Slumdog leads British charge at the Oscars

Slumdog Millionaire swept the board at the Oscars today, scooping eight awards and capping a great night for British talent.

The feelgood film set in the slums of Mumbai took the coveted Best Film and Best Director awards, while Kate Winslet finally won her first Academy Award as she was named Best Actress for her performance in The Reader.

Sean Penn upset the odds to win the Best Actor award, beating favourite Mickey Rourke.

There was a Best Supporting Actor award for Heath Ledger for his role as the Joker in Batman movie The Dark Knight - only the second time an acting Oscar has been given posthumously.

But Hollywood superstar Brad Pitt left empty-handed. His hotly-tipped film The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button picked up just three minor Oscars, for Art Direction, Make-up and Visual Effects.

Winslet, 33, who has endured five unsuccessful nominations in the past, said she had been rehearsing her acceptance since she was a child.

Fantasy

But there was no repeat of the gushing speech she gave on winning two Golden Globes earlier this year.

"I'd be lying if I (said I) hadn't made a version of this before I was eight years old and staring into the bathroom mirror and this (Oscar) would be a shampoo bottle. Only it's not a shampoo bottle now," she said.

"I feel very fortunate to have made it all the way from there to here."

Afterwards, Winslet said she had always believed an Oscar was a fantasy that would never come true.

"I feel like an unlikely hero," she said, "I was not the privileged kid things like this could happen to.

"My mum won a pickled onion competition in the local pub just before Christmas and the Reading Evening Post sent me a picture of her holding her jar.

"Well, Reading Evening Post, here's your next Winslet picture!"

Slumdog's Danny Boyle (pictured above) jumped up and down with delight as he took the Best Director award, then explained his energetic celebration.

"My kids are too young to remember this, but I swore that if this miracle ever happened, I would receive it in the spirit of Tigger from Winnie the Pooh, so that's what that was about," he said.

He thanked the Academy for being "so generous to us tonight".

There was plenty of excitement and enthusiasm but no overwrought Hollywood emotion from the 52-year-old in his acceptance speech.

Instead he thanked the cast and crew and his family.

"Just to say to Mumbai - unending, unseparable, unborn - all of you who helped us make the film and all of you who didn't, thank you so much. You dwarf even this guy," he said.

The rags-to-riches story of an orphan from the Mumbai slums who wins the Indian version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? has swept all before it at other awards ceremonies this year - and the trend continued at the 81st Academy Awards ceremony.

Slumdog's total of eight Oscars - for Best Film, Director, Song, Musical Score, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Film Editing and Sound Mixing - is the best by a British film since the Second World War romance The English Patient took nine in 1997.

The cast and crew of the film - including the child actors from the Mumbai slums - descended on Hollywood for the awards.

Penelope Cruz took the award for Best Supporting Actress for her part in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, and thanked director Woody Allen for "trusting me with this wonderful character".

"Has anybody ever fainted here?" she asked as she collected her Oscar. "I think I might be the first one."

Penn's Best Actor gong was probably the surprise of the night, and he was clearly taken aback.

"You commie, homo-loving sons of guns," Penn said as he received the prize.

Competition was stiff in the category, with Penn up against Rourke, Frank Langella in Frost/Nixon, Pitt for Benjamin Button and Richard Jenkins for The Visitor.

Humbling

The award for Ledger, who died at the age of 28 as a result of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs in New York, was accepted by his parents and sister on behalf of his young daughter Matilda, who, under Academy rules, is the official recipient of the statuette.

His father Kim said: "This is ever so humbling - being amongst such wonderful people and such a wonderful industry.

"This award would have humbly validated Heath's quiet determination to be accepted by you all here - his peers within an industry he loved."

The ceremony took place exactly a year to the day after Ledger's death.

While Winslet and Slumdog will hog the limelight for the coming days, there was glory for other British films, with The Duchess taking the Oscar for Costume Design and Man On Wire, about Phillippe Petit's daredevil high-wire walk between New York's Twin Towers in 1974, being named Best Documentary.

Slumdog's success at awards ceremonies has been matched by its performance at the box office - since opening on January 9 it has taken £21 million in the UK alone.

It enjoyed its own a rags-to-riches ride - it was nearly consigned to the straight-to-DVD pile before being saved by Fox Searchlight, which released the film in cinemas.

Boyle said today's haul was a victory for independent films.

"It's working against the odds," he said. "We've got to protect small films and the studios have to protect them as well."

Prime Minister Gordon Brown hailed a "great night" for Britain in Hollywood.

"I would like to congratulate Danny Boyle and all those who worked on Slumdog Millionaire on winning an incredible eight Academy Awards," he said.

"I was lucky enough to see the film myself and understand how it has captured the imagination of people all over the world. Its success is truly well-deserved.

"Slumdog Millionaire's triumph, together with Kate Winslet winning Best Actress, is a fantastic achievement for the British film industry which is now leading the world in film.

"Last night was a great night for Britain."

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