Home » Film & TV » Academy Awards » First Recap of the 71st Academy Awards 1999

First Recap of the 71st Academy Awards 1999

© Nicholas Moreau

Well, Oscar 71 has come and gone, and it will certainly go down in the record books as one of the most unpredictable and surprising. The Oscar telecast this year clocked in at 4 hours and 2 minutes, setting a new record as the longest Oscar telecast in history.

But what will be remembered most is the surprising win of Shakespeare in Love taking the coveted Best Picture award over what had been the front runner ever since it came out, Steven Spielberg's war epic Saving Private Ryan. Harvey Weinstein's Miramax campaigning for Shakespeare worked, and that film was clearly in the Academy's mind when they did their voting. Shakespeare not only won Best Picture, but walked off with six other Oscars, including three majors, Best Actress-Gwyneth Paltrow, Supporting Actress-Judi Dench, and Original Screenplay.

Spielberg's Private Ryan amazingly only won one major, that for Best Director, giving Spielberg his second Best Director award. It won four other Oscars, but all in technical categories, clearly showing how technically accomplished the film was, winning for Cinematography, Sound, Sound Effects Editing, and Film Editing. But it was still such a shock when Harrison Ford opened the Best Picture envelope to read Shakespeare in Love instead of Ryan, especially after Spielberg took Best Director.

It was the first time since 1989 that the Best Picture and Best Director differed ... in 1989, it was Driving Miss Daisy taking Best Picture, and Oliver Stone winning Director for Born on the Fourth of July. But that win was still not as much of a surprise as Shakespeare's win.

The only other multiple Oscar winner was Roberto Benigni and his Holocaust film, Life is Beautiful. It won for Foreign Film, Dramatic Music Score, and Best Actor. The Best Actor win made Benigni only the second person to ever win a leading acting award for a foreign language performance. And as expected, his acceptance of both awards was hilarious and memorable.

Elizabeth won for Makeup, What Dreams May Come deservingly won for Visual Effects, James Coburn won Supporting Actor for Affliction, which was also somewhat of a surprise. In another upset, Gods and Monsters was voted the year's Best Adapted Screenplay. And "When You Believe," the song from Prince of Egypt, won for Original Song.

This year's Oscars did have some interesting moments.

Host Whoopi Goldberg came out dressed as Queen Elizabeth (the African Queen) and did a pretty good job of hosting. She seemed genuinely comfortable with her third stint as host.

The copyright of the article First Recap of the 71st Academy Awards 1999 in Academy Awards is owned by . Permission to republish First Recap of the 71st Academy Awards 1999 in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.