Few surprises on Bigelow's big night

' The Hurt Locker' – and Irishman Richie Baneham – were winners in an Oscar night of mostly agreeably dignified speeches and an odd, no more than glossily competent, ceremony

WE WERE anticipating a nail-biting tussle between James Cameron's Avatarand Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Lockerat the 82nd Academy Awards. For months, the delicious prospect of the most financially lucrative picture ever taking on a film that barely made back its production budget profoundly agitated the world's entertainment journalists. The fact that the directors were once married added spice to the dish. A recent kerfuffle that saw a producer of The Hurt Lockerbanned from the ceremony for badmouthing Avatarby e-mail further heightened the tension.

Well, as events transpired on Sunday morning, The Hurt Lockerended up hammering Avatarinto the ground like a virtual tent peg. By the time the best picture award came round, Bigelow's flick had already picked up five awards – including the vital best director gong – and Cameron looked resigned to defeat. Sure enough, The Hurt Locker, a study of bomb disposal specialists in Iraq, became the first combat film to win the top prize since Platoon in 1986. Avatarmanaged just three Oscars.

In an evening of agreeably dignified speeches, Bigelow refused to get hysterical about becoming the first woman ever to win the Oscar for best director. The hard-boiled action specialist is no mucus-spewing Halle Berry. Sometime director Barbra Streisand, who presented the award, probably expected some guff about "all those people who paved the way. Jane Campion, Sofia Coppola and, of course, you dear, dear Barbra". But Bigelow stuck to thanking her collaborators and – reminding the throng that The Hurt Lockeris no liberal hand-wringer – the American military abroad. She didn't mention Cameron. She found no time to ponder WMDs. You couldn't help but feel that, not for the first time, this singular director was conspicuously refusing to play ball.

The television pictures failed to register any steam spurting from Streisand’s ears.

In truth, there were few massive surprises. Yes, Geoffrey Fletcher overcame marginal front runner Up in the Airin the best adapted screenplay race to become the first African-American to win a writing Oscar. Academy Awards virgins may have viewed the victory in the best foreign-language picture category of The Secret in their Eyes– a modestly regarded Argentinean film – over The White Ribbonand A Prophet,two of the most lauded films of the past decade, as some sort of outrageous upset. But experienced observers have long accepted that this particular award is such a mismanaged, compromised, unfathomable farce that it doesn't even merit derision.

Has there been a year in which the acting awards were so predictable? Every one of the favourites romped home. Christoph Waltz, winner of best supporting actor for his cackling Nazi in Inglourious Basterds,came across as a more amiable class of eccentric at the microphone.

Mo'Nique, triumphant for her searing turn as an abusive mother in Precious, struck a rare abrasive note by thanking the Academy "for showing that it can be about the performance and not the politics".

This was, it seems, a dig at those who had criticised her for not working the chat-show circuit and pumping important hands in the run- up to ceremony.

It would be overstating the case to say that Sandra Bullock looked slightly sheepish when she grasped her best actress Oscar for The Blind Side, but, keeping the tears back until the last few clauses, she, like so many others, showed impressive courage under fire.

American critics greeted that popular American football drama with sniffs, and her award is largely seen as an expression of gratitude for two decades of combat in the romcom trenches.

The most popular acting win was surely that of veteran Jeff Bridges. The son of actor Lloyd Bridges, the great man quite literally sauntered – arms levering – on stage to take the best actor prize for his role as a washed-up country singer in Crazy Heart. "Thank you, Mom and Dad, for turning me on to such a groovy profession," he drawled somewhat in the style of The Dude, his character in the Coen brothers' The Big Lebowski.

By this stage, most of the Irish contingent had resigned itself to an evening of disappointment. Neither Granny O'Grimm's SleepingBeauty, nominated as best animated short, nor The Door, a contender for best live action short, managed to convert their nominations into statuettes. Tomm Moore's The Secret of Kellslost best animated feature to Up, but the film's achievement in receiving a nomination cannot be underestimated. As predicted, Richard Baneham, a graduate of Ballyfermot Art College, grabbed an Oscar for his visual effects work on Avatar.

WHAT OF THEceremony itself? In recent times, following victories for less mainstream films such as No Country for Old Menand Slumdog Millionaire, television viewing figures had plummeted and, by increasing the number of best picture nominees from five to 10, the Academy was hoping to drag in more popcorn-munchers.

The ceremony a very, very odd affair indeed. After last year’s pseudo off-Broadway revue, the organisers appeared to be attempting an embrace of old-fashioned Tinseltown values. “Hooray for Hollywood” blared out every time a presenter took a breath, and the defiantly ugly set looked like something left over from a Morecambe and Wise Christmas special. If Angela Rippon had waltzed on stage to present “André Preview” with an award it would not have seemed that great a surprise. Mind you, that television show tended to get by with fewer aesthetic and technical infelicities. Many of the public announcements were inaudible, and the strange decision – retained from last year – to have pals and colleagues, gathered in an arc, introduce each best actor and actress nominee lent those sections of the evening the quality of a satanic rite.

Before presenters Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin began trading quips, we were treated to a satirical musical number – the lyrics unintelligible sludge – from light-footed Neil Patrick Harris, former star of Doogie Howser MD. By this early point, the truly appalling Sky TV coverage had already revealed its shabby colours. David Baddiel, one of three panellists sitting opposite a hysterical Claudia Winkleman, expressed surprise at learning that the Coens' A Serious Manwas nominated for best picture and went on to reveal that he hadn't really seen enough of the films to express any worthwhile opinions. None of the four knew who Harris ("some guy") was and, more bafflingly, no researcher bothered to tell them. So banal was the package that even Martin's and Baldwin's most feeble jokes seemed gut-bustingly entertaining by comparison.

To be fair, the veterans, though used sparingly, did pick up their game as they went along. The opening monologue was the usual self-congratulatory piffle, but, later on, Martin managed to inject just a hint (just a hint, mind) of genuine cynicism into proceedings.

Following Geoffrey Fletcher’s genuinely moving, visibly stunned acceptance of his best screenplay Oscar, Steve tilted his head toward the departing writer and said: “I wrote that speech for him.” Perhaps Martin should have improvised the entire show. After all, he could hardly have done worse than the joke he was required to deliver upon “spotting” the famously hemp-friendly Woody Harrelson. “He’s so high,” Martin remarked. Is that even a joke?

THE LOW POINTsurely came with the (never particularly appealing) dance number accompanying excerpts from the nominated scores. In a hilarious attempt to connect with the youth market, the producers drafted in a large body of "street dancers" to leap about energetically while unaccommodating melodies echoed about an only fleetingly tolerant auditorium. Were the dancers really trying to mime bomb disposal in the Hurt Lockersequence or were we watching something more avant garde? Either way, the performance would have seemed underwhelming if presented to proud parents in a village scout hall.

Nothing about this year’s presentation was anything more than glossily competent.

So, what did it all mean? It will be a surprise if the tussle between Avatarand The Hurt Lockerhas not caused viewing figures to rise from last year's wretched near-nadir. But more cynical heads in the Academy will no doubt regret that fact that the winning film only took in a comparatively measly $15 million at the US box office. Still, the Oscar organisers can console themselves with the knowledge that, after eight decades of male dominance, the best director club has finally admitted a female member. Sensible punters can rejoice in the fact that, of the two favourites, by far the better film triumphed. And James Cameron? He can cheer himself up by hugging $2.5 billion worth of box-office takings to he substantial chest.