And the winner is...

Slumdog Millionaire and its impressive eight Academy Awards including, of course, Best Picture of the year.

No real surprises tonight.  Slumdog won in 8 of the 10 prizes it was nominated for, losing only to itself in original song and The Dark Knight in sound editing (poetic justice?).

Sean Penn takes home his second best actor award and Kate Winslet got her first.  Penelope Cruz and Heath Ledger won the supporting trophies, with Ledger's parents and sister accepting the Oscar on his behalf.

I loved watching the shots of all the actors' reactions to Heath Ledger's win. I enjoyed how Danny Boyle got more excited for the other Slumdog winners than he did for himself.  Hugh Jackman did great (though am I alone in thinking everyone I've seen host recently did a good job?).  And does anyone know when Sophia Loren turned into a zombie? I was worried she was going to feast on Kate's brains.

The one upset of the night was the Japanese movie Departures beating out both Waltz with Bashir and The Class in the foreign film category.  I believe this category is so hard to predict because so few of them are seen until voting time. How else could a movie like Pan's Labyrinth two years ago, nominated six times over and winner of three Oscars, lose the prize for best foreign film? And a movie like City of God still flies completely under the radar.