Mirren only UK success at Oscars

Meanwhile Forest Whitaker won the award for best actor for a critically hailed performance as Ugandan ruler Idi Amin in "The Last King of Scotland," beating out 74-year-old screen legend and sentimental favourite Peter O'Toole.

pounds to play Amin and dazzled critics with his portrayal of the mercurial, brutal dictator, won the Oscar on his first-ever nomination.

The most popular award of the night went to Martin Scorsese.

His best director Oscar was considered long-overdue. He has been nominated on five previous occasions - for films including Raging Bull and Goodfellas - but never made it. And as he accepted the award from presenter Steven Spielberg, he joked: "Could you double check the envelope?"

"An Inconvenient Truth," the big-screen adaptation of former US Vice President Al Gore's slide-show lecture about the perils of global warming, won the award for documentary feature and best song.

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