The Hurt Locker, a little-seen war film wi­th big backing from the critics, pushed pa­st Avatar and other cr­owd-pleasers to win the be­st picture Oscar at a Sunday night ceremony here, while its director, Kathryn Bi­gelow, became the first wo­man to win the directing award.

Avatar and The Hurt Locker had come into the night as favourites, but the smaller film took the prize from the bigger in the end.

“There’s no other way to describe it, it’s the moment of a lifetime,” said Bigelow in accepting her award. It was presented by Barbra St­reisand, who had anno­unc­ed it with the words, “Well, the time has come.”

Mark Boal, a producer of The Hurt Locker, said of his modest expectations when the movie was shot back in 2007, “Hopefully, we would find a distributor and somebody might even like the movie.”

There was no mention of a last-minute embarrassment in which a fellow producer of the film, Nicolas Chartier, had been banned from the show for violating Oscar rules by urging Academy members by e-mail messages to vote against a film assumed to be Avatar, which had the advantage of a vast budget and enorm­ous popularity. In a sense, the awards season had shaped up into a showdown between Jam­es Cameron, who directed Avatar, and Bigelow, who was previously married to Cameron.

Among other winners, Christoph Waltz took best supporting actor at the start of a sluggishly paced ceremony for his bilingual performance as a Jew-hunting Nazi officer in Inglourious Basterds. And also, as expected, Mo’Nique won for best supporting actress for her portrait of a terrifying mother in Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire. With no excess of modesty, Mo’Nique thank­ed the Academy’s members for showing that “it can be about the performance, not the politics.” The was a reference not just to her considerable talent, but to the fact that she had refused to spend time playing the usu­al Oscar campaign game. Backstage, she blamed the media for trying to stir up a controversy.

Jeff Bridges, a multiple no­minee and now first-ti­me winner, took best actor for his portrayal of a co­untry sing­er in Crazy He­art. A darling of the Hollywood crowd, Bridges had been seen as the designated winner almost from the mo­ment Fox Searchlight made a last-minute decision to drop the low-budget movie into the Oscar race.

Sandra Bullock, who had been pointed toward an Oscar since winning a bellwether Screen Actors Guild award, won best actress for her performance as a tough and loving contemporary Southern mother in The Blind Side.