Jakes Gyllenhaal said it best this evening, pointing out that it would be the shorts that make or break our Oscar Pools. I am usually able to get half of them right by watching them and picking favorites but this year I got them all wrong. Amongst the big categories there were few surprises though, outside of Tom Hooper ( The King's Speech ) beating out David Fincher ( The Social Network ) for achievement in directing. But hey, Chris Nolan wasn't even nominated for Inception so without further

Steven Spielberg's War Horse managed to land six nods, but the bulk of its nominations were for technical achievements; by comparison, Alexander Payne's The Descendants raked in five, including (as expected) one for George Clooney as an actor, and others in areas like adapted screenplay and direction. Similar to War Horse , David Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo landed mostly technical category nods - though, Rooney Mara was recognized for her performance in the f

Her husband Albert is a successful businessman in the golf industry, and it consumes his life. He is very cold to his wife, which is doubly unfortunate because of the fact that she has deep emotional problems stemming from being the victim of sexual abuse as a child. She is teeming with self-loathing and his attitude towards her certainly doesn't help matt

This is a lot like the Mad Men situation. Its star, Oscar Isaac, deservedly represents David Simon's tremendous Show Me a Hero here and yet, the series itself isn't nominated. Again, it's great to see a quirky (some might say questionable) choice like Flesh and Bone here, but one has to wonder whether HFPA tuned in to HBO in mid-to-late Aug

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak and Oscar-nominated actress Jennifer Lawrence ( Winter's Bone , The Hunger Games ) jointly announced the nominations for the 84th Academy Awards this morning, on Tuesday January 24th. The actual 2012 Oscar ceremony will take place next month, on February 26th at the Kodak theater - with Billy Crystal serving as host, for the ninth time in his car

Summer Bishil (who was 19 at the time the movie was filmed) plays 13 year old Jasira. The movie puts the audience in an uncomfortable position with the very first scene - in which she walks out of a bathroom wearing a bathing suit with shaving cream on either side of her crotch along the line of the bathing suit. Not only that, but her divorced mother's boyfriend is volunteering to shave her down th

If you missed our live-chat for the 83rd Annual Academy Awards this evening, don’t fret, we have the winners and a brief recap of the ceremony for you. In short, Inception took home the technical categories, The Social Network took a few, notably for its score and The King's Speech was the big winner, coming in with 12 nominations and walking out with four big wins, including best pict

Martin Scorsese's Hugo led the way with eleven nominations, stacking up many a nod in the technical categories, while Michel Hazanavicius' The Artist was close behind with ten total. Academy members clearly love a good homage to visit the next website magic of old-fashioned cinema - be it a Hollywood flick set in Paris or a French production set in Hollywood. Moving o

You can look at Towelhead from a couple of different angles, but as the parent of an 11 year old daughter, I look at it as a cautionary tale of exposing kids to sexual images too early, and not being a father that they can turn to for advice and comfort instead of whatever guys is availa

So, all in all, just another year at the Oscars - complete with plenty of obvious choices, surprising snubs, and a handful of unexpected nominations. Whether or not the actual winners list will be quite so predictable - or, perhaps, mix things up a bit - that remains to be s

The film opens with Nancy discussing her thoughts on what happens after you die with another woman. At this point it sounds like she is optimistic about the afterlife while her friend is very negative and keeps bringing up counterpoints to make it sound like she could be somehow trapped in some way after death. As it turns out, the friend turns out to be a therapist who is trying to convince Nancy that death is not an escape or free

Some interesting notes: True Grit didn't get a single award despite ten (10!) nominations; Christopher Nolan didn't receive any awards despite Inception being entirely original and praised for its design, winning 4 other awards no less; Anne Hathaway, poking fun at the Academy's attempt at appealing to a younger demographic is the presentation's youngest host ever at 28 and last but not least, 8-time Oscars host Billy Crystal made a friendly and fun appearance making some wish he was back to host ag

Unlike the Golden Globes, Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life was recognized, as was Gary Oldman for his much-praised lead turn in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy . Notable absences include praised indie titles (and Screen Rant favorites) Shame and Martha Marcy May Marlene in the acting categories, while Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive only managed to land one nod, in the technical categor