From the queens to the commoners, everyone knew their place on the red carpet this year
View an Oscars red carpet fashion gallery or click on the names below to see each dress
First, if I can make a fashion editor's speech of my own: the Oscars are all about the message, and that applies to the red carpet as much as the awards. As one critic put it last week, the best picture race between The King's Speech and The Social Network came down to the Academy members making a choice between a chilly tale of money and ruthless ambition, and a heartwarming story of friendship and adversity overcome. You do the maths on that one.
The red carpet is a platform for female actors to get a message across about who they are. Beauty is part of it, but it's more than that: the dream is to get all those folks at home cooing over you, believing in you, rooting for you. Because if you can bring that to the table, Hollywood directors will pay good money for it. This is why the faux-bridal look has recently been so popular at the Oscars. Everyone loves a bride. Probably the only thing more adorable than a bride is a kitten, but as Bj�rk proved all those years ago, channelling wildlife on the red carpet is risky. So actors tend to go with a pale, frothy, wedding-cakey dress, in the hope that it will get the little people on side.
If you don't believe me, consider the Marchesa factor. Marchesa is the label behind most of those off-white tulle fantasy gowns. Sandra Bullock, Kate Hudson, Kate Beckinsale, Halle Berry ? the list of actors who have worn long, white Marchesa on red carpets goes on and on. Marchesa is designed by Georgina Chapman, who is married to Harvey Weinstein, of King's Speech fame. He makes the movies that secure Oscar glory with their heartwarming message ? she makes the gowns to match. Quite a team.
Trouble is, by now every starlet in town has cottoned on to the bridal ruse. A couple of years ago, it got to the point where the Oscar red carpet looked a bit like one of those mass weddings they have in South Korea, except with a lot more Harry Winston diamonds. And, no offence, but mass weddings aren't adorable. So the smarter cookies have moved on, and the red carpet has got a little bit more interesting again. And here, without further ado, are the winners and the losers of the night.
Queens
The red carpet is usually pretty much an all-girls event, but this was the year of the power couple. From a British perspective the Firths have been pretty much owning the awards-season power couple thing, what with Colin's charming speeches and Livia's laudable Green Carpet Challenge (she wears only ethical clothes on the red carpet). But the honour was snatched from them tonight by the Cruz-Bardems, making their first post-baby appearance. Penelope looks not only unbelievably hot in her L'Wren Scott dress, she also looks incredibly happy. The low-key hair and accessories and the slightest suggestion that she has had to squish into that dress, rather than every ounce of her baby weight having magically vanishd within a month, all make her seem human and therefore even more lovely. The message: I'm just like you, girls, apart from being about a zillion times sexier.
Full disclosure: I am totally biased here because I am literally obsessed with this Givenchy haute couture collection. On the off-chance you are one of the few people I haven't already bored to death on the subject, let me tell you about the embellishment on this dress: those beads are pearls and gems trapped between the layers of fabric, the idea being that over the decades, the chiffon starts to rub and the beads show through, and so the dress develops. These dresses are incredibly body-conscious but not in a cheesy boobs-and-bum way. Lavender and egg yolk yellow isn't the obvious, go-to red carpet colour combination ? but that's part of the point. Probably only Blanchett could pull this off. And that's the message here: I'm special. I don't do girl-next-door, but if you're looking to cast a queen or a white witch, I'm the one.
She looked really cute with her husband, but for Portman this night wasn't really about working the power couple thing. It was about her and her bump. Actually, about her, her bump and her cleavage. The dress is kind of old-fashioned for Rodarte, which usually does edgier stuff ? it doesn't look a million miles away from a maternity dress you might find in the formalwear section of a home counties department store ? but I love the way her cleavage and her bump vie for your attention. And either that colour really, really flatters her, or that girl actually glows. The message: I may be only 29, but I'm an old-fashioned movie star.
Scarlett Johansson is the face of Dolce & Gabbana perfume, which means they get to dress her for awards shows. This is a good hire. Dressing Johansson in really tight lace is essentially product placement in a million sexual fantasies. If anyone else wore this dress it would look a bit like upholstery, but when Johansson does it ? and with that Monroe-ish open mouth, wanton-eyes thing she does ? it's killer. Also, it's a fantastic colour with that dirty-blonde hair. The message in this one is brilliantly uncomplicated, and I won't spell it out because this is a family newspaper. It's like the old-fashioned casting couch, except she seduces the public directly, and doesn't have to actually sleep with the directors. Clever.
Some people think that HBC doesn't get red carpet dressing, but she absolutely does. She had this dress made by costume designer Colleen Atwood, because she wanted her dress to celebrate film, not fashion. If that's not understanding that red-carpet dressing is sending a message, I don't know what is. The message: the lady said it herself.
Princess
This is a dress that would look silly on anyone older than Hailee Steinfeld's 14 tender years, and ridiculous anywhere less dressy than the Oscars. In other words, it is the perfect dress for this girl on this night. The style is called "tea length", by the way. Love that. My one gripe is that the Ferragamo shoes are wrong: too high, too showgirl-ish. A kitten heel would have been more appropriate, both for the dress and for her age. The message: if you're not going "Aw", you must be some kind of cold-hearted, kitten-drowning freak.
Ladies in waiting
I love this. It manages to look very Fashion, and yet very much in keeping with Welch's established on-stage look. And all the details (jewellery, nails) work too. The message: I'm not all kook any more. I'm all about the polish, now that I'm cracking America.
OK, I have a theory about Michelle Williams. On the red carpet, she is the one who absolutely should be killing it: she's beautiful, and she's got great personal style when off duty. But somehow it never happens. This is Chanel, but the T-shirt shape totally lacks punch. And the pearls don't show up too well ? from a distance, it looks like a sweater dress gone bobbly. And her body language is stiff and defensive; she doesn't sell it. It's as if the message is: I don't want you to know anything about me. Theory over.
Which one? This is the question. Now we know why she accepted the hosting gig: the costume changes meant she got to have multiple bites of the apple. Weirdly, the worst one was the gown she wore on the actual red carpet. The hair and makeup are lovely but then there's a whole section from neck to hip where there's literally nothing going on, just a very thin lady in red, and then it all gets jazzy around the hips but by then we've lost interest. Later on, things improved. I wasn't wild about the gold Oscar de la Renta, but the black Westwood, the burgundy Versace and the cream Givenchy were nice, and the Armani navy sequins and the Tom Ford black lace were hot. I even liked the Lanvin tux. Anne needs to work out what message she's trying to sell us. She sort of knows she's not sexy, but she doesn't want to do good girl, and she's too gawky to do cute. Seven dresses = mixed messages.
This woman is ridiculously beautiful. I think what she's trying to do here is move on from the super-charged Black Swan erotica, and show that she has a soft, romantic side. That's the message I'm getting from Elie Saab lilac lace. I'm a genius, right? It doesn't totally work: the dress seems a bit too big, or something, because it should have more shape than that. And the lace panels, which are exquisite close up, look a bit raggedy from a distance. But the thought is there.
Commoners
I wanted to love this dress. Of course I did, because I'm not an entirely cold and callous human being. In case you have been living in a cave, to recap: Livia only wears ethical clothes, and this dress was made out of 11 dresses from the era of The King's Speech. The trouble is, that's exactly what it looks like. Great concept, bad dress. I would feel bad saying this, but Livia did get to swan around LA all Sunday night drinking champagne and waving her husband's Oscar around.
I think people are pretending to like this dress because they like Bening. Well, duh. Obviously we love Bening. She's an incredible actor and totally beautiful and she has Warren Beatty standing next to her on the red carpet gushing about how she's the greatest woman ever. She does not need our sympathy. The colour is good but the lines are all going in the wrong directions, somehow, making it an unflattering shape.
This dress is by L'Wren Scott, who is Mick Jagger's girlfriend. You know, she's the one who's about twice his height. Anyway, I like the dress, it really suits her, but I don't get what's happening with that necklace and the hair. I guess the necklace is probably priceless, because it's not pretty. Maybe she likes it, but in that case, why half-cover it? And why not wash your hair, maybe? It's the Oscars, Amy. Push the boat out and get a blowdry.
Jennifer Hudson
This Versace is fine from the waist down, but ? goodness me. I don't consider myself a prude, but I am not wild about dresses where you can see the whole contour of and almost the entire underside of a woman's breasts.
Nicole Kidman
I am quite amazed Nicole didn't rethink the Dior in the wake of the Galliano scandal. It seems like most other people did, because there wasn't a lot of it about. And it's not even like it's a nice dress. There's a Japanese theme here somewhere I think, kind of origami-folds and a fan shape, but I don't really get it. And the orange shoes? And, sorry, one last thing: the fringe. It's as if at the last minute she wanted to soften the effect of the outfit, which is pretty harsh what with her pale colouring and her bony shoulders, so she pulled a bit of hair out of her ponytail. Or, maybe it's her husband's fault. Bad hair is contagious, you know.
Gwyneth Paltrow
Another shocker from Calvin Klein. This is a spiky, unlovable look. Amazing to think that this is the same woman who once wore sugar-pink to the Oscars ? and won, remember? My take on Paltrow post-Tracy Anderson is that's she's a bit too cold-and-mean looking, especially when she has her hair poker-straight, but the legs are fabulous. So this is about my least-favourite look for her, with no legs and just lots of harsh, metallic straight lines. Fail.
Hilary Swank
Hilary Swank always wears such pretty dresses, and yet somehow always looks to me like a school athlete whose mom has made her dress up for the prom ? she's smiling gamely, but really she just wants to get back to shooting hoops. Anyway. I think she overdoes the frou-frou, and that's why I don't find it believable. This Gucci featherfest does nothing to change my mind.
Reese Witherspoon
I don't mind the Armani dress, although it's a bit safe, and also a bit too much of an homage to Julia Roberts in 2001. But the hair and the makeup! Reese, get a grip on yourself. That cheerleader bouncy hair ? yes, it looked great on you in Legally Blonde. But that was a comedy. And years ago. Get over it! Because this is cheese. Cheese on toast.
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