- Hosts: Ellen Degeneres
- Air Date: March 2, 2014
- Channel: ABC (in the US at least)
Still reeling from their Golden Globe party hangovers, Hollywood had to get a little more serious this morning. Why? Because the Academy Award nominations were just announced. What did we learn? This is probably a three-horse race for Best Picture between American Hustle, Gravity, and 12 Years a Slave. Hustle and Gravity tied for the most nominations, 10, while 12 Years a Slave was right behind them with 9. Insta-prediction as to who will win: Gravity cleans up in the technical award categories (they had to basically create the technology used in their movie), Hustle in the acting categories, but 12 Years a Slave proves far too a “big, socially important” movie to not win Best Picture. Also, fans of The Butler, Enough Said, Saving Mr. Banks, Inside Llewyn Davis, and Fruitvale Station are likely unhappy campers right now after the Academy mostly ignored those films.
As always, there are surprises, and chief among them this year is that both Paul Greengrass and Tom Hanks were NOT nominated for Best Director and Actor, respectively, for Captain Phillips. They each appeared like locks for nominations. Plus, one should never…ever doubt the power of Harvey Weinstein. Yes, his Weinstein Company failed to turn its films The Butler, Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, and Fruitvale Station into Oscar contenders, but they managed to score big with Philomena and wring out a couple of acting nominations for the incredibly divisive August: Osage County.
The nominations attest to the continued time-honored power of being the freshest in voters’ memories, with November/December releases like 12 Years a Slave, American Hustle, Dallas Buyer’s Club, Her, Nebraska, Philomena, and the Wolf of Wall Street being well represented. Earlier 2013 releases like Mud, Fruitvale Station, Great Gatsby, and Prisoners which many adored went completely ignored by both the Academy and most other awards bodies. October releases like Gravity and Captain Phillips proved too large to forget, although Phillips did get snubbed in big categories, and a summer release like Blue Jasmine might have earned a Best Picture nomination had it come out more recently. Also current critical darling and box office champ Lone Survivor did qualify for nominations, but only earned a couple of technical nods from the Academy.
Thankfully, unlike last year, there are no real embarrassing “why on Earth did the Academy nominate Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close?” jokes to be made.
Without further adieu, here are the nominees:
THE BIG ONES
Best Motion Picture
- 12 Years a Slave
- American Hustle
- Captain Phillips
- Dallas Buyers Club
- Gravity
- Her
- Nebraska
- Philomena
- The Wolf of Wall Street
Notable Snubs: Lee Daniels’ The Butler, Blue Jasmine, Fruitvale Stations, Inside Llewyn Davis, Saving Mr. Banks
Best Director
- Alfonso Cuaron, Gravity
- Martin Scorsese, The Wolf of Wall Street
- Steve McQueen, 12 Years a Slave
- Alexander Payne, Nebraska
- David O. Russell, American Hustle
Note: These are the same people nominated in this category by the Golden Globes, except they nominated Greengrass instead of Scorsese.
Notable Snubs: The Coen Brothers (Inside Llewyn Davis), Paul Greengrass (Captain Phillips), Spike Jonze (Her), Lee Daniels (The Butler).
Best Actor
- Christian Bale, American Hustle
- Bruce Dern, Nebraska
- Leonardo DiCaprio, The Wolf of Wall Street
- Chiwetel Ejiofor, 12 Years a Slave
- Matthew McConaughey, Dallas Buyers Club
Notable Snubs: Tom Hanks (Captain Phillips), Robert Redford (All Is Lost), Oscar Isaac (Inside Llewyn Davis), Joaquin Phoenix (Her), Forest Whitaker (The Butler), Michael B. Jordan (Fruitvale Station)
Best Actress
- Amy Adams, American Hustle
- Cate Blanchett, Blue Jasmine
- Sandra Bullock, Gravity
- Judi Dench, Philomena
- Meryl Streep, August: Osage County
Notable Snubs: Emma Thompson (Saving Mr. Banks), Kate Winslet (Labor Day), Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Enough Said), Julie Delpy (Before Midnight)
Best Supporting Actor
- Bradley Cooper, American Hustle
- Michael Fassbender, 12 Years a Slave
- Jared Leto, Dallas Buyers Club
- Jonah Hill, The Wolf of Wall Street
- Barkhad Abdi, Captain Phillips
Note: These are the exact same men nominated in this category by the Golden Globes, except they nominated Daniel Bruhl from Rush instead of Jonah Hill.
Notable Snubs: Daniel Bruhl (Rush), Will Forte (Nebraska), Tom Hanks (Saving Mr. Banks), Matthew McConaughey (Mud).
Best Supporting Actress
- Sally Hawkins, Blue Jasmine
- Jennifer Lawrence, American Hustle
- Lupita Nyong’o, 12 Years a Slave
- Julia Roberts, August: Osage County
- June Squibb, Nebraska
Note: these are the exact same 5 women nominated in this category by the Golden Globes.
Notable Snubs: Oprah Winfrey (The Butler), Octavia Spencer (Fruitvale Station), Jennifer Garner (Dallas Buyers Club)
Best Adapted Screenplay
- Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy, Ethan Hake, Before Midnight
- Billy Ray, Captain Phillips
- Jeff Pope and Steve Coogan, Philomena
- John Ridley, 12 Years a Slave
- Terence Winter, The Wolf of Wall Street
Notable Snubs: August: Osage County
Best Original Screenplay
- Woody Allen, Blue Jasmine
- Bob Nelson, Nebraska
- Craig Borten & Melisa Wallack, Dallas Buyer’s Club
- Spike Jonze, Her
- David O. Russell & Eric Warren Singer, American Hustle
Notable Snubs: Inside Llewyn Davis
Best Animated Feature Film
- The Croods
- Despicable Me 2
- Ernest & Celestine
- Frozen
- The Wind Rises
Notable Snub: Monsters University
THE MUSIC ONES
Best Original Score
- The Book Thief, John Williams
- Gravity, Steven Price
- Her, William Butler & Owen Pallett
- Philomena, Alexandre Desplat
- Saving Mr. Banks, Thomas Newman
Notable Snub: 12 Years a Slave (Hans Zimmer)
Best Original Song
- “Alone Yet Not Yet Alone” from Alone Yet Not Alone
- “Happy” from Despicable Me 2
- “Let It Go” from Frozen
- “The Moon Song” from Her
- “Ordinary Love” from Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
Notable Snub: Anything else from Frozen, “Young and Beautiful” from Great Gatsby
THE TECHNICAL ONES
Best Cinematography
- The Grandmaster
- Gravity
- Inside Llewyn Davis
- Nebraska
- Prisoners
Notable Snub: Great Gatsby, Captain Phillips
Best Costume Design
- American Hustle
- The Grandmaster
- Great Gatsby
- Invisible Woman
- 12 Years a Slave
Best Film Editing
- American Hustle
- Captain Phillips
- Dallas Buyer’s Club
- Gravity
- 12 Years a Slave
Notable Snub: The Wolf of Wall Street (the work Scorsese and his editor had to do to get that down from a 4-hour film to a 3-hour film)
Best Make-Up/Hair
- Dallas Buyer’s Club
- Bad Grandpa
- The Lone Ranger
Notable Snub: American Hustle, aka, explosion at the wig factory
Best Production Design
- American Hustle
- Gravity
- Great Gatsby
- Her
- 12 Years a Slave
Best Sound Editing
- All Is Lost
- Captain Phillips
- Gravity
- Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
- Lone Survivor
Best Sound Mixing
- Captain Phillips
- Gravity
- Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
- Inside Llewyn Davis
- Lone Survivor
Best Visual Effects
- Gravity
- Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
- Iron Man 3
- The Lone Ranger
- Star Trek: Into Darkness
THE ONES ONLY THE HARDCORE CARE ABOUT
Best Documentary Film
- The Act of Killing
- Cutie and the Boxer
- Dirty Wars
- The Square
- 20 Feet from Stardom
Notable Snub: Blackfish, Stories We Tell
Best Documentary Short
- CaveDigger
- Facing Fear
- Karama Has No Walls
- The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life
- Private Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall
Best Foreign Film
- The Broken Circle Breakdown
- The Great Beauty
- The Hunt
- The Missing Picture
- Omar
Best Animated Short Film
- Feral
- Get a Horse! aka the Mickey Mouse short with Frozen
- Mr. Hublot
- Possessions
- Room on the Broom
Best Live-Action Short-Film
- That Wasn’t Me
- Just Before Losing Everything
- Helium
- Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?
- The Voorman Problem
So, there you have it. What do you think? Any snubs I missed? Nominations you are excited about? Distressed about? Let us know in the comments.
The 86th Academy Awards will air on ABC on March 2, 2014.
