"Slumdog Millionaire" won eight Academy Awards. As is often the case at the Oscars, these wins followed up on equivalent kudos from the respective guilds, largely because the two sets of kudos share many of the same voters. But the scale is hugely different. There are, for example, 1,240 members of the academy's actors' branch, but more than 100,000 members of the Screen Actors Guild. The academy contains 374 directors, but 13,000 helmers belong to the DGA and most of them create TV shows, commercials and music videos instead of feature films.

"Slumdog Millionaire" won with the Producers Guild of America and the cast won with the Screen Actors Guild;
Helmer Danny Boyle won with the Directors Guild of America;
Script adapter Simon Beaufoy won with the Writers Guild of America;
Shooter Anthony Dod Mantle won with the American Society of Cinematographers;
Cutter Chris Dickens won with the American Cinema Editors;
Sound mixers Resul Pookutty, Richard Pryke and Ian Tapp won with the Cinema Audio Society.

There is no music guild that bestows equivalent kudos, but "Slumdog Millionaire" composer A.R. Rahman did win a raft of precursor awards for his score including the Golden Globe and the BAFTA. That his composition "Jai Ho" took best song was more of a surprise given that "Down to Earth" ("Wall-E") won both the Golden Globe and the Grammy.

Among the four Oscar acting champs, supporting actor winner Heath Ledger ("The Dark Knight") had taken almost every precursor prize leading up to last night.

Lead actor winner Sean Penn ("Milk") won with the Screen Actors Guild, as well as with the LA and Gotham critics and the Critics Choice. Penn lost the Golden Globe, BAFTA and Independent Spirit awards to Mickey Rourke ("The Wrestler").

Lead actress winner Kate Winslet ("The Reader") won supporting actress with the Screen Actors Guild as well as the Golden Globes before being bumped up to lead actress and winning the BAFTA.

Supporting actress winner Penelope Cruz ("Vicky Cristina Barcelona") won with the L.A. and Gotham critics, the National Board of Review, BAFTA, and the Independent Spirits.