In brief
- The 98th Academy Awards have been held in Hollywood, hosted by Conan O’Brien.
- Sinners received a record-breaking 16 nominations, with One Battle After Another close behind at 13.
Action thriller One Battle After Another has swept the 98th Academy Awards, winning six out of the 13 awards it was nominated for, including the coveted best picture.
The film, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, stars Leonardo DiCaprio and is loosely based on Thomas Pynchon’s novel Vineland.
It beat out Sinners, Bugonia, F1, Frankenstein, Hamnet, Marty Supreme, The Secret Agent, Sentimental Value and Train Dreams for the top honour.
Anderson won best directing for the film and best adapted screenplay, while Sean Penn won best actor in a supporting role for his portrayal of a corrupt military officer. Andy Jurgensen won best film editing for his work on the film, while Cassandra Kulukundis won the inaugural best casting award.
The vampire horror Sinners — which received a record-breaking 16 nominations — was close behind.
It won four awards, including best actor in a leading role for Michael B Jordan. Set in 1930s Mississippi, Jordan plays identical twin brothers who return to their hometown to open a juke joint but are confronted by supernatural forces.
Best actress in a leading role went to Jessie Buckley for her performance as Agnes Shakespeare in Hamnet, while best actress in a supporting role went to Amy Madigan for her role as disturbing aunt Gladys in Weapons.
Multiple Australians were among the nominees — including Rose Byrne for best actress in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You and Jacob Elordi for best supporting actor in Frankenstein.
Nick Cave was nominated for best original song in Train Dreams, while costume and production designer Fiona Crombie was nominated in the best production design category for her work on Hamnet.
Swipes against Trump and a warning about fascism
Conan O’Brien returned to hosting duties for the second year in a row for the ceremony, which took place at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles.
Political tensions and industry concerns about artificial intelligence taking over creative jobs hung above the evening, with O’Brien joking that he was going to be “the last human host” of the ceremony.
He noted that nominees hailed from 31 countries on six continents.
“Let us celebrate not because we think all is well but because we work and hope for better,” O’Brien said.
Javier Bardem, presenting the award for best international film, started by declaring “no to war and free Palestine”, to loud applause.
Late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel, while presenting the awards for best documentaries, took swipes at United States President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and TV network CBS, which has been accused of capitulating to Trump during his second term.
Mr Nobody Against Putin, about a young Russian schoolteacher waging quiet resistance against Russia’s war on Ukraine, won the Oscar for best documentary feature.
Director David Borenstein said in his acceptance speech that the film was about how to lose one’s country through small acts of complicity.
“When we act complicit, when a government murders people on the streets of our major cities, when we don’t say anything, when oligarchs take over media and control how we produce it,” he said.
The comments follow the killing of two Americans in Minneapolis by immigration agents earlier this year.
History made
It was also a night of firsts. This year’s Oscars introduced a new award recognising achievement in casting — the Academy’s first new award category in more than two decades.
Actors who were cast by each of the nominated casting directors walked out onstage before the winner was announced, sharing tributes to the nominees. The inaugural award went to Cassandra Kulukundis for One Battle After Another.
KPop Demon Hunters, which follows a K-pop girl group who moonlight as demon slayers, also broke new ground.
Director Maggie Kang became the first filmmaker of South Korean descent to win in the best animated feature category. Its hit song Golden, performed by Ejae, Audrey Nuna and Rei Ami of the film’s fictional group Huntrix, became the first K-pop song to win in the best original song catgory.
“Thank you to the academy and to all the fans who got us here, and for those of you who look like me, I am so sorry that it took us so long to see us in a movie like this,” Kang said when accepting the best animated feature award.
“But it is here. And that means that the next generations don’t have to go longing. This is for Korea and for Koreans everywhere.”
Best international film went to Sentimental Value, Norwegian filmmaker Joachim Trier’s drama about two daughters whose estranged father — Stellan Skarsgård — re-enters their lives. It’s the first Norwegian film to win in the catgory.
During his acceptance spech, Trier — who described himself as “just a film nerd from Norway” — said it was important to recognise the other films in the category.
Those films include critically acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi’s It Was Just an Accident — filmed in secret in Iran, it won Sydney Film Festival’s top prize last year.
Other nominees included Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho’s The Secret Agent, Spanish filmmaker Oliver Laxe’s Sirāt and Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania’s The Voice of Hind Rajab, about a five-year-old Palestinian girl killed by the Israeli military in Gaza in 2024.
“Important, beautiful films that reflect our present crisis and the crisis of the past,” Trier said.
“I want to end by paraphrasing the wonderful American writer James Baldwin, who makes us remember that all adults are responsible for all children, and let’s not vote for politicians who don’t take this seriously into account.”
Autumn Durald Arkapaw, meanwhile, was the first woman to ever win the Oscar for best cinematography, for her work on Hamnet.
Here are the 2026 Oscar winners
- Best Picture — One Battle After Another
- Best Actor in a Leading Role — Michael B Jordan, Sinners
- Best Actress in a Leading Role — Jessie Buckley, Hamnet
- Best Actress in a Supporting Role — Amy Madigan, Weapons
- Best Actor in a Supporting Role — Sean Penn, One Battle After Another
- Best Directing — Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another
- Best Writing (Original Screenplay) — Ryan Coogler, Sinners
- Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay) — Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another (based on the novel Vineland by Thomas Pynchon)
- Best Animated Feature Film — KPop Demon Hunters
- Best Animated Short Film — The Girl Who Cried Pearls
- Best Live Action Short Film — The Singers; Two People Exchanging Saliva (tie)
- Best Documentary Short Film — All the Empty Rooms
- Best Documentary Feature Film — Mr Nobody Against Putin
- Best International Feature Film — Sentimental Value
- Best Music (Original Score) — Ludwig Göransson, Sinners
- Best Music (Original Song) — Golden, KPop Demon Hunters
- Best Sound — Gareth John, Al Nelson, Gwendolyn Yates Whittle, Gary A. Rizzo, and Juan Peralta, F1
- Best Costume Design — Kate Hawley, Frankenstein
- Best Makeup and Hairstyling — Mike Hill, Jordan Samuel, and Cliona Furey, Frankenstein
- Best Casting — Cassandra Kulukundis, One Battle After Another
- Best Production Design — Tamara Deverell and Shane Vieau, Frankenstein
- Best Visual Effects — Joe Letteri, Richard Baneham, Eric Saindon and Daniel Barrett, Avatar: Fire and Ash
- Best Film Editing — Andy Jurgensen, One Battle After Another
- Best Cinematography — Autumn Durald Arkapaw, Sinners
— With additional reporting by Reuters.
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