Golden Globe Awards 2015: ‘Boyhood,’ ‘Budapest’ take top film prizes

“Boyhood,” Richard Linklater’s coming-of-age drama about the childhood of a Texas boy, emerged as the big winner Sunday night at the 72nd Golden Globe Awards, taking the prizes for best picture, director and supporting actress.

The movie, shot one week annually for 12 years, has already won countless awards from film critics groups. Linklater noted how personal the film became for him over that time, voicing appreciation that moviegoers have connected to the film’s subject of family and parenting. He dedicated his director award to his parents and “to parents that are evolving everywhere, and families that are just passing through this world and doing their best.”

“I was just trying to make a film about growing up and parenting and it had to cover all those years to get what I wanted to express out of it,” Linklater said backstage. “To tell the story properly took 12 years.”

Wes Anderson’s “The Grand Budapest Hotel” won the award for best picture, comedy/musical. Surrounded by members of his cast, Anderson reeled off the foreign names of his collaborators on the largely German production after thanking the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. members — another list of very foreign-sounding names — to much laughter.

Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, hosting for the third and what they maintain was the final time, skewered Hollywood vanity, ageism and the film “The Interview,” saving their most cutting jokes for last when they laid into Bill Cosby in a bit that began with an “Into the Woods” riff (“Sleeping Beauty just thought she was getting coffee with Bill Cosby”) and ended with the two imitating the embattled comedian’s trademark cadence. (“I put the pills in the people!”)

Lead honors for movie drama went to Eddie Redmayne, for his portrayal of theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking in “The Theory of Everything,” and Julianne Moore, who plays a woman battling early-onset Alzheimer’s in “Still Alice.”

Michael Keaton won lead actor in a comedy film for “Birdman,” playing a movie actor trying to reignite his career by staging a Broadway play.

“I want to thank the Hollywood Foreign Press for even having a comedy category,” Keaton said. He also voiced his appreciation to “Birdman” writer-director Alejandro G. Iñárritu (the night’s screenplay winner), calling him a “true artist,” someone everyone in the room would work with at a moment’s notice.

Keaton’s wide-ranging speech included an emotional, choked-up tribute to his “best friend,” his son, Sean. “Two things I said I wasn’t gonna do, cry and give air quotes — damn!” Keaton said.

Amy Adams won a Golden Globe for the second straight year, taking the comedy/musical lead actress award for her turn as artist Margaret Keane in “Big Eyes,” a woman who, Adams said, “had such a quiet voice and such a strong heart and such a strong artistic vision.”

The supporting actor and actress categories went to the season’s overwhelming front-runners, J.K. Simmons (“Whiplash”) and Patricia Arquette (“Boyhood”).

Simmons, who played a sadistic music teacher in “Whiplash,” thanked the movie’s two “boy wonders” — writer-director Damien Chazelle, 29, and costar Miles Teller, “a young actor of such maturity and brilliance that he inspired me every day to want to scream at him and hit him in the face.”

Arquette, playing “Boyhood’s” single mother, voiced her appreciation to the film’s writer-director Linklater for allowing her to honor her own mother “with this beautiful character,” and also told her own children that “my favorite role in this whole life has been being your mom.”

Accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award from former costars Julianna Margulies and Don Cheadle, George Clooney thanked the HFPA for “keeping small films alive,” saluted the late Robin Williams and warmly paid tribute to his wife, Amal, saying he “couldn’t be more proud to be your husband.”

Clooney, like many others during the evening, also paid tribute to the murdered cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo and the millions who marched in Paris in solidarity.

“This is a really important moment in time,” Clooney said backstage. “We have to stand up together or we fall apart.”

The HFPA maintained its penchant for rewarding TV shows ahead of Emmy voters, naming first-year series “Transparent” best TV comedy series and its lead, Jeffrey Tambor, for lead comedy actor.

“This is much bigger than me,” said Tambor, who plays a Pacific Palisades transgender woman in the Amazon Prime series, noting that his costars had helped him find “more Jeffrey” than he had in his entire life. He went on to dedicate the award and his performance to the transgender community. “Thank you for letting us be part of the change.”

Showtime’s “The Affair,” a first-year series showing an adulterous relationship from multiple perspectives, won best TV drama. The show’s female lead, Ruth Wilson, was awarded lead drama actress.

Newcomer Gina Rodriguez took the comedy actress award for her rookie series “Jane the Virgin.”

“This award is so much more than myself,” Rodriguez said. “It represents a culture that wants to be seen as heroes.” She went on to give a special salute to her dad. “My father used to tell me to say every morning, ‘Today’s going to be a great day, and I can, and I will,’” she said. “Well, Daddy, today is a great day. I can and I did.”

Globes voters showered FX’s first-year limited series “Fargo” with a lot of love, giving it the prize for TV movie/miniseries and naming Billy Bob Thornton as lead actor. The show’s creator, Noah Hawley, thanked his wife for leading him to the message of “Fargo,” namely that “there’s more to life than a little money, you know. And here it is, and it’s a beautiful day.” He also thanked FX for letting him “go full Coen,” shouting out to the show’s inspiration, the 1996 Coen brothers movie.

Thornton, meanwhile, kept his speech shorter.

“These days you get in a lot of trouble no matter what you say,” Thornton said. “You can say anything and get in trouble. I know that for a fact. So I’m just going to say ‘thank you.’”

Twitter: @GlennWhipp