They had to wait all night, enduring that silent disappointment that comes when an award you’ve been nominated for goes to someone else. But as the 69th annual Golden Globe Awards came to an end Sunday, the filmmakers behind "The Descendants" walked away with Best Picture, and the star of the Hawaii story, George Clooney, received Best Actor, Drama.

The poignant story about a Hawaii family in crisis, which was inspired by the novel by local author Kaui Hart Hemmings, had received five nominations. But the film’s nominees for best director (Alexander Payne), best supporting actress (Shailene Woodley) and best screenplay went to other films.

The last two awards of the three-hour show, however, went to "The Descendants."

"It was nerve-wracking but it was terrific," producer Jim Burke said by telephone.

Even though critics had praised the film for months, Burke said he and Payne felt like a man who walks into a room on his birthday and everyone shouts "surprise."

"It’s all just being sorted out in our heads," Burke said.

The filmmakers had planned a longer thank-you to the people of Hawaii but were told just before their awards were announced that all speeches needed to be cut short.

"We are really, really grateful," Burke said after the show. "If we could do it over again, the only thing we would express more emphatically was our gratitude for the people of Hawaii."

Burke praised Clooney’s performance, saying it was the best of the actor’s career.

Clooney plays attorney Matt King, a descendant of a 19th-century Hawaiian princess and a Caucasian banker, who must address the reality that his comatose wife is about to die from a brain injury and that she was also having an affair. At the same time, he is also trying to reconnect with his two rebellious daughters and negotiate the sale of his family’s extensive land holdings.

"His performance was a performance that we have never seen him give before," Burke said. "He ordinarily plays a pretty cool customer, but in this picture he was vulnerable and he had conflicting emotions. He really showed his range as an actor."

Hemmings watched the awards in her Maunawili home with her 7-year-old daughter, Eleanor Lautenbach, who had seen "Hugo" but not "The Descendants," so was torn about which film to root for.

Toward the end of the show, Hemmings even told her daughter that "The Descendants" wouldn’t win.

When it did, the smile on her daughter’s face outshone the polished award.

"She was screaming with joy, ‘Descendants,’" Hemmings said. "She has never seen the movie, but she has been with me through this whole process so it was fun to see her so excited."

The author admitted that she really didn’t expect this. But to see the filmmakers on stage overwhelmed her to the point of tears.

"I was so thrilled for them," she said. "But I would be thrilled for them with or without the award. For that to be the last thing on the award show — well, I was very proud."