Oscar Nods Out in the Open

Let the ferocious film fanatic in me share this year’s Oscar nominees in the major categories, which I got from the live BBC broadcast a few hours ago:

Picture: Brokeback Mountain; Capote; Crash; Good Night, and Good Luck; Munich.

Director: George Clooney, for Good Night, and Good Luck; Paul Haggis, for Crash; Ang Lee, for Brokeback Mountain; Bennett Miller, for Capote; Steven Spielberg, for Munich.

Actor: Philip Seymour Hoffman, in Capote; Terrence Howard, in Hustle & Flow; Heath Ledger, in Brokeback Mountain; Joaquin Phoenix, in Walk the Line; David Straithairn, in Good Night, and Good Luck.

Actress: Judi Dench, in Mrs. Henderson Presents; Felicity Huffman, in Transamerica; Keira Knightley, in Pride & Prejudice; Charlize Theron, in North Country; Reese Witherspoon, in Walk the Line.

Supporting Actor: George Clooney, in Syriana; Matt Dillon, in Crash; Paul Giamatti, in Cinderella Man; Jake Gyllenhaal, in Brokeback Mountain; William Hurt, in A History of Violence.

Supporting Actress: Amy Adams, in Junebug; Catherine Keener, in Capote; Frances McDormand, in North Country; Rachel Weisz, in The Constant Gardener; Michelle Williams, in Brokeback Mountain.

Original Screenplay: Crash, by Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco; Good Night, and Good Luck, by George Clooney and Grant Heslov; Match Point, by Woody Allen; The Squid and the Whale, by Noah Baumbach; Syriana, by Stephen Gaghan.

Adapted Screenplay: Brokeback Mountain, by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana; Capote, by Dan Futterman; The Constant Gardener, by Jeffrey Caine; A History of Violence, by Josh Olson; Munich, by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth.

Foreign Language Film: Don’t Tell, from Italy; Joyeux Noël, from France; Paradise Now, from Palestine; Sophie Scholl—The Final Days, from Germany; Tsotsi, from South Africa.

Animated Feature Film: Howl’s Moving Castle, by Hayao Miyazaki; Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride, by Tim Burton and Mike Johnson; Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, by Nick Park and Steve Box.

Overall, not bad at all. There were some mild surprises, chief among them Keira Knightley’s nomination, bumping Ziyi Zhang from the lineup. I had hoped that David Cronenberg’s superb A History of Violence would fare more strongly in the major categories. In any case I’m glad William Hurt and Josh Olson’s screenplay were recognized. It’s better than nothing.

For the complete list of nominations, check it out here.