There were few major surprises in the list of nominees for this year’s Oscar’s which will take place on March 25. As expected, Gladiator leads the hunt with 12 nominations, closely followed by Ang Lee’s dark-horse Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (10 nominations). The award for Best Film will be fought out between Chocolat, Erin Brockovich, Crouching Tiger, Gladiator and Traffic.
The one unexpected guest in the Best Actor category was Spanish star Javier Bardem (nominated for Before Night Falls). The other contenders are Russell Crowe (for Gladiator), Tom Hanks (for Cast Away), Ed Harris (Pollock) and Geoffrey Rush (Quills).
The nominees for Best Actress are Joan Allen (The Contender), Juliette Binoche (Chocolat), Ellen Burstyn (Requiem for a Dream), Laura Linney (You Can Count on Me) and heavy favourite Julia Roberts (Erin Brockovich).
The award for Best Director will go to either Ridley Scott (Gladiator), Ang Lee (for Crouching Tiger), Britain’s Stephen Daldry (for Billy Elliot) or Steven Soderbergh who has been nominated for both Traffic and Erin Brockovich.
The great wild cards of this year’s awards are thus confirmed as Soderbergh, who may yet wind up splitting the votes in both the Best Film and Best Director categories and so come away with nothing, and Crouching Tiger. Ang Lee’s epic is nominated for both Best Film and Best Foreign Language Film. If Ang Lee’s Mandarin film fails to snare the coveted Best Film Oscar, insiders predict it will take the other as a consolation prize.
Xan Brooks, Guardian Unlimited