Want to get this list of winners up as quickly as possible – for those with two-year-old children who didn’t let them watch the awards right through today/tonight – but first of all can I just say, wow! I choked up when Kathryn Bigelow’s name was read out as Best Director for “The Hurt Locker”. A well-deserved win for a filmmaker whose career I’ve been following for about two decades now – kicking off with 1982′s “The Loveless” starring a then-unknown Willem Dafoe, “Near Dark”, one of my favourite horror films of all time, and later with the little-seen but hugely fun “Blue Steel” starring Jamie Lee Curtis and (the late, great) Ron Silver, perennial popcorn favourite “Point Break”, and of course, the underrated science-fiction epic “Strange Days” which, despite what some critics said at the time, offered much more than a crotch-shot of Juliette Lewis. And now, of course, Bigelow’s made her most accomplished and most meaningful (not to take anything away from Bodhi’s mission to ride the biggest wave) film of her career. Just awesome.

Awesome just as proud to see Jeff Bridges, Lloyd’s boy, finally get the recognition he so richly deserves. His performance in “Crazy Heart” is magnificent – but then, Jeff has always been fab. From “The Last Picture Show”, “Kiss Me Goodbye”, “Starman” to “Tron”, “The Fisher King”, and, of course, “The Big Lebowski”, ‘the dude’ has been pumping up fine turn after fine turn. Saluting you sir!

Here’s the Winners (Winner in Italics) :

Best Picture

An Education

A Serious Man

Avatar

District 9

Inglourious Basterds

The Hurt Locker

Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

The Blind Side

Up

Up In The Air

Best Director

James Cameron for Avatar

Jason Reitman for Up In The Air

Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker

Lee Daniels for Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Quentin Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds

Best Actor

Colin Firth for A Single Man

George Clooney for Up In The Air

Jeff Bridges for Crazy Heart

Jeremy Renner for The Hurt Locker

Morgan Freeman for Invictus

Best Actress

Carey Mulligan for An Education

Gabourey Sidibe for Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Helen Mirren for The Last Station

Meryl Streep for Julie and Julia

Sandra Bullock for The Blind Side

Best Supporting Actor

Christopher Plummer for The Last Station

Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds

Matt Damon for Invictus

Stanley Tucci for The Lovely Bones

Woody Harrelson for The Messenger

Best Supporting Actress

Anna Kendrick for Up In The Air

Maggie Gyllenhaal for Crazy Heart

Mo’Nique for Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Penelope Cruz for Nine

Vera Farmiga for Up In The Air

Best Original Screenplay

Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman for The Messenger

Joel and Ethan Coen for A Serious Man

Mark Boal for The Hurt Locker

Pete Docter, Bob Peterson for Up

Quentin Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds

Best Adapted Screenplay

Geoffrey Fletcher for Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner for Up in the Air

Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci and Tony Roche for In the Loop

Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell for District 9

Nick Hornby for An Education

Best Foreign Language Film

Ajami

El Secreto de Sus Ojos

The Milk of Sorrow

A Prophet

The White Ribbon

Best Animated Feature

Coraline

Fantastic Mr Fox

The Princess and the Frog

The Secret of Kells

Up

Best visual effects

Avatar

District 9

Star Trek

Best sound editing

Avatar

The Hurt Locker

Inglourious Basterds

Star Treks

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Best sound mixing

Avatar

The Hurt Locker

Inglourious Basterds

Star Trek

Up

Best short film (live action)

The Door

Instead of Abracadabra

Kavi

Miracle Fish

The New Tenants

Best short film (animated)

French Roast

Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty

The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte)

Logorama

Wallace and Gromit in A Matter of Loaf and Death

Best original song

Almost There from The Princess and the Frog

Down in New Orleans from The Princess and the Frog

Lain de Paname from Paris 36

Take It All from Nine

The Weary Kind from Crazy Heart

Best original score

James Horner for Avatar

Alexandre Desplat for Fantastic Mr Fox

Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders for The Hurt Locker

Hans Zimmer for Sherlock Holmes

Michael Giacchino for Up

Best makeup

Il Divo

Star Trek

The Young Victoria

Best film editing

Avatar

District 9

The Hurt Locker

Inglourious Basterds

Precious: Based on the novel Push by Sapphire

Best documentary short

China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province

The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardiner

The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant

Music by Prudence

Rabbit a la Berlin

Best documentary feature

Burma VJ

The Cove

Food, Inc

The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers

Which Way Home

Best costume design

Bright Star

Coco Before Chanel

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Nine

The Young Victoria

Best cinematography

Avatar

The Hurt Locker

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Inglourious Basterds

The White Ribbon

Best art direction

Avatar

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Nine

Sherlock Holmes

The Young Victoria