Gravity, Hustle lead Oscar nods

12 Years a Slave among 9 films nominated for best picture

Chris Hemsworth and Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, announce nominees for best picture Thursday in Beverly Hills, Calif.
Chris Hemsworth and Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, announce nominees for best picture Thursday in Beverly Hills, Calif.

LOS ANGELES - Conventional wisdom held true Thursday for the 86th annual Academy Awards as the comedic drama American Hustle, the space adventure Gravity and the searing historical drama 12 Years a Slave received the most nominations.


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American Hustle received 10 nods, including best picture, best director, for David O. Russell, and for four of its actors: Christian Bale (best actor), Amy Adams (best actress), Bradley Cooper (best supporting actor) and Jennifer Lawrence (best supporting actress.)

Gravity, also a best picture nominee, tied with 10, including for best direction and best actress, but more of its overall attention came from some of the more technical categories.

12 Years a Slave was right behind with nine nominations, including Steve McQueen as director, Chiwetel Ejiofor as best actor, and Michael Fassbender and Lupita Nyong’o in supporting-acting categories.

In all, nine films received best-picture nominations in a field that can include as many as 10 or as few as five, depending on how voters from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences spread their hand.

Rounding out the field are Captain Phillips, Dallas Buyers Club, Her, Nebraska, Philomena and The Wolf of Wall Street.

The Wolf of Wall Street was one of the year’s most divisive pictures because of its depiction of sex and drug use that pushed the boundaries of the R rating. But it came away a big winner Thursday with five nominations. Martin Scorsese was nominated for his direction, and the film also received nods for actor (Leonardo DiCaprio), supporting actor (Jonah Hill) and adapted screenplay (Terence Winter).

Joining Adams in the best-actress category were Cate Blanchett for Blue Jasmine, Sandra Bullock for Gravity, Judi Dench for Philomena and Meryl Streep for August: Osage County. It was Streep’s 18th nomination.

Along with Bale, DiCaprio and Ejiofor, the other best-actor nominees were Bruce Dern for Nebraska and Matthew McConaughey for Dallas Buyers Club.

“I don’t think it ever stops being an absolute thrill, but I do have an immediate leveler,” said Bullock. “I still have to get up and make lunch for a little person, and pray - please, dear God - that he eats something I put in his lunchbox today.”

Perhaps reflecting the strong year in film, there were more perceived slights this year. Hollywood immediately deemed Robert Redford snubbed; he was expected to be nominated in the best-actor category for All is Lost, a largely silent lost-at sea picture. Tom Hanks also failed to get an acting nomination for his role in Captain Phillips.

Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks failed to win any nominations in the major categories - Emma Thompson was considered a strong candidate for best-actress attention - and Oprah Winfrey was snubbed as best supporting actress in Lee Daniels’ The Butler. Pixar failed to makethe animation category cut with its Monsters University.

In fact, Lee Daniels’ The Butler, a Weinstein Co. movie that was counted among the early favorites after its release in August, was completely shut out.

Harvey Weinstein, known for his aggressive Oscar campaigns, came up relatively light, with 11 nominations, although he edged into the best picture race with Philomena.

Inside Llewyn Davis, from Joel and Ethan Coen, aggressively backed for best picture by CBS Films, failed to make the cut, but it did receive two nominations in smaller categories - sound mixing and cinematography.

Chris Hemsworth, best known as Thor but also a star of Ron Howard’s Rush, which received no nominations, read the list of nominees at 5:38 a.m. Pacific time in a televised news conference at Academy headquarters. He was joined by Cheryl Boone Isaacs, the organization’s president.

Hollywood was hoping Oscar voters would add some clarity to a puzzling awards season. No one ever said a movie season should be orderly, but the only pattern to the current awards race is the lack of one. There is no underlying theme that made 2012 - with films like Argo, Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty - the year of political discourse, for instance. And guilds, critics’ groups and the Golden Globes have so far failed to deliver any kind of consensus, at least in some categories.

On Thursday morning, the Academy cleared up some questions while it created others. Her finally moved from fingers-on-theledge status to full-fledged contender. Some contenders - Octavia Spencer of Fruitvale Station, The Great Gatsby and Hanks - officially ended their hopes (and campaigns).

The best-picture nominees surely gave a modicum of vindication to at least two ousted studio executives. Jeff Robinov, formerly the movie chief at Warner Bros., played a major role in Gravity before his unhappy departure. James Schamus, the former chief executive of Focus Features, saw his Dallas Buyers Club get in - making it three gay-themed pictures that he managed to push into that rarefied circle. (He was also behind Milk and Brokeback Mountain.)

Of all the nominees, 12 Years a Slave has perhaps the clearest shot at making history. If it were to win the best-picture Oscar, it would become the first film by a black director to win the Academy’s highest honor.

This year’s ceremony, to be held March 2 and broadcast on ABC, will amount to a do-over for producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan.

Last year, the pair drew harsh criticism for putting together what some people saw as a tacky and, at times, misogynistic show that also seemed to hide a great year for film behind nonstop musical numbers.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 01/17/2014

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