83rd Academy Awards

Honestly, what must Christopher Nolan do in order for him to get an Oscar nomination for Best Director? His fist major theatrical film, Memento, got him and Oscar nom for best Adapted Screenplay, but he did not win. The a few years down the road there came this little ity-bity movie called The Dark Knight that was the highest grossing film of the year, one of the best reviewed of the year, and considered by many the greatest comic book movie ever made, and he didn't get nominated for screenplay, picture, or director. Then came this past year another little movie called Inception. And this morning the Oscar nominations were announced and once again Mr. Nolan was snubbed out of Best Director. This is just a slap in the face from the Academy. "Yes Mr. Nolan, your movie might possibly be one of the greatest movies of the year, and yes, we might let you receive your own statuette for Best Original Screenplay (only because Aaron Sorkin's The Social Network is Adapted), but you aren't a good enough director to be in the same class as Mr. Aronofsky or Mr. Hooper or Mr. Fincher. But luck next time sport."

But here I am, editorializing. That's not the point of this blog. Here are the nominations and tomorrow I will have my next review and addition to my serial.


Best Motion Picture of the Year


■Black Swan

■The Fighter

■Inception

■The Kids are All Right

■The King's Speech

■127 Hours

■The Social Network

■Toy Story 3

■True Grit

■Winter's Bone


Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

■Annette Bening (The Kids are All Right)

■Nicole Kidman (Rabbit Hole)

■Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone)

■Natalie Portman (Black Swan)

■Michelle Williams (Blue Valentine)


Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

■Javier Bardem (Biutiful)

■Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network)

■Colin Firth (The King's Speech)

■James Franco (127 Hours)

■Jeff Bridges (True Grit)


Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

■Christian Bale (The Fighter)

■John Hawkes (Winter's Bone)

■Jeremy Renner (The Town)

■Mark Ruffalo (The Kids are All Right)

■Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech)


Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

■Amy Adams (The Fighter)

■Helena Bonham Carter (The King's Speech)

■Melissa Leo (The Fighter)

■Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit)

■Jacki Weaver (Animal Kingdom)


Best Animated Feature Film of the Year

■How to Train Your Dragon

■The Illusionist

■Toy Story 3


Best Documentary Short Subject

■Killing in the Name

■Poster Girl

■Strangers No More

■Sun Come Up

■The Warriors of Qiugang


Best Short Film (Animated)

■Day & Night Teddy Newton

■The Gruffalo Jakob Schuh and Max Lang

■Let's Pollute Geefwee Boedoe

■The Lost Thing Shaun Tan and Andrew Ruhemann

■Madagascar, carnet de voyage (Madagascar, a Journey Diary) Bastien Dubois


Best Short Film (Live Action)

■The Confession Tanel Toom

■The Crush Michael Creagh

■God of Love Luke Matheny

■Na Wewe Ivan Goldschmidt

■Wish 143 Ian Barnes and Samantha Waite


Achievement in Art Direction
■Alice in Wonderland

■Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

■Inception

■The King's Speech

■True Grit


Achievement in Cinematography

■Black Swan (Matthew Libatique)

■Inception (Wally Pfister)

■The King's Speech (Danny Cohen)

■The Social Network (Jeff Cronenweth)

■True Grit (Roger Deakins)


Achievement in Costume Design

■Alice in Wonderland (Colleen Atwood)

■I Am Love (Antonella Cannarozzi)

■The King's Speech (Jenny Beaven)

■The Tempest (Sandy Powell)

■True Grit (Mary Zophres)


Achievement in Directing

■Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan)

■David O. Russell (The Fighter)

■Tom Hooper (The King's Speech)

■David Fincher (The Social Network)

■Joel and Ethan Coen (True Grit)


Best Documentary Feature

■Exit through the Gift Shop Banksy, director (Paranoid Pictures)

■Gasland Josh Fox, director (Gasland Productions, LLC)

■Inside Job Charles Ferguson, director (Representational Pictures)

■Restrepo Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger, directors (Outpost Films)

■Waste Land Lucy Walker, director (Almega Projects)


Achievement in Makeup

■Barney's Version

■The Way Back

■The Wolfman


Achievement in Film Editing

■Black Swan (Andrew Weisblum)

■The Fighter (Pamela Martin)

■The King's Speech (Tariq Anwar)

■127 Hours (Jon Harris)

■The Social Network (Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall)


Best Foreign Language Film of the Year

■Biutiful (Mexico)

■Dogtooth (Greece)

■In a Better World (Denmark)

■Incendies (Canada)

■Hors la Loi (Algeria)


Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Score)

■How to Train Your Dragon (John Powell)

■Inception (Hans Zimmer)

■The King's Speech (Alexandre Desplat)

■127 Hours (A.R. Rahman)

■The Social Network (Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross)


Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Song)

■"Coming Home" from Country Strong Music and Lyric by Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey

■"I See the Light" from Tangled Music and Lyric by Alan Menken Lyric by Glenn Slater

■"If I Rise" from 127 Hours Music by A.R. Rahman Lyric by Dido and Rollo Armstrong

■"We Belong Together" from Toy Story 3 Music and Lyric by Randy Newman


Achievement in Sound Editing

■Inception

■Toy Story 3

■TRON: Legacy

■True Grit

■Unstoppable


Achievement in Sound Mixing

■Inception

■The King's Speech

■Salt

■The Social Network

■True Grit


Achievement in Visual Effects

■Alice in Wonderland

■Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

■Hereafter

■Inception

■Iron Man 2


Adapted Screenplay

■127 Hours (Simon Beaufoy and Danny Boyle)

■The Social Network (Aaron Sorkin)

■Toy Story 3 (Michael Arndt, story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich)

■True Grit (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)

■Winter's Bone (Debra Granik and Anne Rossellini)


Original Screenplay

■Another Year (Mike Leigh)

■The Fighter (Paul Attanasio, Lewis Colich, Eric Johnson, Scott Silverand Paul Tamasy)

■Inception (Christopher Nolan)

■The Kids are All Right (Stuart Blumberg and Lisa Cholodenko)

■The King's Speech (David Seidler)