Set your PVR – 79th Annual Academy Awards, Sky HD, Sunday, 11:00pm
Hollywood’s biggest night of the year takes place on Sunday February 25 and will be shown in HD in the UK for the first time, so you can see all the glittering dresses and botoxed foreheads in more detail than ever before.
There’s a heavy international presence in this year’s nominations, with Mexico’s Babel (pictured) up for seven awards, Pan’s Labyrinth (Mexico and Spain) up for six and the UK’s The Queen also up for six. Hollywood movies set overseas also figure prominently, such as Blood Diamond (up for five gongs), Clint Eastwood’s Letters from Iwo Jima (up for four) and Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto (up for three).
Attention is also on whether Martin Scorcese will finally get an Oscar for direction with The Departed (itself based on the Hong Kong thriller Infernal Affairs), though he does face strong competition from Eastwood.
Sky’s HD broadcast starts at 11pm on Sky One with a 90-minute pre-awards show featuring ‘red carpet’ coverage of the stars arriving and the latest buzz from LA.
Full live coverage of the awards event follows from 12:30am on Sky Movies 1 and Sky Movies 9HD. Host Claudia Winkleman and a panel of experts offer commentary on the winners and losers during the US ad breaks.
A two-hour highlights programme follows on Sky One HD on Monday 26 at 10pm (which Freeview viewers can see on Sky Three on Tuesday 27).
Related story: Older stars shun HD-friendly makeup at Oscars interviews.
