So, the AMPAS didn’t embarrass itself TOO much this morning. At the end of the day, “Invictus” proved to lack the proper passionate support to yield a Best Picture nomination. The beneficiary of that: “The Blind Side.” Make of that what you will.
“Avatar” and “The Hurt Locker” — get this — tied with a field-leading nine nominations each. “Inglourious Basterds” wasn’t far behind with eight, while “Precious” and “Up in the Air” tied with six apiece. Pixar’s “Up” managed five, while “District 9” and “Star Trek,” the other sci-fi entries in the race, each received four, the former landing a Best Picture nomination and trending on Twitter as I type. But how the hell it missed in Best Makeup is beyond me. More on the techs below.
“The Blind Side” and “A Serious Man” get the “winner of two Oscar nominations, including Best Picture” honors. But at least the latter made the cut after all. There was some nervousness for a while there.
As I look through the nominations, I see nothing particularly eye-catching. All of the “surprises” seem awfully reasonable and make perfect sense. First and foremost, I’m kicking myself for blinking on Maggie Gyllenhaal in “Crazy Heart.” In fact, I had that supporting actress category pegged 5/5 24 hours ago. That’s what I get for over-thinking it. I’m really happy to see her slide into contention. She worked it last month and at just the right time.
Unfortunately, though, her writer/director, Scott Cooper, was left off of the adapted screenplay contenders. He has a bright future ahead of him regardless, offers coming in left and right, so he’ll be just fine and might find himself back on Oscar’s doorstep one day. The film that DID make it into that adapted field was “In the Loop,” which makes perfect sense and seemed a safe back-up bet to me yesterday.
As for original screenplays, hallelujah, “(500) Days of Summer” was snubbed. And in favor of “The Messenger,” no less. Class. I really thought a Best Picture nod was in Oren Moverman’s future when this category was announced.
The tech fields are what they are. “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” was thankfully remembered for its crafts, while “Avatar” was the expected dominating party.
Most revealing is the film editing category, where “Precious” managed a surprising (and MOST deserving) nomination. If you go by Oscar history, one of those films will win Best Picture or it would be the first time in nearly 30 years that it didn’t happen. Then again, using the preferential balloting system for the winners could change that this year.
Elsewhere, Guy and I were correct in our assumption that Dion Beebe would be the lenser left off of the cinematography list, but it was Bruno Delbonnel’s work on “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” that made the cut rather than “The Road,” which is what we were thinking.
I had a hunch that if “Il Divo” had enough gas to make it to the bake-off then it might slid into the makeup field, and so it did, while the visual effects category was the only field throughout the techs that I nailed 100% Then again, who was betting on any other trio?
“Inglourious Basterds” managed nominations in both sound categories, as I suspected it might. Michael Minkler and Wylie Stateman are titans of their fields. And in the music categories — WHEW — “The Weary Kind” got its much deserved nomination and should go on to win the big prize.
The surprise nominee for song was a tune from “Paris 36,” while over in the score category, Alexandre Desplat managed to pull out a nod for “Fantastic Mr. Fox” after all, alongside Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders for their haunting work on “The Hurt Locker.”
Oh, in the animated feature category, it was “The Secret of Kells,” an Annie nominee you might recall, that got in over “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” rather than “Ponyo.” Very interesting. I’ll see the film some time next week at the Santa Barbara Film Festival. And in the documentary feature category (which had better be a clear path for “The Cove” on Oscar night), I was sad to see “Mugabe and the White African” miss, but you just never know what that committee will do.
Anyway, you can mull over the list of nominees below and draw your own conclusions. I have nothing major to complain about, to be perfectly honest. Yeah, the “Blind Side” nomination is silly, but it was either that or “Invictus,” so what can you do?
Anyway, the race between David and Goliath continues. I think the amount of support shown for “The Hurt Locker” speaks for itself, though, with clear support from the actors and the writers, which Cameron’s film just didn’t get. But with a preferential balloting system, things are a bit more wide open than the two-horse race we’ve boiled it down to, so we’ll see.
As for the experiment with the 10, I imagine by most counts, it will be considered a success. That is definitely a unique mixture of American film product. It’s a shame something truly independent like “Crazy Heart” or “The Messenger” couldn’t find room, but I think they were clearly close, so the logic holds that they still have a better opportunity in a scheme such as this.
As far as predictions, I managed 85/116 in the 23 categories I attempted. 94/116 if you count alternates. And I went 39/45 in the top eight categories.
Stick around throughout the day. Guy will offer his thoughts soon enough, while I’ll be taking nominees’ reactions for most of the morning and afternoon.
Best Picture
“Avatar”
“The Blind Side”
“District 9”
“An Education”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”
“A Serious Man”
“Up”
“Up in the Air”
Best Director
James Cameron, “Avatar”
Kathryn Bigelow, “The Hurt Locker”
“Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”
“Lee Daniels, “Precious”
Jason Reitman, “Up in the Air”
Best Actor
Jeff Bridges, “Crazy Heart”
George Clooney, “Up in the Air”
Colin Firth, “A Single Man”
Morgan Freeman, “Invictus”
Jeremy Renner, “The Hurt Locker”
Best Actress
Sandra Bullock, “The Blind Side”
Helen Mirren, “The Last Station”
Carey Mulligan, “An Education”
Gabourey Sidibe, “Precious”
Meryl Streep, “Julie & Julia”
Best Supporting Actor
Matt Damon, “Invictus”
Woody Harrelon, “The Messenger”
Christopher Plummer, “The Last Station”
Stanley Tucci, “The Lovely Bones”
Christoph Waltz, “Inglourious Basterds”
Best Supporting Actress
Penelope Cruz, “Nine”
Vera Farmiga, “Up in the Air”
Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Crazy Heart”
Anna Kendrick, “Up in the Air”
Mo’Nique, “Precious”
Best Adapted Screenplay
“District 9”
“An Education”
“In the Loop”
“Precious”
“Up in the Air”
Best Original Screenplay
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“The Messenger”
“A Serious Man”
“Up”
Best Animated Feature Film
“Coraline”
“Fantastic Mr. Fox”
“The Princess and the Frog”
“The Secret of Kells”
“Up”
Best Foreign Language Film
“Ajami” (Israel)
“The Milk of Sorrow” (Peru)
“A Prophet” (France)
“The Secret in Their Eyes” (Argentina)
“The White Ribbon” (Germany)
Best Art Direction
“Avatar”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine”
“Sherlock Holmes”
“The Young Victoria”
Best Cinematography
“Avatar”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”
“The Hurt Locker”
“The White Ribbon”
Best Costume Design
“Bright Star”
“Coco Before Chanel”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine”
“The Young Victoria”
Best Film Editing
“Avatar”
“District 9”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”
Best Makeup
“Il Divo”
“Star Trek”
“The Young Victoria”
Best Music (Original Score)
“Avatar”
“Fantastic Mr. Fox”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Sherlock Holmes”
“Up”
Best Music (Original Song)
“Almost There” from “The Princess and the Frog”
“Down in New Orleans” from “The Princess and the Frog”
“Loin de Paname” from “Paris 36”
“Take it All” from “Nine”
“The Weary Kind” from “Crazy Heart”
Best Sound Editing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Up”
Best Sound Mixing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”
Best Visual Effects
“Avatar”
“District 9”
“Star Trek”
Best Documentary Feature
“Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country”
“The Cove”
“Food, Inc.”
“The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers”
“Which Way Home”
Best Documentary Short
“China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province”
“The Last Campaign of Booth Gardener”
“The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”
“Music by Prudence”
“Rabbit a la Berlin”
Best Short Film (Animated)
“French Roast”
“Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty”
“The Lady and the Reaper”
“Logorama”
“A Matter of Loaf and Death”
Best Short Film (Live Action)
“The Door”
“Instead of Abracadabra”
“Kavi”
“Miracle Fish”
“The New Tenants”
Comments
177 responses to “‘Avatar,’ ‘Hurt Locker’ lead Oscar nods with 9 each”
In a perfect world Sharlto Copley and Sam Rockwell would be on that Best Actor list but it’s a fine batch of nominees this year anyway.
Ooh, btw Kris, in this paragraph:
….Didn’t you mean to say “the latter”?
If I read correctly Inglourious Basterds got 9 Nominations (Waltz, Kruger, Director, Oscreenplay, Picture, Sound, Sound E., Editing, Cinematography)
Did’t expect Kruger.
I’ve just seen The Young Victoria last night!
nominated for MAKEUP??????
:))) ridiculous. The work done on Paul Bettany was average stuff
James: Indeed I do. Sigh. It’s early. I need to snap out of it already. Do let me know if there are any other major fuck-ups.
Kruger is not nominated. Monique is.
At least Kevin O’Connell doesn’t have to worry about losing for the 21st time, since Public Enemies wasn’t nominated for sound mixing.
DAMN, NO ZOE SALDANA!
Now THAT would have been the sh!t !
I hope The Blind Side wins Best Picture, it was easily the biggest surprise and fan favourite after AVATAR and ordinary people liked it.
Sometimes, I forget that you’re on the west coast, because I assume everyone’s NYC-metro-area-based like me. You and the nominees will probably go narcoleptic without warning =). That’s always fun.
So I take it we can all retire “Eastwood Panic” now? Or will Hereafter be on everyone’s predictions in 2 months? Haha.
Yeah, I guess at least Foreign looks “Respectable”.
And the other mike, that’s what the People’s Choice Awards are for. C’mon.
i have this feeling that maggie gyllenhaal is gonna have the biggest upset on march 7th.
Overall I’m pretty pleased with the final list; ever since Ebert predicted The Blind Side I’d had a hunch about it myself, but I never thought it’d actually make it. But like Kris said, it’s either that or Invictus, which was my prediction in the 10th slot.
Also, out of the 106 nominees I attempted (I didn’t try any of the short films), I predicted 89 correctly, which is actually my best attempt in the 4 years I’ve been doing this!
My reactions…
1) Maggie Gyllenhaal ? instead of Julianne Moore?? No Way
There is already Oscar Buzz for Julianne Moore” for “The Kids Are All Right” too!
This time im sure will be more than just buzz…
sad!
I really wanted to hear her name this morning…
2) The BLIND SIDE?? instead of Invictus? could be any other one….
3) Im Glad NINE didnt make it, except for Penelpe Cruz, she deserves it!
4) Sandra Bullock (Miss Congeniality, The Proposal, Speed) after Kate Winslet?? Is this a Joke?
I mean do u remember Winslet Perefect performance in the reader? compare to Bullock?? no way!
Meryl HAVE to win!!
Han:
Yeah……no……
the other mike:
Yeah…..no…..times one-million.
Come on, people. Let’s not get weird.
“And who fucking called that either District 9 or Star Trek would drop out of editing, letting the Basterds in. That’s right, Megan did.”
Well, I called “Basterds” getting in over “Up in the Air.” Do I get a cookie too?
I wonder if everyone momentarily freaked when “Avatar” was read first, only to have “An Education” pop up a few seconds later due to some unforeseen alphabetizing.
Congratulations Penelope.
Winners: The hurt locker, Bigelow, Bullock, Bridges, Waltz, Monique… :(
My winners: AVATAR, Bigelow, Streep, Firth, Tucci, Monique. :)
Glad, Maggie Gyllenhaal that got in, finally. She is by far the best actress in that category. Mo’nique? Kendrick? Eh.
I’m thrilled by the BP and Screenplay nods for District 9. Would go so far to say that doesn’t bode well for Avatar’s chances for winning BP while helping THL.
Clearly, there’s a lot of deserved love for District 9. I finally saw it over the weekend and consider it the anti-Avatar. Yes, there’s CGI, but live actors still rule the day. Copley is amazing, especially knowing he improvised his dialogue. Yet even all the “talking heads” in the film make significant contributions. It successfully feels like a documentary.
Sure, I’m disappointed that Mackie was overlooked; Sarsgaard, too. (I think he was even more deserving than Molina.) I do believe, though, that THL will rule the day.
Han, You never know.Crazy Heart could be another Pollock (though I imagine Bridges unlike Ed Harris will be up on stage). I remember seeing Kate Hudson already starting to get out of her chair when Marcia Gay Harden’s name was called that year. Though I think none of the big five (Hurt, Avatar, Precious, Basterds and Air) will go home emptyhanded so I expect Mo’Nique to be Precious’ lone win.
My thoughts:
1. (500) Days of Summer and Fantastic Mr. Fox being left out of screenplay depresses me, but I guess the academy’s writing branch doesn’t have many 20something hipster douchebags in it.
2. If someone had said that The Blind Side would have been at all involved in the Oscar season, I would have laughed at them until my voice went hoarse. Shows what I know.
3. Someone, somewhere, predicted The Secret of Kells. Guaran-fucking-tee it.
Give it up Kris,
you are always oscar bashing but this year they came through with the best picks of the lot of the awards season. SRSLY we know how much you hated invictus. I’m surprised you are not running naked screaming through the streets haha
anyway kudos to the AMPAS for a good year
Hans said:
What the hell are you talking about? Why would you think it would have been read first? “An” is an article, just like “a” and “the”, and one doesn’t alphabetize using the articles.
Guy – You might want to reconsider the disposition of the people who vote on the foreign film committee. They voted “Milk of Sorrow” into the top five and you were surprised it made the short list. I don’t think these people are given enough credit – this is another fine list of unconventional movies that took risks while trying to explore interesting and rich themes.
Sandra Bullock can’t lose now.
Lance: They did a respectable job this year. But they’re still the same people who snubbed “Gomorrah,” and chose “Departures” over “The Class” and “Waltz With Bashir” a year ago. I’ll wait and see who they pick as their winner before I grant them a total reprieve ;)
Did the Hurt Locker get nominated for Best Score? How crazy.
Meh. I thought Departures was way better than The Class.
Guy:
I totally didn’t even look at the fact that UITA didn’t get an editing nod; was too distracted with seeing which among Star Trek or District 9 would drop out.
BUT…..I’ll make sure I bring enough cookies for everyone here.
And I already bought those foil star stickers and put one on my forehead for being so damned awesome. You get one, too.
Has there ever been a time before when half of the best picture nominees grossed over 100 million pre-nom?
No Cat Piano?
Nono: Crazyawesome. (I love you, Demetri Martin.)
Also, boo. The Class is extraordinary. I finally saw it recently, and I was flabbergasted when I took a look at the IMDb message board full of brain damage. It’s amusing how few people got it, and how many wanted some uplifting Lifetime crap. Sprinkle some Vagisil and get over it.
I don’t understand why everyone HATES The Blind Side… Good hell! Get over it…its was a legitimately good film. Just because it isn’t whatprudes consider “high art” doesn’t mean it can’t be nominated. Fact is…people that watched it….and a lot of people did watch it (check the numners)…enjoyed it! I think I remember last year EVERYONE bitching about The Dark Knight not getting nominated eventhough it had so much critical acclaim and box office success. Here we are a year later and you’re all bitching again. I think the Acedemy is SICK of this crap. Good for them for picking something most people saw and enjoyed instead of some stupid holocaust movie that nobody saw. By the way….Sandra Bullock was great…if Meryl Streep had played the exact same role you’d all have a wet dream and talk about how amazing she was. Can The Blind Side haters just shut the hell up… Get over it and get a life. Besides lest be honest it is all a two horse race…Avatar and The Hurt Locker.
Well I guess the Academy is simply sick of Clint.
GT was definitly one of the best of 2008 and Invictus is clearly top material. With MF and MD nominated it seems clear that is the Clint they didn´t want to vote for. I guess they believe 2 is too much…such a shame especially if TBS or ASM is in.
I guess THL will win more easily than expected with 4 ou 5 nods. The weighnet ballot could be the only mess up there. Probably it will be
THL-Bigelow-Bridges-Bullock-Waltz-MoNique-Up-Cove-Das Weiss Band-Inglorious for OS and Up in the Air for AS.
Great job guys!
The hurt locker noooo pleaseeeeeeeeeeee!
All in all, I’m pretty happy with the nominations. Especially since they chose to ignore that awful Leona Lewis “song” at the end of Avatar. Result.
Miguel wrote:
Fixed.
The one nomination that really bugs me is the best score nod for the Hurt Locker. How did ambient noise beat out something like New Moon? I similar thing has happened the past few years with films like Michael Clayton and Babel. It just demonstrates the lack of care many put into the music categories.
“Has there ever been a time before when half of the best picture nominees grossed over 100 million pre-nom?”
I believe this happened in 2000. Two 100+ movies happened more often.
My biggets headscratchers:
The Young Victoria for Make-Up? You might as well nom UP for Make-Up. Makes no sense whatsoever.
The Blind Sdie for Best Pic – OK, I have hated some Best Pic noms in the past, but they were at least good film, made well, with great critiques. This film? Mediocre with a goodish lead performance. HOW DOES THAT MAKE TOP 10?
Heck, STAR TREK, and CRAZY HEART had strong demographic appeal, craftsmanship, critical support, & multiple nominations this morning. How did they miss?
luke828, with all due respect, I felt the same way til I went back and listened to some youtube clips of THL’s score and it actually is quite haunting and good.
I can’t say I’m disapppointed, but I expected more nice surprises (Laurent, Mackie, Korzeniowski) – instead, we have only two – Maggie Gyllenhaal and “Milk of Sorrow”, a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant film.
Luke, given what you said, I think “The Hurt Locker” can now be considered dark horse for Best Score.
District 9 gets to go to the DAAAAAANCE!!!!
w00t! Although I agree the Makeup snub is egregrious.
Colin Firth!!! yes yes yes! (can you tell I just read these?)
Time will heal THE BLIND SIDE shock and pain. Seriously, when the Academy was essentially instructed to go populist and middlebrow in order to compensate for films like THL and A SERIOUS MAN, we had to see it coming. Remember that older, more traditional voters attend screenings and reportedly never fail to vote. Digging for 10, they found THE BLIND SIDE.
Thanks, James, I was wondering about that Gran Torino typo…