Whale of a Start to Award Season

November 30, 2005

The Independent Spirit Awards announced the nominations today and The Squid and the Whale led the way with six nominations, including Best Feature, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and nods in three of the four acting categories.

Other films to grab multiple nominations include Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Good Night and Good Luck, and The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, all of which earned four nominations a piece.

Here are a complete list of nominations:

Best Feature:

• Brokeback Mountain
• Capote
• Good Night and Good Luck
• The Squid and the Whale
• The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada

Best First Feature

• Crash
• Lackawanna Blues
• Me and You and Everyone We Know
• Thumbsucker
• Transamerica

Best Director

• Gregg Araki for Mysterious Skin
• Noah Baumbach for The Squid and the Whale
• Rodrigo Garcia for Nine Lives
• George Clooney for Good Night and Good Luck
• Ang Lee for Brokeback Mountain

Best Female Lead

• Felicity Huffman in Transamerica
• Dina Korzun in Forty Shades of Blue
• Laura Linney in The Squid and the Whale
• S. Epatha Merkerson in Lackawanna Blues
• Cyndi Williams in Room

Best Male Lead

• Jeff Daniels in The Squid and the Whale
• Philip Seymour Hoffman in Capote
• Terrence Howard in Hustle & Flow
• Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain
• David Strathairn in Good Night and Good Luck

Best Supporting Male

• Firdous Bamji in The War Within
• Matt Dillon in Crash
• Jesse Eisenberg in The Squid and the Whale
• Barry Pepper in The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada
• Jeffrey Wright in Broken Flowers

Best Supporting Female

• Amy Adams in Junebug
• Maggie Gyllenhaal in Happy Endings
• Allison Janney in Our Very Own
• Michelle Williams in Brokeback Mountain
• Robin Wright Penn in Nine Lives

Best Screenplay

• Capote
• Nine Lives
• The Squid and the Whale
• The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada
• The War Within

Best First Screenplay

• The Beautiful Country
• Fixing Frank
• Junebug
• Me and You and Everyone We Know
• Transamerica

Best Cinematography

• Capote
• Good Night and Good Luck
• Keane
• Last Days
• The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada

Best Documentary

• Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
• Grizzly Man
• La Sierra
• Rom�ntico
• Sir! No Sir!

Best Foreign Film

• The Death of Mr. Lazarescu - Romania
• Duck Season - Mexico
• Head-On - Germany / Turkey
• Paradise Now - Palestine / Netherlands / Germany / France
• Tony Takitani - Japan

John Cassavettes Award - Best Feature made for under $500,000

• Brick
• Conventioneers
• Jellysmoke
• The Puffy Chair
• Room

Reactions:

• The fact that The Squid and the Whale lead the way with six nominations is a bit of a surprise. That is not to say it is a bad movie, but I didn't think it was that good.
• I'm more shocked that Heath Ledger earned an acting nomination over Brokeback Mountain co-star Jake Gyllenhaal.
• Crash picked up two nominations, which might be enough to remind Oscar voters that the movie was released this year giving it a chance at scoring an Oscar nod or two, but I wouldn't bet on it.
• Out of all of the nominations, I think Philip Seymour Hoffman's acting nod for Capote is the least surprising.
• Good Night and Good Luck was able to secure several nominations, but it didn't have to compete with George Clooney's other film, Syriana because the latter film's budget puts it out of contention for the Independent Spirit Awards consideration. Vote splitting could still be a problem for both films come Oscar time.

- C.S.Strowbridge

Source: Independent Feature Project

Filed under: Brokeback Mountain, Crash, Good Night, and Good Luck, Capote, Hustle & Flow, Broken Flowers, The Squid and the Whale, Los tres entierros de Melquiades Estrada, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, Me and You and Everyone We Know, Grizzly Man, Junebug, Brick, Paradise Now, Thumbsucker, Happy Endings, Mysterious Skin, Nine Lives, Last Days, The Beautiful Country, Gegen die Wand, Tony Takitani, Forty Shades of Blue, The War Within, Keane