By Phanuel Roxas
As the dust settles from the Golden Globes, the attention of the award season shifts to the biggest award show of the year.
On January 25, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences released the nominations for the 2011 Academy Awards.
Nominations range from blockbuster productions to small, independent films.
The Oscars, the pinnacle of the award season, have several awards shows preceding it, making it an easy prediction for winners.
Best Picture
The best picture category nominations this year are: The Social Network," The King’s Speech, Black Swan, The Fighter, Inception, True Grit, Toy Story 3, The Kids Are All Right, 127 Hours, and Winter’s Bone.
Beginning last year, the pool for this category increased from five nominations to 10, enabling a wide variety of genres to receive recognition.
The King’s Speech, The Social Network and Black Swan seem to be the front-runners.
The Social Network defines the culture of the last decade, and its impressive cinematography seems hard to beat.
The Academy, however, tends to side with more artistic films and stray away from the summer blockbusters.
This leaves the race between The King’s Speech and Black Swan. Darren Aronofsky’s psychodrama thriller Black Swan should take the Oscar.
Best Actor
The category for best actor has a clear winner, unlike the best picture category.
The nominations for best actor are: Jeff Bridges in True Grit, Colin Firth in The King’s Speech, Jesse Eisenberg in The Social Network, Javier Bardem in Biutiful and James Franco for 127 Hours.
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Firth’s dramatic portrayal of Britain’s King George VI, who has a speech impediment, put him in the lead for the Oscar.
Firth also won last year for A Single Man, which bolsters his chance of winning.
Javier Bardem’s work, however, in Biutful received many accolades both internationally and state-side, making it a strong contender.
Best Actress
The best actress category has a number of powerful performances from the esteemed actresses.
The best actress nominees are: Annette Bening for The Kids Are All Right, Natalie Portman for The Black Swan, Jennifer Lawrence for Winter’s Bone, Nicole Kidman for Rabbit Hole, and Michelle Williams "Blue Valentine."
Portman leads in the category with her intense role in The Black Swan, and Portman is most favoured to win after her success at the Golden Globes.
Best Director
Mimicking the top five films of the year, the nominees for best director are: Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan, David Fincher for The Social Network, Tom Hooper for The King’s Speech, Joel Coen and Ethan Coen for True Grit, and David O. Russell for
The Fighter.
The representation of talent in the category always makes it difficult to choose a winner.
Fincher seems to be the favourite for the marvellous cinematography of The Social Network.
The Coen brothers’ remake of True Grit also deserves recognition. Regardless, Aronofsky’s work in Black Swan should take the Oscar home.
The best director category is easily one of the most anticipated of the season.
The Academy Awards nominations represents and honours the achievements of those in the film and movie industry.
This year’s nominees clearly depict the artistry and beauty of film and reflect the reasons why audiences flock the movie theatres.
Tune in to ABC for the Academy Awards of February 21 at 7pm.
— The Collegian Online
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