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Austria's Christoph Waltz has won the Oscar for best supporting actor in his portrayal of a sadistic Nazi in the bloody World War II revenge fantasy "Inglourious Basterds”.
Waltz, 53, was the odds-on favorite after winning nearly 30 awards for his performance, including best actor at the Cannes Film Festival as well as a Golden Globe Award earlier this year.
Waltz was a virtual unknown when he was cast by Quentin Tarantino for the part of the diabolical SS colonel Hans Landa, which Tarantino has described as one of the greatest characters he has ever written.
"Oscar and Penelope, that's an uber bingo," Waltz said as he accepted his award, the first of the night at the glittering 82nd Academy Awards.
"I always wanted to discover some new continent and I thought I had to go this way and then I was introduced to Quentin Tarantino, who was putting together an expedition that was equipped by Harvey Weinstein and Lawrence Spender and David Linder and he put this script in front of me and he said, "This is where we're going, but we're going the other way.'
"Quentin, with his unorthodox methods of navigation, this fearless explorer, took the ship across and brought it in with flying colors."
Waltz was a relative unknown even in his own country before he appeared in Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds" and started raking in every major film award.
Quiet and perfectionist, he worked steadily in German-language films and TV series before hitting the big time with the role of the devilish Nazi officer Hans Landa, which won him the Oscar for best supporting actor on Sunday.
Other nominees included Woody Harrelson for his part in "The Messenger," Christopher Plummer for "The Last Station," Matt Damon for "Invictus" and Stanley Tucci for "The Lovely Bones."
Tarantino himself said he would not have made the film without Waltz, a comment the Austrian -- described by the press as "awfully polite, so awfully humble" -- shrugs off modestly.
Over the past year, Waltz has garnered every major film prize, from the best actor award in Cannes to the Screen Actors Guild award, the Golden Globe, the British Bafta and now the Oscar.
As Hollywood's new darling, he has already lined up high-profile projects like Michel Gondry's "The Green Hornet" with Cameron Diaz, "Water for Elephants" with Reese Witherspoon and David Cronenberg's "The Talking Cure" in which he will play his countryman Sigmund Freud alongside Keira Knightley.
But one thing is for sure: "The role of a Nazi, I will never play again," Waltz has said.
