Best Picture - Birdman Lead Actor - Eddie Redmayne, The Theory of Everything Lead Actress - Julianne Moore, Still Alice Supporting Actor - JK Simmons, Whiplash Supporting Actress - Patricia Arquette, Boyhood
As much as I loved Birdman, Whiplash was easily the best film. JK Simmons knocks it out of the ****ing park, his performance is incredible.
I haven't seen Whiplash yet so can't comment. In the other categories, I wanted Michael Keaton get best actor. I think its more challenging to create a fictional character than impersonate a real person (Redmayne was excellent though).
Best lead actor IMO this year was Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler, yet somehow he was snubbed in the nominations. Nightcrawler should've been up for Best Picture too IMO.
I've only seen the 'shorts' and read the 'experts' opinions but from what I've seen and heard these were probably the category 'favourites' who won. Redmayne was perfection for the character (Steven Hawkins) he played whilst Keaton can consider himself unlucky as he would have won (bar Redmaynes performance) in any other year. I thought Boyhood might have won the Best Film award in view of the extraordinary way in which it was created. Simmons was a 'shoo-in' for Supporting Actor as were Moore (Lead Actress) and Arquette (Supporting Actress).
Rightly so, it was one of the best performances I've seen. It was better than any of the lead actor performances, expect maybe Keaton.