Birdman

No one was betting on these movies taking home the grand prize.

Alejandro G. Iñárritu returns with a new film on Netflix.

These movies were finished before you could say "action."

Last night, Alejandro González Iñárritu attended a gala thrown by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art as the guest of honor alongside artist James Turrell. As part of his guest of honor duties, the director of such films as Biutiful, Birdman and the upcoming The Revenant took the podium to deliver a speech expressing his commitment to artistry and a few other topics pressing on his mind, one of which has made headlines for touching on some hot-button issues. Iñárritu, a Mexican-born filmmaker, took time in his speech to denounce the “constant and relentless xenophobic comments” that have been made against Latinos and Latinas in recent months.

At long last, the Oscars are in the books for another year. As usual, the Academy Awards made for a night full of memorable moments, great speeches, and huge disappointments. (You deserved better, Boyhood.) Here now, the highs and lows of Oscars 2015 — all the things the Oscars got right this year, and all the things they got wrong:

The 2015 Oscar Best Picture race was highly contested and no one was sure who would win, but Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman ultimately won the award, beating out Boyhood, for Best Picture at the 2015 Oscars.

This year’s Best Director race ultimately came down to Alejandro González Iñárritu’s crafty work on Birdman, and Richard Linklater’s masterful work over the course of 12 years on Boyhood. Tonight, the Academy honored Iñárritu, presenting him with the award for Best Director for Birdman at the 2015 Oscars.

Whatever your feelings on Birdman, we can all agree that Sesame Street’s spoof of the Oscar contender is absolutely perfect (and absolutely adorable). The long-running children’s program has made a delightful habit of spoofing some of our pop culture favorites, and their latest effort doesn’t disappoint. And it’s perfectly timed for this Sunday’s Academy Awards ceremony.

Ready for the Academy Awards this Sunday? Need help winning your Oscar pool? ScreenCrush Editor-in-Chief Mike Sampson and Managing Editor Matt Singer are here to help. Or potentially make things worse. Honestly, they’re not great at guessing the winners. But they’re going to try their best.

The ending of Alejandro González Iñárritu’s ‘Birdman’ is already pretty dark and a bit surreal—the entire film, including and especially the ending, have a righteously pessimistic view of Hollywood and stardom as Michael Keaton’s character completes his arc in exceedingly cynical fashion…well, maybe. It depends on how you interpret the ending. But apparently that wild ending could have been even more strange, and it would have included Johnny Depp.