The 2007 Oscar Nominations

Every year, the Oscar nominations get us down. After the heady rush of year-end top ten lists, when critics everywhere shout out their quirky selections, the best of the year ossifies into five picks per category. The films that remain in the race generally impress with their mediocrity rather than their merit. With a few exceptions, the independent and foreign films that are the focus of this site are left out in the cold. 

Take Little Miss Sunshine, that prefab "indie" with an A-list cast. The movie has its charms, but Best Picture? Without a doubt, Babel is this year's Crash: heavy handed posturing that gives art house films a bad name (and Marcy has far worse things to say in her scathing review.)  The Departed, a remake of a Hong Kong action flick, was a crowd pleaser, but certainly not Martin Scorcese's best work. Penelope Cruz was rewarded for her marvelous performance in Volver, but Pedro Almodovar's terrific film was otherwise left out of contention. And so it goes down the list: for every boring, middle-of-the-road choice, a dozen great films that have been ignored.

But we like the awards; we like the dresses (well, Marcy does.) So on a positive note: Helen Mirren and Forest Whitaker have been racking up award after award this season, and deservedly so. Their expected wins are most welcome. Ryan Gosling was given a surprise nomination for his naturalistic performance as a liberal, crack-smoking history teacher in Half Nelson. Guillermo Del Toro's sublime Pan's Labyrinth was nominated for best foreign film and Mel Gibson's atrocious Apocolypto was not. In the foreign category, we're especially excited about the nominations for The Lives of Others and Deepak Metha's moving Water.

Best Picture:
Babel, The Departed, Letters From Iwo Jima, Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen.

Actor:
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond; Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson; Peter O'Toole, Venus; Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness; Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland.

Actress:
Penelope Cruz, Volver; Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal; Helen Mirren, The Queen; Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada; Kate Winslet, Little Children.

Supporting Actor:
Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine; Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children; Djimon Hounsou, Blood Diamond; Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls; Mark Wahlberg, The Departed.

Supporting Actress:
Adriana Barraza, Babel; Cate Blanchett, Notes on a Scandal; Abigail Breslin, Little Miss Sunshine; Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls; Rinko Kikuchi, Babel.

Directing:
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Babel; Martin Scorsese, The Departed; Clint Eastwood, Letters From Iwo Jima; Stephen Frears, The Queen; Paul Greengrass, United 93.

Foreign Language Film
After the Wedding, Denmark; Days of Glory (Indigenes), Algeria; The Lives of Others, Germany; Pan's Labyrinth, Mexico; Water, Canada.

Documentary Feature:
Deliver Us From Evil, An Inconvenient Truth, Iraq in Fragments, Jesus Camp, My Country, My Country.

Adapted Screenplay:
Sacha Baron Cohen and Anthony Hines and Peter Baynham and Dan Mazer and Todd Phillips, Borat Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan; Alfonso Cuaron and Timothy J. Sexton and David Arata and Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby, Children of Men; William Monahan, The Departed; Todd Field and Tom Perrotta, Little Children; Patrick Marber, Notes on a Scandal.

Original Screenplay:
Guillermo Arriaga, Babel; Iris Yamashita and Paul Haggis, Letters From Iwo Jima; Michael Arndt, Little Miss Sunshine; Guillermo del Toro, Pan's Labyrinth; Peter Morgan, The Queen.

The official site of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has the complete list of nominees. Oscar night is February 25.