The 95th Academy Awards witnessed Everything Everywhere All At Once emerge as a star winner, scoring multiple awards, including Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Director, among other categories. Held on March 13 in Los Angeles’ Dolby Theatre, the Oscars 2023 were hosted by Jimmy Kimmel.
India registered its win with RRR’s chartbuster song “Naatu Naatu” bagging the Oscar award for Best Original Song. Tamil documentary The Elephant Whisperers marked the maiden victory for India in the Documentary Short Subject category at the 95th Academy Awards.
India’s win at Oscars 2023 brings up one of our major strengths, which is being unafraid of sentiment, of bringing something real and emotional to a world which has been taken over by pallid superheroes and there even more pallid tales.
India shone bright at the 95th Academy awards. As an ecstatic MM Keeravani sang out his thanks in tune with that Carpenter’s immortal cheesy ditty, the auditorium exploded in hoots, whistles and loud cheers. His ‘namaste’, a delightful little tailpiece to his acceptance speech, echoed the sentiments of a billion Indians on the top of the world after ‘Naatu Naatu’ won the Best Original Song at the Academy awards.
It’s not just the song which had had the globe dancing to its tune from S S Rajamouli’s blockbuster ‘RRR’ that made history at this edition of the Oscars. It was also the Best Documentary Short award for the ‘The Elephant Whisperers’, a heart-warming film on the deep bond between a pair of elephants and their humans, directed by Kartiki Gonsalves, and produced by Guneet Monga.
Shaunak Sen didn’t win the Best Documentary Feature for ‘All That Breathes’, a stunning film about a pair of Delhi-based brothers who care for injured kites falling from the skies, and that will be a lasting regret. Still, two out of three is not a bad strike. It can be made out of these small incremental steps, because of what they mean once the hurly burly of the awards night and the zillion pre-Oscars and post-Oscars after parties are done and dusted.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday congratulated the “RRR” team after its hit track “Naatu Naatu” became the first Indian film song to win Oscar.Taking to Twitter PM Modi said, “Exceptional! The popularity of ‘Naatu Naatu’ is global. It will be a song that will be remembered for years to come. Congratulations to the entire team for this prestigious honour. India is elated and proud.”
‘Naatu Naatu’ is the first Telugu song to be nominated in the ‘Original Song’ category at the Oscars. ‘Naatu Naatu’ has won the award trumping big names like Rihanna and Lady Gaga. Composer MM Keeravani and lyricist Chandra Bose accepted the award on behalf of the team. Singers Rahul Sipligunj and Kaala Bhairava and composer along with director SS Rajamouli and lead actors Jr NTR and Ram Charan are all present at the big event.
The song’s big win has undoubtedly brought smiles to everyone’s faces. As soon as Naatu Naatu bagged the trophy, Indians world wide beamed with pride and expressed happiness on social media. The song competed against ‘Applause’ from the film ‘Tell It Like A Woman,’ ‘Hold My Hand’ from the movie ‘Top Gun: Maverick,’ ‘Lift me Up’ from ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,’ and ‘This Is Life,’ from ‘Everything, Everywhere All At Once’.
