Frost/Nixon

Jason slashed his way to a box office record this weekend, but those cerebral and emotionally rich films vying for Oscars look as limp as one of his victims.

This year's best picture nominees have grossed $273.2 million at the domestic box office, down significantly from the $316.6 million raked in by last year's class, Variety reports.

What's worse, if you remove runaway hit Slumdog Millionaire's $88 million and the $122.5 million brought in by The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, the remaining films are among the lowest-grossing nominees in years. So far... read more 5 Comments

Notch another one for Slumdog Millionaire.

The runaway hit cemented its status as Oscar frontrunner with another key precursor win, this time for helmer Danny Boyle at the Directors Guild of America Awards. Boyle was singled out for outstanding directorial achievement in a feature film, besting David Fincher (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Ron Howard (Frost/Nixon), Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight) and Gus Van Sant (Milk).

He'll go toe-to-toe with all of them except for Nolan at the Academy Awards again (The Reader's Stephen Daldry is the other Oscar nominee). Boyle's win bodes well for Oscar glory as the DGAs have only mismatched with Oscar winners six times in 60 years. The last time was six years ago when The Pianist's Roman Polanski won the Oscar over the DGAs' choice of Rob Marshall (Chicago).

On the TV side ...
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Actors from each of the five features up for outstanding cast at Sunday's Screen Actors Guild Awards will present a clip package showcasing their work in their respective films.

Milk boys Josh Brolin, James Franco and Emile Hirsch will do the honors for ...
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On the one-year anniversary of his death, Heath Ledger earned a supporting actor Academy Award nomination for his role as The Joker in The Dark Knight.

Ledger's nod was among the most anticipated of Thursday's Oscar announcements. The best-picture nominees include The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which led with 13 total nominations, Slumdog Millionaire, Frost/Nixon, Milk and The Reader. (Check out the list of nominees here.)

Ledger, a previous lead-actor nominee for Brokeback Mountain, picked up the biggest nomination for The Dark Knight, which was shut out of the picture and director race despite momentum in recent weeks, including nominations from the three Guilds (Producers, Writers and Directors).

Competing against Ledger are
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Nominations for the 81st Academy Awards will be announced Thursday, which means time's ticking to finalize predictions. Here are some things you can keep a few things in mind for the big reveal.

For almost a year, we've heard talk about The Dark Knight being a factor in the Oscar race. Their safest bet, of course, is a supporting actor nod for Heath Ledger. (Thursday, by the way, is also the one-year anniversary of his death.) Beyond that for the film, nothing's as certain, but thanks to a hat trick of precursor nominations from the three of the Guilds (Producers, Writers and Directors), The Dark Knight is looking good to land on the best picture list.

Frontrunner Slumdog Millionaire, along with Milk, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and ...
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