Oscar Nominations Announced: American Hustle, Gravity and 12 Years a Slave dominate

Article by News Team | 16 Jan 2014

This year's Oscar nominations have been announced, with Steve McQueen's acclaimed slave trade drama 12 Years a Slave, David O. Russell's wig-driven audience favourite American Hustle, and Alfonso Cuarón's elegant space drama Gravity leading the charge for the big awards. 

In the Best Picture category, that trio of films face stiff competition from the Tom Hanks-starring hostage drama Captain Phillips – Hanks is always tasty Oscar-bait (although surprisingly no nomination for Best Actor this year), and the presence of Brit director Paul Greengrass (The Bourne Supremacy) could be enough to swing the award. Also in contention is the Steve Coogan and Judi Dench-starring Philomena – Stephen Frears' genteel drama was a big hit Stateside, and shouldn't be underestimated. In addition, Martin Scorsese's drug-fuelled excess-fest The Wolf of Wall Street gets a nod, despite proveing too abrasive for some Oscar voters' tastes, and the Matthew McConaughey-starring Dallas Buyers Club, Spike Jonze's transhumanist love story Her and Alexander Payne's father-son road movie Nebraska round off the Best Film contenders.

Elsewhere, the battle for the Best Actor award comes down to a struggle between Christian Bale, for his transformative role in American Hustle, Chiwetel Ejiofor, for his brave and harrowing performance in 12 Years a Slave, and Leonardo DiCaprio, for his barnstorming turn as rogue trader Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street. Following his Golden Globe win, Matthew McConaughey also has a good chance for his role in Dallas Buyers Club, while veteran actor Bruce Dern, nominated for Nebraska, is a living legend, and sure to get a decent share of the votes. 

In the Best Actress category, Amy Adams' role in American Hustle, with her multiple accents and complex layers of character and cover story, seems to be where the smart money should be placed. But you can't count out Sandra Bullock, for her gritty performance in Gravity, nor can you underestimate the appeal of Judi Dench, in Philomena – the Academy has always loved an English actress of such distinctive pedigree. The same could be said for the 'actor's actor' Meryl Streep, nominated – for the 18th time – for her role in August: Osage County. Also nominated is Cate Blanchett, who won at the Golden Globes for Blue Jasmine (and gave a decidedly strange and possibly intoxicated acceptance speech).

Captain Phillips, American Hustle, 12 Years a Slave, The Wolf of Wall Street and Dallas Buyers Club dominate the Supporting Actor and Actress categories, with nominations for Barkhad Abdi, Bradley Cooper, Michael Fassbender, Jonah Hill and Jared Leto respectively in the men's category, and Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle), Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave) in the women's – also nominated alongside Lawrence and Nyong'o are June Squibb (Nebraska), Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine), and Julia Roberts (August: Osage County).

Cuarón, Russell, McQueen and Alexander Payne compete for the Best Director award with the notoriously Oscar-unlucky Scorsese, who, despite being acknowledged as one of cinema's greats, only received his first Director statuette in 2006 for The Departed, giving him a score of one win for seven nominations so far. Joshua Oppenheimer's visually stunning and utterly harrowing The Act of Killing looks likely to take home the award for Best Documentary. See the full list of nominees here.

From the archive

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http://oscar.go.com/nominees