Blanchett A Double Nominee At Oscars That May Not Take Place

Sydney Morning Herald

Thursday January 24, 2008

Clare Morgan

PORTRAYING a virgin queen and an iconic singer have earned Cate Blanchett a chance of double Oscar glory.

Blanchett is the hot favourite to win supporting actress for her portrayal of Bob Dylan in I'm Not There, following her Golden Globe win last week.

She faces tougher competition in the best actress category, where she is is nominated for her role as Queen Elizabeth I in Elizabeth: The Golden Age. The hot tip is Julie Christie, who stars as a woman with Alzheimer's in Away From Her.

Yesterday, Blanchett's happiness with her nominations was tempered by sadness over the death of Heath Ledger. "I'm thrilled by the nominations but more profoundly saddened by the loss of Heath," she said in a statement. "I deeply respected his work and always admired his continuing development as an artist. My thoughts are with his family and close friends."

Blanchett won the best supporting actress award in 2005 for her turn as Katherine Hepburn in The Aviator.

The only other Australian contender is the New York-based producer Eva Orner, nominated with the American director Alex Gibney for Taxi To The Dark Side in the best feature-length documentary category. The film explores a controversial incident in which a taxi driver at a military base in Afghanistan was killed by US soldiers. Violence and deceit are the big themes this year, with a handful of grim films dominating proceedings. No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood, two violent portraits of moral decline, lead the race with eight nominations each, followed by the British period romance Atonement and the legal thriller Michael Clayton with seven nominations each.

Michael Clayton could be this year's Crash which, bucking the trend and hitting cinemas well before the awards season, stunned pundits by beating Brokeback Mountain to the best picture award in 2005.

Left out in the cold was Sean Penn, who was widely expected to earn a best director nomination for the critically acclaimed Into The Wild.

The real drama, however, is whether the awards ceremony will happen at all. If the Hollywood writers' strike, in its 12th week, is not settled by the time the awards take place on February 24, the Writers Guild of America has threatened to protest at the ceremony, and the Screen Actors Guild has vowed that its members will not cross any picket lines.

"I don't think anybody is going to go [to the Oscars ceremony]," the writer-director of Michael Clayton, Tony Gilroy, said at a union rally. "It won't be a decision I'll be taking individually. It's one of these situations where you just don't cross a picket line, and I think everybody knows that."

Oscar organisers insist the show will go on, one way or another, as scheduled.

and agencies

And the finalists are ...

BEST PICTURE

* Atonement

* Juno

* Michael Clayton

* No Country For Old Men

* There Will Be Blood

BEST DIRECTOR

* Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton

* Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood

* Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell And The Butterfly

* Jason Reitman, Juno

* Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country For Old Men

BEST ACTOR

* George Clooney, Michael Clayton

* Daniel Day-Lewis , There Will Be Blood

* Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd

* Tommy Lee Jones, In The Valley Of Elah

* Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises

BEST ACTRESS

* Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age

* Julie Christie, Away From Her

* Marion Cotillard, La Vie En Rose

* Laura Linney, The Savages

* Ellen Page, Juno

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

* Casey Affleck, The Assassination Of Jesse James ...

* Javier Bardem, No Country For Old Men

* Philip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson's War

* Hal Holbrook, Into The Wild

* Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

* Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There

* Ruby Dee, American Gangster

* Saoirse Ronan, Atonement

* Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone

* Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton

© 2008 Sydney Morning Herald

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