HOLLYWOOD, Feb 26: Bloody gangster drama “The Departed” rubbed out its rivals at the Oscars here on Sunday, scooping best picture honours and delivering a long-overdue director's prize for filmmaker Martin Scorsese.

Scorsese's violent thriller, a remake of the Hong Kong film “Infernal Affairs” was the biggest winner of the night with four Oscars at a show that saw Helen Mirren and Forest Whitaker win the top acting prizes.

An internationally diverse field was also notable for its strong political overtones, with former US vice president Al Gore using the Oscars stage as a platform to spread his environmental alarm call.

Gore's speech received some of the biggest cheers of the night but it was Scorsese who finished the evening with the biggest smile.

A trio of legendary Hollywood filmmakers — Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola — presented the 64-year-old with his Oscar which finally came at the sixth attempt after a series of snubs.

“I'm overwhelmed, I'm overwhelmed by receiving this from my old friends. We go back 37 years,” said Scorsese, the creator of such cinematic landmarks as “Raging Bull”, “Taxi Driver” and “Goodfellas”.

“So many people over the years have been wishing this for me — strangers,” Scorsese added to an ovation from the 3,400-strong audience at Hollywood's Kodak Theatre.

Moments later “The Departed”, which stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon and Jack Nicholson and tells the story of an undercover detective who infiltrates the Boston mob, won best picture, the final award of the night.

It beat out multi-lingual drama “Babel”, Clint Eastwood's Japanese-language war epic “Letters from Iwo Jima”, quirky comedy “Little Miss Sunshine” and royal drama “The Queen.” ”Babel” was one of the night's biggest losers, nominated in seven categories but finishing with only one Oscar. Hit musical “Dreamgirls” also had to settle for only two Oscars, despite receiving eight nominations.

Unusually, “The Departed” did not pick up any awards in the acting categories which as expected saw Mirren and Whitaker crowned as Oscars royalty.

Mirren won best actress for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II in the “The Queen” while Whitaker took best actor for his blood-curdling turn as Ugandan dictator Idi Amin in “The Last King of Scotland.” Mirren, 61, praised the British monarch after securing a clean sweep of this year's acting honours. She had also won Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild and Bafta Awards.

“For 50 years Elizabeth Windsor has maintained her dignity, her sense of duty, and her hairstyle,” Mirren said. “I salute her courage and her consistency ... Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Queen!” An emotional Whitaker said he hoped his win would serve as an inspiration.

In the best documentary category, heavy favourite “An Inconvenient Truth” took home the statuette, and gave environmental campaigner Gore the platform to renew calls for an urgent effort to tackle climate change.

“My fellow Americans ... people all over the world, we need to solve the climate crisis,” Gore said. “It's not a political issue, it's a moral issue.

Several celebrities took up the green theme by arriving for the awards in environmentally friendly hybrid cars instead of gas-guzzling stretch limos, prompting talk of a 'green Oscars'.

But veteran Oscar-watcher Lew Harris of movies.com was sceptical.

“There's a lot of posturing going on,” said Harris “They had green limos and stuff like that, it was a nice gesture, but it was one of the gestures that has the people in the Midwest scratching their heads and saying 'Oh, those Hollywood folks — they're too full of themselves!

Elsewhere the supporting actor awards saw an upset, with “Dreamgirls” Eddie Murphy upstaged by Alan Arkin, superb as the foul-mouthed, drug-snorting grand-father in the low-budget “Sunshine”.

Arkin, 72, picked up the first Oscar of his career, 41 years after his first Academy Award nomination in 1966.

But while Murphy was left to mull over his defeat, there were no such disappointment for his “Dreamgirls” co-star Jennifer Hudson, the former reality television show contestant who picked up best supporting actress.

The best foreign-language Oscar was won by Germany's “The Lives of Others,” the Cold War drama about the East German secret police.

It shaded the pre-Oscars favourite from Mexico, Guillermo Del Toro's magical “Pan's Labyrinth”, which finished the night with three Oscars for art direction, cinematography and make-up.—AFP