Matthew McConaughey won the Oscar for best actor for his role in Dallas Buyers Club. Photo: Focus Features

The Academy has voted and Peter Sanders’ Tuesday afternoon film studies class at George Brown College have spoken about the Oscar winners.

In reaction to 12 Years a Slave winning best picture, Alberto Tazorra Valdez agreed by simply describing the film as “Good acting, good picture.”

Sanders said “[the film is a] beautiful portrait of slavery and of the day-to-day life, and beautifully shot. So yes, I think it was by far the most worthy of the films to win a best picture.”

Another big moment of the Oscars was when Lupita Nyong’o won best supporting actress over last year’s best actress in a leading role winner Jennifer Lawrence. Jocelynn Roy said “I think Jennifer was the easy prediction, she’s kind of a fan favourite. maybe Lupita won just ‘cause its maybe a more powerful message.”

On Lupita’s performance Sanders said, “There was certainly a huge gamut for her. She was in dire straits, she was very happy. Her performance was very broad ranging. I think she’s a great actress, but she was doing stuff I’d already seen her do.”

The question of whether first-time nominee Matthew McConaughey deserved his best actor in a leading role over four-time nominee Leonardo DiCaprio proved to be a slightly more controversial topic.

“I don’t think Leonardo deserved it at all,” Andrea Velez said, “I think Matthew McConaughey completely embodied his character, where as Leonardo we know that he can play that character. He’s done it, he can do it, we know that. But if you think about Matthew McConuaghey’s past movies, he’s been known for being a hunk.”

Jordan Hagler rebutted her point by stating “Matthew McConaughey’s role was a much easier role to play and I think you could have gotten many more actors play that role, rather than Leo where he had some parts like absolutely crazy and enticing and other parts where he had to be like serious and show like he’s absolutely desperate. I think Matthew McConaughey’s part was just depressing most of the time.”

Gravity snagged a whopping six awards including best director, original score, film editing, sound mixing, sound editing and visual effects. Darnell Reddick, who has seen the film four times, said “The audio in that movie is so immersive; it’s like my favourite part of the movie.”

On the film’s visual awards Sanders said “The cinematography was absolutely fabulous.”

In terms of movies or people who deserved nominations or more, Hagler said Man of Steel should have been nominated for best score. “The score was phenomenal in. The music I felt was so powerful.”

Velez said “I’m surprised Oprah [Winfrey] wasn’t nominated for best supporting actress [for The Butler],” she adds “I am surprised [The Butler] wasn’t nominated for more. I bawled my eyes out at that movie.”

According to this class, for the most part the awards were given deservingly this year. Will it be the same next year? Only time will tell.