Golden Globe Nominations – MOTION PICTURE: Unbroken and American Sniper Not Invited to the Party

Erik Anderson December 11, 2014

The nominations for the 72nd annual Golden Globes were announced this morning with Fox Searchlight‘s Birdman earning a field-best 7 nominations. There were similarities but also some stark contrast to yesterday’s Screen Actors Guild nominees. A favorite of the Golden Globes, Angelina Jolie, wound up completely snubbed in the Drama categories for her 2nd directorial effort, Unbroken, as well as for her turn as Maleficent ,in the film of the same name, in the Comedy section. How that performance could be categorized as such is a mystery but then the Globes nominated Jolie and her film The Tourist just to get her to the party. No such luck today. What that meant was that it opened the door for some delicious surprises and some utter randomness.

After a total snubbing at SAG yesterday, Selma bounced back with nominations for Best Director (Ava DuVernay), Best Actor in a Motion Picture, Drama (David Oyelowo), Best Original Song (“Glory”) and Best Motion Picture, Drama. It will compete against Boyhood, Foxcatcher, The Imitation Game and The Theory of Everything. Foxcatcher‘s mention caught most people off-guard as word was that the HFPA didn’t really care for the film too much. Apparently not though, as it bested Gone Girl and Unbroken here.

Best Director – Motion Picture was also full of surprises as The Grand Budapest Hotel‘s Wes Anderson showed up. He and his film have seen one of the biggest reawakenings of a campaign I’ve seen in years. With its SAG ensemble nomination yesterday and its Director, Best Motion Picture, Comedy or Musical, Best Actor, Comedy or Musical (Ralph Fiennes) and Best Screenplay – Motion Picture it looks like The Grand Budapest Hotel is making a major play as a top 5 Oscar contender this year. The other (sort of) surprise mention here was David Fincher for Gone Girl. Since the film didn’t make it into Best Motion Picture, Drama and most pundits (including the Gold Rush Gang) had mostly counted him out, his nomination here came as a bit of a shock. Clint Eastwood (American Sniper), Angelina Jolie and James Marsh (The Theory of Everything) all seemed like much safer bets. Even Bennett Miller makes more sense in hindsight with Foxcatcher snagging that Best Motion Picture slot.

Two categories followed SAG 5/5 this morning; Best Actress in a Motion Picture, Drama and Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture. We could very well be looking at our Oscar nominees right there. But hold on, not so fast. We have seen an increasingly growing number of contender hit all of the right precursors and then fail to hit at Oscar. Most recently Tom Hanks, Helen Mirren, Emma Thompson, Marion Cotillard, Tilda Swinton and Daniel Brühl. That’s a whopping five big names, previous Oscar winners, falling short in the final leg. But who would it be? Previous winner Robert Duvall in The Judge? Logic tells me that his film, which was released in early fall, benefited heavily by being one of the very first screeners available. We know, year in and year out, that screeners can be crucial to a campaign and to a nomination to get the ball rolling. We saw it a few years ago with Damian Bichir’s nomination for Best Actor and we saw this year that Selma‘s lack of a screener (the film was locked too late to get them out during nomination voting time) set that film back.

But what to make of Jennifer Aniston in Cake? What sort of seemed like a joke just a few months ago has now turned into a real campaign and a real shot. Her film couldn’t secure distribution so the producers formed their own company, Cinelou, to get it out there. It was dangerously close to going to VOD. But, Aniston put herself out there, holding hands and shaking babies like a politician and she wooed the right people. She’s in it to win it. A nomination, that is. In all seriousness she doesn’t really stand a chance against Julianne Moore in Still Alice, but no one does. The only thing standing in Aniston’s way is Amy Adams. Adams has twice before missed at SAG only to bump someone out to earn that Oscar nomination. With her and Aniston competing in different categories here that opened the door for Aniston’s nomination. Would she have made it in the Comedy section? Probably, it was really open. Would she have had Adams’ Big Eyes been submitted and accepted in Drama? That’s more up in the air but at least we’d have had a more fair fight and a clearer line on the race. But a more fluid race is more fun, isn’t it?

Then there’s Jake Gyllenhaal in Nightcrawler. After his surprise nomination yesterday at the Screen Actors Guild he did it again today at the Globes. That puts him in real contention for a second Oscar nomination and it also takes care of retaining that pesky stat that the Best Actor Oscar category has never seen all first-timers in over 80 years. Expect Gyllenhaal to go into campaign mode now that he’s wrapped with Jean-Marc Valleé’s Demolition and Antoine Fuqua’s Southpaw.

More surprises came in the form of Pride‘s nomination for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy. I was this close to changing my predictions last night to include this but struggled to see what would miss. Clearly that was Inherent Vice, which came away with just one nomination, for Best Actor Joaquin Phoenix. Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy is kind of a blast this year with Oscar nominee Quvenzhané Wallis in Annie and Julianne Moore in Maps to the Stars. This is Moore 2nd time with double lead Golden Globe nominations in the same year (she did it back in 2000 with The End of the Affair and An Ideal Husband). Could she win both? She’s the clear frontrunner in Drama but Musical or Comedy is really open and she could take it if they really want to show some major love. Her other competition, Helen Mirren, Amy Adams and Emily Blunt will probably provide some chase but a double win is certainly not out of the question. I’m looking at you, Kate Winslet.

The Full List:

Best Motion Picture – Drama
Boyhood
Foxcatcher
The Imitation Game
Selma
The Theory of Everything

Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama
Steve Carell, Foxcatcher
Benedict Cumberbatch, The Imitation Game
Jake Gyllenhaal, Nightcrawler
David Oyelowo, Selma
Eddie Redmayne, The Theory of Everything

Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama
Jennifer Aniston, Cake
Felicity Jones, The Theory of Everything
Julianne Moore, Still Alice
Rosamund Pike, Gone Girl
Reese Witherspoon, Wild

Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy
Birdman
Into the Woods
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Pride
St. Vincent

Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy
Ralph Fiennes, The Grand Budapest Hotel
Michael Keaton, Birdman
Bill Murray, St. Vincent
Joaquin Phoenix, Inherent Vice
Christoph Waltz, Big Eyes

Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy
Amy Adams, Big Eyes
Emily Blunt, Into the Woods
Helen Mirren, The Hundred-Foot Journey
Julianne Moore, Maps to the Stars
Quvenzhané Wallis, Annie

Best Director – Motion Picture
Wes Anderson, The Grand Budapest Hotel
Ava Duvernay, Selma
David Fincher, Gone Girl
Alejandro González Iñárritu, Birdman
Richard Linklater, Boyhood

Best Screenplay – Motion Picture
Birdman
Boyhood
Gone Girl
The Grand Budapest Hotel
The Imitation Game

Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture
Robert Duvall, The Judge
Ethan Hawke, Boyhood
Edward Norton, Birdman
Mark Ruffalo, Foxcatcher
JK Simmons, Whiplash

Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture
Patricia Arquette, Boyhood
Jessica Chastain, A Most Violent Year
Keira Knightley, The Imitation Game
Emma Stone, Birdman
Meryl Streep, Into the Woods

Best Animated Motion Picture
Big Hero 6
The Book of Life
The Boxtrolls
The Lego Movie
How to Train Your Dragon 2

Best Foreign Language Film
Force Majeure (Sweden)
Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem (Israel)
Ida (Poland)
Leviathan (Russia)
Tangerines (Estonia)

Best Original Song – Motion Picture
“Big Eyes” – Big Eyes
“Glory” – Selma
“Mercy Is” – Noah
“Opportunity” – Annie
“Yellow Flicker Beat” – Hunger Games, Mockingjay Part 1

Best Original Score – Motion Picture
Alexandre Desplat – The Imitation Game
Yohan Yohanson – The Theory of Everything
Trent Reznor – Gone Girl
Antonio Sanchez – Birdman
Hans Zimmer – Interstellar

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.