Halle Berry and Denzel Washington may have walked away with the acting honours but the big winners at the Oscars may be AOL Time Warner and France's Vivendi Universal.
Academy Award honours almost always create a "bounce" at the box office for films and translate into higher sales when the movies go into release on video and DVD.
AOL raked in the biggest corporate tally at the Oscars thanks to its New Line unit and the blockbuster fantasy " The Lord of the Rings.
The epic based on the Tolkien trilogy dominated the technical section of the Oscars, adding some Oscar momentum to the nearly $800 million it has grossed worldwide.
AOL's Warner Bros studio, which released the movie Training Daystarring Denzel Washington, could also bask in the reflected glory of Washington's win in the Best Actor category.
Universal Pictures, a unit of France's Vivendi Universal, however, claimed the bigger Oscar honours as its A Beautiful Mindwon awards for Best Picture, Best Director for Ron Howard and Best Supporting Actress for Jennifer Connelly.
In the 40 days since the Oscar nominations were announced, Beautiful Mindadded $30 million to its domestic receipts and has grossed nearly $211 million worldwide.
By contrast, Lord of the Ringshas seen a smaller Oscar effect at the box office - adding about $20 million from its nominations. But New Line is clearly looking ahead to the video and DVD after-life for the tale of Middle Earth and plans to detail those release plans tomorrow.
In one example of the enduring power of the Oscars, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer shipped two million videos and DVDs of serial killer thriller The Silence of the Lambslast year - 10 years after it won Best Picture honours.