Jake Gittes

I think The Ghost Writer has an utterly ridiculous ending, which really hurts it as a whole, but it certainly should have been at least considered for original score and supporting actor & actress. In a weaker year, maybe even for best director - with regards to attention to detail, atmosphere and suspense-building, it was classic Polanski.

And Shallow Grave. And Beginners. Even Bay's The Island. Hell, the fact that he managed to give a fine, immensely likable and alive performance in the Star Wars Prequels says everything about what a reliable actor he is.

Ulrich Muhe - The Lives of Others Viggo Mortensen - A History of Violence Ewan McGregor - Moulin Rouge and Big Fish Julianne Moore - The Kids Are All Right

Brody was incredible in The Pianist. The fact that he played a Holocaust survivor sure helped, but I think the Academy should still be commended for choosing him over the likes DDL and Nicholson and being willing to make him the youngest winner ever. One of the better calls they ever made.

Sharlto Copley in District 9.

Guy Pearce - Memento Andy Serkis - The Two Towers Mark Ruffalo - Zodiac Andrew Garfield - The Social Network Tom Hardy - Bronson Michael Stuhlbarg - A Serious Man Leonardo Di Caprio - The Departed, Revolutionary Road, Shutter Island Uma Thurman and David Carradine - Kill Bill Vol. 2

Hell fucking no.

I thought it was a very good movie filled with great performances.

You actually think those are the rule, and not exceptions? I'm not saying they don't nominate auteurs, but for the majority of the time they do stay with the mainstream. No arthouse film was nominated for Best Director in between Diving Bell and The Tree of Life - that's 3 straight years of no auteurs. None was nominated in 2000, and 1999 (unless you consider Being John Malkovich an art film), none in 1990-1992. And when an auteur does get nominated, he's almost always the only one to make it in any given year (this year can be considered an exception I guess). Going back to your original point, this may be the group that throws a bone to an auteur when it feels like it, but it is NOT the group that would ever consider Affleck and Bigelow "too mainstream" and thus deny them nominations. With that, you're making the Oscars seem like a European film festival.

Best Actor: Jack Nicholson - One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Robert De Niro - Raging Bull Adrien Brody - The Pianist Daniel Day-Lewis - There Will Be Blood Best Actress: Vivien Leigh - A Streetcar Named Desire Elizabeth Taylor - Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Liza Minnelli - Cabaret Marion Cotillard - La Vie en Rose Best Supporting Actor: Walter Huston - The Treasure of the Sierra Madre George Sanders - All About Eve Joel Grey - Cabaret Michael Caine - Hannah and Her Sisters Joe Pesci - Goodfellas Gene Hackman - Unforgiven Martin Landau - Ed Wood Kevin Spacey - The Usual Suspects Heath Ledger - The Dark Knight Christoph Waltz - Inglourious Basterds Best Supporting Actress: Ruth Gordon - Rosemary's Baby Dianne Wiest - Hannah and Her Sisters If I were to pick the best of the best, I'd choose Nicholson and Leigh in the main categories... Supp. Actor is a real toss-up and in Supp. Actress I've seen way, way too few performances. But out of those I've seen, Gordon.

Sure. That's why they also snubbed Spielberg, Lee and Russell this year, Payne, Allen and Scorsese last year, Fincher and the Coens two years ago, and filled those spots with unknowns, up-and-comers, independent darlings and European auteurs. That's how daring and non-mainstream they are. Oh wait.

Went to see it twice in 2010, unfortunately hasn't got back to it since. But what I remember is wildly funny, heartfelt, has a cast of characters to kill for, and is as much a ridiculously underappreciated marvel in terms of visual effects, editing and overall detail as Speed Racer was two years earlier. I really need to go out and get this on Blu-ray.

I haven't seen most of his interviews, but barely kept myself from facepalming when in Hollywood Reporter's writers' roundtable discussion he denounced Schindler's List for being emotionally manipulative. Yeah, 'cause Amour is totally not. On the other hand, checking out his personal quotes on IMDb I didn't find anything to disagree with, quite the opposite for the most part.

One of the three or four greatest films I've ever seen. First time I watched it, I wasn't entirely sure what to expect (out of eone's films I'd only seen A Fistful of Dollars prior to it) and had a somewhat mixed reaction - the cinematography, the music, _that_ flashback scene, Bronson's coolness, Fonda's evilness, Robards' likability and Cardinale's beauty all instantly knocked me off my seat, but the very deliberate pacing and storytelling had me scratching my head. Still, there was a certain magnetic quality to the film that left me convinced I was going to return to it before long, and sure enough, by the third viewing I admired every single thing in there and wished I could spend as much time as possible in the film's world. A magnificent epic on the passing of the mythic Old West and the archetypes that inhabited it, with some of the finest cinematography and original music of all time.

Not seen Cache yet, but Benny's Video and The White Ribbon in particular are two of the most pretentious films I've seen. The Seventh Continent and Amour are mostly saved from that by the inherent simplicity of their premises, but Haneke doesn't exactly help himself with his style - the lack of music, the documentary-like realism, the long shots with camera standing in one place for minutes, the open ending, the length and B&W cinematography (all three in the case of TWR) - coming from him it all comes off as overtly deliberate and practically screaming "look what a dead-serious artist I am, look how important my themes are!". Except in the end, I haven't yet seen him entirely earn that attitude. The Seventh Continent is the closest he's come.

Yeah Anonymous is a great example.

Assassination of Jesse James? If I'm not mistaken WB fought long and hard with Dominik and Pitt about the film's length and pacing and when it couldn't have its way it pretty much dumped it. Although I'm not sure if they ever intended it to go wide right away, or were planning a platform roll-out with a later wide release from the beginning.

There may be no clear frontrunner, but TLJ has SAG, Waltz has a Globe and a BAFTA, and Hoffman has BFCA. De Niro has nothing except nominations. I'd be shocked if he won. And Haneke taking the screenplay from QT would be even more ridiculous than Boal doing it in '10. I actually think Django is one of Tarantino's two weakest films (Death Proof being the other), yet screenplay-wise it's still miles above all the other nominees as far as story, dialogue and characterization are concerned. The only one that rivals it is The Master and it's not in contention.

Same. Both are in my all-time top 5.

I have mixed feelings towards Hathaway. The character is pretty much an over-the-top melodramatic joke (just like the whole film), yet I couldn't help but admire her absolute devotion to the part.

After BFCA, Globes and now this, Tarantino is absolutely the frontrunner for Screenplay. Waltz is in a shakier position, but he's easily right behind TLJ and I wouldn't be surprised if he upset.

'Cause the Academy has a hard-on for both RR and 3D... perfect combination. Seriously, I'm no fan of Tree of Life, but its cinematography snub was last year's worst one. Maybe now that Lubezki has made a 3D film with Gravity they'll finally give it to him... it's about damn time.

The Academy has a serious hard-on for Robert Richardson. They've awarded him 3 Oscars already and still put him in competition practically every chance they get. What's funny is that he has like 10 ASC nominations (compared to 8 Oscar noms) to date, but he has yet to win there. What's also funny to me is that I think he did his best job ever on Shutter Island and never received any major nominations for that.

I loved him in The Departed too, but it was a pretty one-note part. In About Schmidt, he's on as high a level as he's ever been - subtle, layered and shedding a lot of his natural movie star charisma. And not that he doesn't deserve his unofficial retirement, but yeah, I'm pretty sad he's for the most part completely off the radar now. I'm sure he could find work if only he wanted to - I mean, Christopher Plummer is 8 years older and is doing great. Although he's definitely in a better physical shape, too.