In an 11th hour shocker, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences shut out Bill Condon’s Dreamgirls from all of the major categories – screenplay, director and picture. But the film still managed to lead the nominations with eight total, including three song nominations.
The Directors Guild almost always predicts what will be nominated for Best Picture. Even if the film’s director is snubbed, the film itself usually is in. This year, two directors off that list were left out of the running: Bill Condon for Dreamgirls and the directing duo, Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton for Little Miss Sunshine.
The inclusion of Clint Eastwood for director instead (and Paul Greengrass for United 93), along with his Best Picture nomination for Letters From Iwo Jima, shows that the Academy “corrected” the guild shutout of Letters, and put its full weight behind Eastwood in a show of support for his grand achievement of putting out two war movies, from opposing sides, in the same year.
The acting categories were mostly as expected, with the biggest life-changing nod for Jackie Earle Haley for Little Children. The Todd Field film received three Oscar nominations, including one for Kate Winslet for Best Actress and an Adapted Screenplay nod.
Making a big splash were the three amigos: Guillermo Del Toro, whose great film Pan’s Labyrinth was nominated for a total of six Oscars, including Best Foreign Language Film (it should easily win there); Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Babel, leading the Best Picture contenders with seven nominations; and Alfonso Cuaron’s Children of Men, which picked up a screenplay nod, as well as one for cinematography and one for film editing, with three total. This is a record year for Latino filmmakers, but especially for Mexican directors.
Best Picture is wide open, with the strongest possibilities being Martin Scorsese’s The Departed versus Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Babel. But in truth, any film could take it and it wouldn’t be that big of a surprise. Little Miss Sunshine takes a hit without a director nod.
A sampling of nominees as follows:
Leading Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio Blood Diamond
Ryan Gosling Half Nelson
Peter O’Toole Venus
Will Smith The Pursuit of Happyness
Forest Whitaker The Last King of Scotland
Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin Little Miss Sunshine
Jackie Earle Haley Little Children
Djimon Hounsou Blood Diamond
Eddie Murphy Dreamgirls
Mark Wahlberg The Departed
Leading Actress
Penelope Cruz Volver
Judi Dench Notes on a Scandal
Helen Mirren The Queen
Meryl Streep The Devil Wears Prada
Kate Winslet Little Children
Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza Babel
Cate Blanchett Notes on a Scandal
Abigail Breslin Little Miss Sunshine
Jennifer Hudson Dreamgirls
Rinko Kikuchi Babel
Directing
Babel Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
The Departed Martin Scorsese
Letters from Iwo Jima Clint Eastwood
The Queen Stephen Frears
United 93 Paul Greengrass
Motion Picture
Babel
The Departed
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen
Animated Feature
Cars John Lasseter
Happy Feet George Miller
Monster House Gil Kenan
Original Screenplay
Babel
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
Pan’s Labyrinth
The Queen
Original song
I Need to Wake Up (An Inconvenient Truth)
Listen (Dreamgirls)
Love You I Do (Dreamgirls)
Our Town (Cars)
Patience (Dreamgirls)
Visual Effects
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
Poseidon
Superman Returns
