Oscar nominations were announced at 5:38 this morning, continuing a tradition that have never been adequately explained to me. (Why so early in the morning? Does earning an Oscar nomination become sweeter if people have to wake you up to congratulate you?) Leading the way in nominations were Avatar and The Hurt Locker, both of which pick up nine nods each, many of them in the same categories.

The categories and nominations are...

BEST PICTURE

• Avatar
• The Blind Side
• District 9
• An Education
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Precious
• A Serious Man
• Up
• Up in the Air

• Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker
• James Cameron for Avatar
• Lee Daniels for Precious
• Jason Reitman for Up in the Air
• Quentin Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds

• Sandra Bullock for The Blind Side
• Helen Mirren - The Last Station
• Carey Mulligan - An Education
• Gabourey Sidibe for Precious
• Meryl Streep for Julie & Julia

• Jeff Bridges for Crazy Heart
• George Clooney for Up in the Air
• Colin Firth for A Single Man
• Morgan Freeman for Invictus
• Jeremy Renner for The Hurt Locker

• Matt Damon for Invictus
• Woody Harrelson for The Messenger
• Christopher Plummer for The Last Station
• Stanley Tucci for The Lovely Bones
• Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds

• Penelope Cruz for Nine
• Vera Farmiga for Up in the Air
• Maggie Gyllenhaal for Crazy Heart
• Anna Kendrick for Up in the Air
• Mo'Nique for Precious

• Mark Boal for The Hurt Locker
• Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman for The Messenger
• Joel and Ethan Coen for A Serious Man
• Pete Docter, Thomas McCarthy, and Bob Peterson for Up
• Quentin Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds

• Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, and Tony Roche for In the Loop
• Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell for District 9
• Geoffrey Fletcher for Precious
• Nick Hornby for An Education
• Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner for Up in the Air

• Coraline
• Fantastic Mr. Fox
• The Princess and the Frog
• The Secret of Kells
• Up

• Ajami (Israel)
• The Milk of Sorrow (Peru)
• A Prophet (France)
• The Secret in Their Eyes (Argentina)
• The White Ribbon (Germany)

• Burma VJ
• The Cove
• Food, Inc.
• The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
• Which Way Home

• China's Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province
• The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner
• The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant
• Music by Prudence
• Rabbit à la Berlin

• The Door
• Instead of Abracadabra
• Kavi
• Miracle Fish
• The New Tenants

• Avatar
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• The White Ribbon

• Avatar
• The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
• Nine
• Sherlock Holmes
• The Young Victoria

• Bright Star
• Coco Before Chanel
• The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
• Nine
• The Young Victoria

• Il Divo
• Star Trek
• The Young Victoria

• Avatar
• District 9
• Star Trek

• Avatar
• District 9
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Precious

• Avatar
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Star Trek
• Up

• Avatar
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Star Trek
• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

• Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders for The Hurt Locker
• Alexandre Desplat for Fantastic Mr. Fox
• Michael Giacchino for Up
• James Horner for Avatar
• Hans Zimmer for Sherlock Holmes

• Crazy Heart - "The Weary Kind"
• Faubourg 36 - "Loin de Paname"
• Nine - "Take It All"
• The Princess and the Frog - "Down in New Orleans"
• The Princess and the Frog - "Almost There"

• Avatar led the way with nine nominations. Granted, The Hurt Locker also earned nine nominations, but something tells me Avatar will be dominating the news. This combined with the box office records it has been setting could generate $10 million to $20 million in additional free publicity.
• Inglourious Basterds was also a major player with eight nominations, while Precious and Up in the Air both earned six.
• I was happiest to see Up earn multiple nominations, five of them, including Best Picture. It will likely only win Best Animated Picture, but it deserves a clean sweep.
• Looking for surprises... I'm not seeing many. The Blind Side for Best Picture is the most surprising inclusion in that list, while The Secret of Kells is a shock for Best Animated Picture, simply because it is such a small film compared the others on the list. I think when that nomination was announced most people watching the nominations said, "Never heard of it."
• Meryl Streep earned a nomination for Julie & Julia, which was not exactly expected. However, she's earned more than a dozen Oscar nominations, so it is never a shock when she earns another.
• The Cove earned yet another nomination and it has to be considered the favorite for Best Documentary.
• Speaking of which, there are heavy favorites in a number of categories, including Best Supporting Actor (Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds, for instance). But there are a number of awards that are completely up in the air (both Adapted and Original Screenplay are a mystery to me).
• We will have more detailed analysis of the big categories once our Oscar Prediction Contest gets underway.
• Update: There has been a lot of talk about The Hangover being snubbed for Best Picture. However, I don't think this is the case. It earned 78% positive reviews, which is great for its genre, it is amazing for its genre, but it is not exactly Oscar worthy. ... It is better than The Blind Side, so there could be some legitimacy to these complaints, but Star Trek was better, Drag Me To Hell was better, even Zombieland was better. So to focus on The Hangover being snubbed doesn't make sense.

- C.S.Strowbridge

Date posted: 2010-02-02