Hits and misses at Oscars

In one of the most unpredictable years, the 85th Academy Awards saw some surprising wins and losses.
Steven Spielberg, who was strongly tipped to win the best director trophy for his civil-war drama 'Lincoln', lost the trophy to Ang Lee for his 'Life of Pi', which managed four wins out of its 11 nods.
'Lincoln' was leading the race with 12 nominations but bagged only two awards by the end. The film's lead actor Daniel Day-Lewis won the Best Actor trophy and the other gong was taken away by the production design team.
Lee's win as the Best Director came as a big surprise as he beat veterans like Spielberg, Michael Haneke, Benh Zeitlin and David O Russell.

Russell's 'Silver Linings Playbook' too had a poor run by managing just one trophy for Lawrence in its eight categories.
Four major contenders - Tom Hooper, Kathryn Bigelow, Ben Affleck and Quentin Tarantino - were not even nominated for the best director tag, despite their movies (Les Miserables, Zero Dark Thirty, Argo and Django Unchained respectively) in race for Best Film.

The much talked about movie 'Zero Dark Thirty', about the decade-long US hunt of Osama bin Laden, won only 1 award in the Sound Editing category that too was shared by Bond film 'Skyfall'.
It is believed that early criticism of its torture scenes ruined film's chances at the Oscar.

Affleck's 'Argo' won the Best Film. The film became a front-runner recently supplanting 'Lincoln'. Affleck's best director snub seems to have helped its chances for the top prize.
Another miss at the glittery ceremony was Paul Thomas Anderson's 'The Master', which had 3 nomination but returned home empty handed.
Director Ben Lewin's 'The Sessions' didn't receive any award either.
Tarantino's 'Django Unchained' took away two awards in the Actor in a Supporting Role and Original Screenplay category.