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Hollywood counts down to sex-, politics-charged Oscar nominations
2006-01-30
Hollywood was breathlessly counting down to Tuesday's Oscar nominations, with the gay cowboy tale "Brokeback Mountain" tipped to dominate the nods in a field led by smaller movies with weighty themes. Taiwanese director Ang Lee's moving love story will lasso the lion's share of the nominations for cinema's top honours when they are announced at a short ceremony in Beverly Hills at 5:30 am (1330 GMT), awards experts predicted. "The picture with most nominations on Tuesday will be 'Brokeback Mountain', I feel absolutely sure," said Tom O'Neil, an Oscars prognosticator for GoldDerby.com and TheEnvelope.com. The controversial film, based on a short story by Annie Proulx, could snag as many as 10 of the coveted nominations including best picture, best director, best actor for Australian star Heath Ledger and twin best supporting actor nods for Jake Gyllenhaal and Michelle Williams and best adapted screenplay, he said. Also expected to pull off nominations in the key categories are George Clooney's political drama "Good Night, And Good Luck," the racially-charged drama "Crash," "Walk The Line," a biopic about country star Johnny Cash, and "Capote," about US author Truman Capote, awards pundits said. In an awards season in which those cheaper independent films have outshone the usual big studio fare, director Steven Spielberg's "Munich" is the only big-budget movie likely to make a splash at Tuesday's nominations, O'Neil said. "I think it is the year of smaller films with independent spirits," the expert said. "Hollywood is snubbing the big studios for making predictable blockbusters like a 'Superman 12', 'Batman 6' or 'Spider-Man 13' or pictures that are remakes like 'King Kong'." In a somewhat lacklustre awards season, filmmaker Peter Jackson's 200-million-dollar epic "King Kong" and other grandiose productions have been largely ignored by other Hollywood awards juries. "Brokeback," the undisputed early leader of the race for Oscars gold, was two weeks ago crowned best drama at the Golden Globe Awards and has also taken top honours at a host of other key awards. The movie tells the story of two young farmhands who meet herding sheep in Wyoming in the 1960s and begin what becomes a conflicted, intense but unfulfilled two-decade relationship that is smothered in secrecy. Clooney's "Good Night, And Good Luck," the true story of US newsman Edward Murrow's crusade against the repression of America's communist witch-hunt of the 1950s, has also swept up plaudits and is expected to shine in the Oscar nominations. Clooney could well find himself nominated for best director, facing off against the likes of Lee, Paul Haggis for "Crash", Spielberg for "Munich", David Cronenberg for "A History of Violence," and James Mangold for "Walk the Line," starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon. Possible contenders for best actor are Ledger, Phillip Seymour Hoffman for the title role in "Capote," Phoenix, David Strathairn for "Good Night, And Good Luck," Russell Crowe for "Cinderella Man" and Terrence Howard for "Hustle and Flow", pundits agree. Best actress hopefuls could include Witherspoon, Felicity Huffman for her role as a transsexual in "Transamerica," Britain's Judi Dench for her role as a theatre owner in "Mrs Henderson Presents", South African Charlize Theron for her turn as a miner in "North Country," Joan Allen for "The Upside of Anger" and China's Zhang Ziyi for "Memoirs of a Geisha". Clooney is expected to pop up again in the best supporting actor category for his role in "Syriana," about US oil policy in the Middle East, facing off against Gyllenhaal, Matt Dillon for "Crash," Paul Giamatti for "Cinderella Man" and Bob Hoskins in "Mrs Henderson". Ledger's real-life partner Michelle Williams is a likely best supporting actress nominee for her role as his neglected screen wife in "Brokeback". Also likely to win berths are Maria Bello for the crime drama "A History of Violence," Rachel Weisz for "The Constant Gardener," Amy Adams for "Junebug" and Catherine Keener for her role as Harper Lee in "Capote". But as pundits laying odds on nominees, O'Neil warned that the unusually long gap between Tuesday's announcement and the March 5 Academy Awards ceremony means that even if "Brokeback" does dominate the nods, it could still lose out on Oscars gold. "It's way, way out front but the race isn't over yet," he said, explaining that the 5,800-odd Oscars voters had a long time to change their minds this year.
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