75th Academy Awards

The 75th Academy Awards ceremony was originally intended to be an especially festive celebration of the ceremony's 75th anniversary. However, it was muted five days before the show by the onset of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, which coincided almost exactly with the ceremony. As a result, the hype and tone of the show were scaled back, and some Award winners (notably Adrien Brody and Michael Moore) took the opportunity to voice their opposition to the invasion. Documentary filmmaker Errol Morris, who would later win Best Documentary at the 77th Academy Awards, made a short filmthat was shown during the ceremony. The film shows almost 100 people discussing movies. Those featured range from Laura Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev to Iggy Pop and Lou Reed to Kenneth Arrow (1972 Nobel Laureate in Economics) to Morris' son Hamilton.

The Awards

Feature Films

• Best motion picture of the year: Chicago

Acting

• Performance by an actor in a leading role: Adrien Brody in The Pianist
• Performance by an actress in a leading role: Nicole Kidman in The Hours
• Performance by an actor in a supporting role: Chris Cooper in Adaptation
• Performance by an actress in a supporting role: Catherine Zeta-Jones in Chicago