The top three Oscar winners who aren’t Leo DiCaprio

Well damn, he did it. The meme is dead. 22 years after his first nomination, good old Leo has finally nabbed his long-awaited Oscar for his leading role in Alejandro Iñárritu’s epic The Revenant. Whilst this is good news, let’s not get carried away in our celebrations. Why not have a look at some of the other winners of the night. Hint: Sam Smith does not feature.

Ennio Morricone – Best Original Score

A lot of people on social media have been raving about this win, and I just thought I’d add to the celebrations. For those of you who don’t know, Morricone is an Italian composer of over 500 scores, most notably for his work on Sergio Leone’s Dollars Trilogy. I think we can all be glad that recognition has finally come for his score of Quentin Tarantino’s phenomenal The Hateful Eight.

Inside Out – Best Animated Feature

Mark Kermode called this his favourite film of the year, and for once I am close to agreeing. This new instant-classic from Pixar in many ways revived a company some people were scared was losing its way. Following the release of their first critically panned film Cars 2, Pixar seemed to be going down a dangerous road. Let’s hope the inventive, emotive power, and downright charm of Inside Out will usher in a second Pixar-renaissance

Ex Machina – Best Visual Effects

The one technical category Mad Max: Fury Road couldn’t win, the VFX nominations were stuffed with big-budget blockbusters. But I am really pleased to see that the simple, unintrusive yet near-perfect realism of Ex Machina won out – details over flashy stuff any day.