A 78-year-old bastion of sincerity, the Academy Awards are not a natural home for the frequently winking Jon Stewart, the evening’s host. Luckily, George Clooney brought enough sincerity for them both. After winning the first award of the night – best supporting actor in “Syriana” – Mr. Clooney first gushed over his fellow nominees. But the back-patting had just begun.

Hollywood is frequently accused of being out of touch, he said, and that’s a good thing. “We’re the ones who talked about AIDS when it was just whispered.. . . It’s a group of people that gave Hattie MacDaniel an Oscar when blacks were still sitting in the backs of movie theaters. I’m proud to be out of touch.”

Later in the ceremony, Samuel L. Jackson introduced an equally self-congratulatory ode to the movie industry’s willingness to take on progressive themes. Set to swelling music, the montage included clips from “The Grapes of Wrath,” “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” “All the President’s Men,” “Network,” “Norma Rae,” and “Philadelphia.” Mr. Stewart’s light touch saved the moment. When the camera returned to him, he deadpanned: “And none of those issues were ever a problem again.”

Mr. Stewart started out a little unsure, dwarfed by the enormous set and sea of movie-star faces. A critic in a roomful of actors, it took him a few minutes to gain his footing. In the opening monologue, he poked fun at his own unstoried movie history, welcoming the audience to an evening devoted to excellent in film,” hosted by me, the fourth male lead in ‘Death to Smoochy.'”

He put a political spin on the perennial Bjork joke. He reported that the Icelandic singer-actress couldn’t make it this year: She was trying on her Oscar dress and Dick Cheney shot her. Badum-dum. The Bjork joke, now four years old, is still a guaranteed laugh line.

Mr. Stewart gained his footing quickly. And the prepared short films kept up with him. A series of fake campaign commercials recalled the best of “The Daily Show.” A warmly lit elderly couple complained that too many actresses have” foreign-sounding “names – Charlize Theron, Keira Knightly, Dame Judy Dench. “Reese Witherspoon, now there’s an American with a traditional name.” Paid for, naturally, by a Witherspoon PAC.

Rachel Weisz won for best supporting actress in “The Constant Gardener,” as many Oscar-watchers had expected. In a short speech, she thanked author John Le Carre, whose book the film was based on. “March of the Penguins” took the award for best documentary, and its producers picked up their statuette with a light note: They carried stuffed animals on stage and whistled a penguin “thank-you.”

Anglo-Irish playwright Martin McDonagh, who brought violent child murder to the New York stage in “The Pillowman” last year, won for his hilariously unhinged live-action short “Six Shooter.” Mr. McDonagh is having a big year: His play “The Lieutenant of Inishmore,” opened at the end of last month on Broadway. The award for Best Foreign Film was surprisingly uneventful. In recent weeks, a furor had arisen over the Oscar nomination of “Paradise Now,” a film that depicts the last 48 hours of a pair of suicide bombers in Palestine. An online petition emerged last week with more than 35,000 signatures demanding that the academy revoke the nomination because of the film’s depiction of suicide bombers. Last Friday, an Arab peace activist delivered a copy of the petition to the academy. The Oscar instead went to “Tsotsi,” a film about a South African gang leader.

Near the end of the evening, Philip Seymour Hoffman won for best actor in “Capote,” and Reese Witherspoon took the best actress statuette for “Walk the Line.” Both were favored to win.