BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. -- Good luck, Oscar voters.
While the dark satire "American Beauty" and biopics on boxer Rubin "Hurricane" Carter and late comic Andy Kaufman won Golden Globe awards Sunday night, no decisive front-runner emerged for the Academy Awards.For "The Sopranos," meanwhile, the embarrassing rub-out at the September Emmys is history: The mobster hit on HBO won best television drama and three acting awards.
"American Beauty" led the motion picture categories with three awards -- best film drama, best director (Sam Mendes) and best screenplay (Alan Ball). But its stars, Annette Bening and Kevin Spacey, were shut out in the acting categories.
"There wasn't one clear-cut film that stood out," said "American Beauty" co-producer Bruce Cohen.
The Golden Globe winners often provide a good indicator of upcoming Oscar nominations, which are scheduled to be announced Feb. 15. This year, the Golden Globes favored projects that were based on true stories.
Denzel Washington won best dramatic actor for his role as a boxer wrongly convicted of murder in "The Hurricane." He was accompanied to the stage at the Beverly Hilton hotel by the real "Hurricane," Carter.
Hilary Swank won dramatic actress honors for "Boys Don't Cry," the reality-based story of a Nebraska teenager who was killed after her masquerade as a man was uncovered.
"It's amazing when you get recognition for your work in a movie that you're so proud to be a part of," Swank said.
Jim Carrey was named best movie comedy actor for his uncanny impersonation of Kaufman in the movie "Man on the Moon." Carrey also won a Globe last year for best dramatic actor in "The Truman Show."
Halle Berry also won for best actress in a TV miniseries for "Introducing Dorothy Dandridge," the first black woman to be nominated for a best actress Academy Award.
Janet McTeer, a British actress who played a Southern mom in "Tumbleweeds," won best actress in a musical or comedy film. Tom Cruise of "Magnolia" and Angelina Jolie of "Girl, Interrupted" won motion picture supporting actor honors.
Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar won the foreign language movie award for "All About My Mother."
HBO dominated the television categories, winning eight of 11 awards.
Virtually overlooked at the Emmys last year, "The Sopranos" was named best drama series. It also nabbed dramatic acting trophies for Edie Falco and James Gandolfini and supporting actress Nancy Marchand.
HBO's other winners were "Sex and the City" as best TV comedy, its star Sarah Jessica Parker as best actress and "RKO 281" as best miniseries or made-for-TV movie.
Michael J. Fox was named best comedy series actor for "Spin City," which he is leaving because of his fight with Parkinson's disease. But he handled it lightly.
"Actor out of work -- news at 11," Fox said.
Among other TV winners, Jack Lemmon was named best miniseries or TV movie actor for Showtime's "Inherit the Wind" and Peter Fonda was best supporting actor for the Showtime miniseries "Passion of Ayn Rand."
Barbra Streisand, winner of more Golden Globe trophies than any other entertainer, including best actress for "Funny Girl" and "A Star is Born," received the Cecil B. DeMille Award for "outstanding contribution to the entertainment field."
"I've been called many names like perfectionist, difficult and obsessive. I think it takes obsession, takes searching for the details for any artist to be good," she said backstage. "It's easy to be sort of good. If you care so much you kind of get punished for it."