And the nominees are...

...too long for me to post here. You can find them if you look around. Still, I can't help but muse:

- Ten nominees for best picture. I've seen three (Up, Inglourious Basterds and The Blind Side). This reversion to the 1930s came about because of last year's ("unfair") snubbing of The Dark Knight. Just as I said at another board about the NBC late night situation, this is the equivalent of having too many chairs in a game of Musical Chairs, so nobody's feelings get hurt when the music stops. Still, congratulations to the nominees.

- You'd think that Rolfe Kent would've scored a nod for his music from Up in the Air. Haven't heard a note, but that's the way these things work. The Michael Clayton effect struck again in the nomination for the ambient music of The Hurt Locker.

- And what the hell happened? No nod for Marvin Hamlisch's The Informant!? Sure, he has his three Oscars (from the same year!) to console him, but this is an outrage.

+ Still, I quite enjoyed three of the nominees for Original Score and wish them well: Alexandre Desplat's Fantastic Mr. Fox, Michael Giacchino's Up and Hans Zimmer's Sherlock Holmes (definitely, the big surprise of the category).

- Pity that the rules for Original Song had to be changed so that there couldn't be more than two songs nominated from one film. "Almost There" (which I hope does win) and "Down in New Orleans" made the cut, but, if only for the possibility of seeing Keith David perform the song at the ceremony, I'm disheartened that "Friends on the Other Side" wasn't nominated.

+ Four of the nominees for Best Animated Feature (The Secret of Kells never made it to my hometown) ended up in my top ten for the year. That has to be a sign.

+ Who've thought that an unknown (in this part of the world) Austrian character actor and the star of a long-running UPN sitcom would be sure things for Oscars? Honestly.

+ Sandra Bullock gets an Oscar nomination and a Razzie nomination in the same week. Seriously, they should've dumped All About Steve straight to DVD, but she was quite good in The Blind Side.

- A lot of good movies got shut out, like Taking Woodstock (which I'd have nominated for Adapted Screenplay and Supporting Actor - Emile Hirsch), The Informant! (Original Score and Adapted Screenplay), (500) Days of Summer (an almost-certain lock for Original Screenplay), Watchmen (at the very least for Visual Effects) and The Brothers Bloom (take your pick).

+ However, I am truly glad that Brothers got shut out. The trailer was your standard Oscar bait boilerplate until the moment where the little girl says, "You're just mad because she'd rather sleep with Uncle Tommy than you!". What kind of little says that to a shell-shocked war veteran? More importantly, what kind of little girl says that?! I don't care if it was in the original film and I don't care if the gods of screenwriting give it a pass. That is, stated simply, bad fucking writing and I will defend that to my last breath.

? James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow are both nominated for Best Director. How awkward is it gonna be is one of them wins over the other?

Steve Martin returns to host, joined by Alec Baldwin. Can't wait for March 7th.