmmaker won this award.

What does the blue ribbon worn by Cate Blanchett and Guillermo del Toro mean?

The suits and dresses have become political for one more year. In the same way that happened in 2022, some of the protagonists like Cate Blanchett and Guillermo del Toro wore a blue ribbon to show their support for Ukrainian refugees. In the previous edition, where this detail was much more visible, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) was in charge of distributing these ribbons with the aim of making visible the consequences of the conflict on the civilian population, a tragedy that was a year old a few weeks ago.

All quiet in Daniel Bruhl's triumph

Actor Daniel Brühl was ecstatic in the lobby reserved for the award winners at the Dolby Theater, beer in hand, shortly after the German film in which he acts and of which he is producer, All Quiet on the Western Front, won the statuette for best international film (it would not be the only one, they have four so far). "We are very excited, we are just guys from Berlin," Brühl told EL PAÍS in perfect Spanish (he was born in Barcelona in 1978). The actor has been working for years on the project of adapting Erich Maria Remarque's classic, an anti-war classic of the 20th century and a widely read novel in Germany. Brühl has done it twice: "When I was 15 and in my early twenties," he explained. "My father was into documentaries and made one about Remarque, an important presence at home. It's a book that is a century old but its language is very current. Not to mention the subject matter. When we started the project, we were concerned about the rise of nationalism and populism in Europe. We never knew that a war [in Ukraine] was about to come, which made this adventure even more relevant."

Lady Gaga, no makeup and a trimmed back version of 'Hold my hand'

Lady Gaga, who contributed to the soundtrack of Top Gun: Maverick, decided to sing an almost melodic version of Hold my hand without big dresses, wearing only a t-shirt, torn pants and a clean face. Until yesterday we thought she was not going to perform at the gala, because she said she was too busy shooting the Joker sequel, a musical where she will play Harley Quinn. If she has joined the school of Joaquin Phoenix and the direction of Todd Phillips, she will surely be in a complicated psychological state. Although not as much as when she played Patrizia in The House of Gucci.

Netflix, still in the game... but less than previous years

Netflix has taken home three awards tonight so far, one for Pinocchio and two for All Quiet on the Western Front, although this year it started with much less success at the Oscars than in previous years. In 2021 it had 36 nominations; in 2022, 28 and this year, 16. They had no great film in which to win all the awards, because Iñarritu's Bardo, Blonde and the smash hit Glass Onion didn't make the cut. Apple has already taken away the possibility of being the first platform to win the Best Picture award. Will it invest so much in the Oscars again or will it focus on huge blockbusters from the Russo brothers?

Indian patriotism in Hollywood

The biggest ovation of the theater in a half-hearted gala so far went to the performance of the song Naatu Naatu from the Indian nationalist film RRR, performed by Kala Bhairava, M. M. Keeravani and Rahul Sipligunj. It is the favorite in its category, despite competing with Rihanna and Lady Gaga. It is the first Indian song nominated in the history of the Hollywood awards. Despite the confusion, it is not a Bollywood film, but a Tollywood film, made in Calcutta.

'All Quiet on the Western Front': Best International Feature

Edward Berger's All Quiet on the Western Front wins Best International Film. An award for Netflix. It is the second statuette of the German film, the first one for cinematography. It is the fourth time that Germany wins the category (the last time was with The Lives of Others).

Marvel leaves without its prize

The Marvel Universe had hopes of making its Oscar debut today, beyond special effects and other technical aspects, with an award for Angela Bassett for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, but the actors of Hollywood's most successful studio (which is half the industry) still can't win an Oscar. To earn it, they will have to go to the competition and become the Joker, always good for an award, as Heath Ledger and Joaquin Phoenix did, and perhaps soon Barry Keoghan (now nominated for The Banshees of Inisherin).

'The Whale', Best Makeup and Hairstyling

The Oscar for Best Makeup and Hairstyling went to Adrien Morot, Judy Chin and Annemarie Bradley-Sherron, who built Charlie over Brendan Fraser during five hours a day for The Whale.

A reminder of the suffering of Iranian women

Iranian actress Shohreh Aghdashloo took advantage of her presence at the gala to make a claim: on her dress, designed by Christian Siriano, one could read "Women, Life, Freedom" next to the names of Mahsa Amini, Hajar Abbasi and Nika Shakarami, all victims of the Iranian regime's repression.