Hollywood's Big Day

For those that care, the Oscar nominations came out today. Here are the top categories:

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

2. 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."

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

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

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

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

The rest of the nominations are here.

Of all the pictures mentioned above, I've only seen two of them: "The Queen" and "Little Miss Sunshine". I thought "The Queen" was excellent and you can read my review here, and we rented "Little Miss Sunshine" a couple of weeks ago. It's a very strange movie, though I can understand how the little girl got the Supporting Actress nomination. I don't think Alan Arkin was all that interesting in his role, but I'm guessing the Academy decided to throw him this nomination as a thank-you for his whole career.

The big talk in the media this morning is the lack of a nomination for "Dream Girls" in the Best Picture and Best Director categories. How long until the race card is played on that one?