REVIEW

2015 Oscar Nominations Fail to Excite

By Matt Oakes · January 15, 2015

In a move that inspires little other than a deep sigh, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science unleashed the 2015 Oscar nominees to a thud. With snubs that ran the category gambit – David Fincher‘s Gone Girl was almost entirely ignored, Dan Gilroy’s transcendent Nightcrawler received a single nomination (Best Original Screenplay), Ava DuVernay’s Selma went almost entirely without recognition (although received a Best Pic nomination), The Lego Movie wasn’t nommed for Animated – and unfettered celebration for the likes of Morten Tyldum’s by-the-books The Imitation Game, which nabbed 8 mighty nominations, while Clint Eastwood’s jingoistic portrait of a trigger-happy, home-bred Americano in American Sniper scored 6.

Listed below are the nominees with those that I called highlighted in red. But first, a run down of how many noms each film scored:

Nomination Run Down

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – 9 nominations
The Grand Budapest Hotel – 9 nominations
The Imitation Game – 8 nominations
American Sniper – 6 nominations
Boyhood – 6 nominations
Foxcatcher – 5 nominations
Interstellar – 5 nominations
The Theory of Everything – 5 nominations
Whiplash – 5 nominations
Mr. Turner – 4 nominations
Into the Woods – 3 nominations
Unbroken – 3 nominations
Guardians of the Galaxy – 2 nominations
Ida – 2 nominations
Inherent Vice – 2 nominations
Selma – 2 nominations
Wild – 2 nominations

Best Picture

American Sniper
Birdman
Boyhood
The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Imitation Game
Selma
The Theory of Everything
Whiplash

Best Director

Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman)
Richard Linklater (Boyhood)
Morten Tyldum (The Imitation Game)
Wes Anderson (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Bennett Miller (Foxcatcher)

Best Actor

Steve Carell (Foxcatcher)
Bradley Cooper (American Sniper)
Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game)
Michael Keaton (Birdman)
Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything)

Best Actress

Marion Cotillard (Two Days, One Night)
Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything)
Julianne Moore (Still Alice)
Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl)
Reese Witherspoon (Wild)

Best Supporting Actor

Robert Duvall (The Judge)
Ethan Hawke (Boyhood)
Edward Norton (Birdman)
Mark Ruffalo (Foxcatcher)
J.K. Simmons (Whiplash)

Best Supporting Actress

Patricia Arquette (Boyhood)
Laura Dern (Wild)
Keira Knightley (The Imitation Game)
Emma Stone (Birdman)
Meryl Streep (Into the Woods)

Adapted Screenplay

Jason Dean Hall (American Sniper)
Graham Moore (The Imitation Game)
Paul Thomas Anderson (Inherent Vice)
Anthony McCarten (The Theory of Everything)
Damien Chazelle (Whiplash)

Original Screenplay

Alejandro González Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris and Armando Bo (Birdman)
Richard Linklater (Boyhood)
E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman (Foxcatcher)
Wes Anderson, Hugo Guinness (The Grand Budapest Hotel)
Dan Gilroy (Nightcrawler)