Oscar nominee predictions 2006

Oscar nominations are due out Tuesday morning, so it's annual prediction time.

It's really difficult to predict how Clint Eastwood's one-two punch of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima will factor in to this year's race. Will the films cancel each other out, since neither one really took off on their own at the box office?

Other wildcards include the 9/11 films (can Oliver Stone really make a Sept. 11 movie that gets zero nominations?) and box office underperformers like Blood Diamond, Bobby, The Good German and The Painted Veil. They should be shut out of major categories but are they doomed to go unrecognized entirely?

For "historical" context: last year's predictions, and how I did.

Best Picture
Babel
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, United 93

There's not much guessing involved here. The Producers Guild and Directors Guild both selected these five nominees. Anything else would be a big upset. (Incidentally Little Miss Sunshine won the top prize from the Producers Guild this weekend. Not a bad sign but not a major harbinger of things to come either: six out of the last ten winners went on to win Best Picture but the last two winners, Brokeback Mountain and The Aviator, did not.)

Best Director
Bill Condon (Dreamgirls)
Clint Eastwood (Letters From Iwo Jima)
Stephen Frears (The Queen)
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Babel)
Martin Scorsese (The Departed)

Alternates: Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris (Little Miss Sunshine), Paul Greengrass (United 93)

The Sunshine team managed a nomination from the Directors Guild and that's impressive but I don't think Picture and Director will match 5/5 this year. Bill Condon also, unfortunately, feels vulnerable. Children of Men's Alfonso Cuaron is a hotly championed contender, but this is a year overflowing with possibilities.

Best Actor
Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat)
Leonardo DiCaprio (The Departed)
Peter O'Toole (Venus)
Will Smith (The Pursuit of Happyness)
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland)

Alternates: Leonardo DiCaprio (Blood Diamond), Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson)

Is Borat too big a sensation to ignore? And Half Nelson too small a movie to make an impact? That's what I'm thinking right now. But I'm most anxious over what voters decided to do about DiCaprio's double duty.

Best Actress
Penelope Cruz (Volver)
Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal)
Helen Mirren (The Queen)
Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada)
Kate Winslet (Little Children)

I'm not even going to bother with alternates. Maybe in another year Annette Bening (Running with Scissors), Maggie Gyllenhaal (Sherrybaby) and even Beyonce (Dreamgirls) would've had a shot. But this year anyone other than these five would be a big surprise.

Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Jackie Earl Haley (Little Children)
Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)
Jack Nicholson (The Departed)
Michael Sheen (The Queen)

Alternates: Djimon Hounsou (Blood Diamond), Brad Pitt (Babel)

The most frustrating category to predict. Only Eddie Murphy was on both the Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild lists. I'm going on a limb by predicting Sheen, who has been ignored so far. I'm not sold on Arkin but I'm not sure who else to turn to. Pitt's star power, and the relative popularity of his film, could serve him well but I still believe the performance is underwhelming. And Golden Globe nominee Mark Wahlberg (The Departed) is a popular contender, but his part is so small...not that that hurt William Hurt last year.

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza (Babel)
Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal)
Emily Blunt (The Devil Wears Prada)
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)
Rinko Kikuchi (Babel)

Alternates: Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine), Toni Collette (Little Miss Sunshine)

Everyone here seems like a lock except Blunt, who I'm predicting will upset the Sunshine contenders (though I'd much prefer a nom for Breslin). Shoulda-beens like Emma Thompson (Stranger Than Fiction), Vera Farmiga (The Departed) and Maggie Gyllenhaal (World Trade Center) have been ignored in awards leading up to this. And Catherine O'Hara (For Your Consideration) got some critical support but her movie is weak, and forgotten at this point.

Best Original Screenplay
Babel
Little Miss Sunshine
Pan's Labyrinth
The Queen
United 93

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, Volver

I want to work in Volver, Almodovar could develop into a perennial Oscar pick the way Woody Allen was for awhile, but I'm not sure what to drop. Stranger Than Fiction got a Writers Guild nom but I'm afraid it will have to make due with just that.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Children of Men
The Departed
The Devil Wears Prada
Little Children
Notes on a Scandal

Alternates: Dreamgirls, Thank You For Smoking

A tough, strange category. The Departed is clearly a lock but beyond that...Little Children isn't a very popular film and the other three scripts, frankly, aren't that great. But genre will probably hold back Dreamgirls. I'm skeptical of Smoking but it earned a Writers Guild nom. So did Borat, in this category, so I assume Oscar voters will have to consider it here. There's also The Last King of Scotland, co-scripted by a hot writer of the moment (Peter Morgan, who also wrote The Queen).

Best Animated Film
Cars
Happy Feet
Monster House

Alternates: Flushed Away, Over the Hedge

DreamWorks muscle might be enough to push in Hedge. Fondness for Aardman could do the trick with Flushed.

Best Documentary (Feature Length)
Deliver Us From Evil
An Inconvenient Truth
Iraq in Fragments
Jonestown: The Life and Death of People's Temple
The War Tapes

Alternates: Jesus Camp, Shut Up & Sing

Beyond Inconvenient Truth, the likely winner, I'm just guessing really, but I'd like to see Shut Up & Sing actually make the cut.

Best Foreign Language Film
Days of Glory (Algeria)
The Lives of Others (Germany)
Pan's Labyrinth (Mexico)
Volver (Spain)
Water (Canada)

Alternates: Avenue Montaigne (France), Black Book (Netherlands)

This category had a "semi-final" round this year and only nine films made it in. Denmark's After the Wedding and Switzerland's Vitus (the only one I'd never heard of) are also in the running. There are only 30 people total voting on this category...that could be dangerous.

Best Art Direction/Production Design
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
Marie Antoinette
Pan's Labyrinth
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Babel, Curse of the Golden Flower

I also buy into predictions for Flags of Our Fathers, Letters From Iwo Jima, The Good German, Apocalypto and The Queen.

Best Cinematography
Babel
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
The Illusionist
Pan's Labyrinth

Alternates: The Departed, The Good Shepherd

It'd be nice to see one of Eastwood's films represented here but this category had the strangest corresponding Guild nominations of the year. I don't believe the Oscar list will be so removed from the Best Picture contenders.

Best Costume Design
Curse of the Golden Flower
The Devil Wears Prada
Dreamgirls
Marie Antoinette
Pan's Labyrinth

Alternates: The Illusionist, The Queen

Can Prada buck the preference for period work by using clothes to drive the story? Who cares really? A nomination for Little Miss Sunshine would be a lot more fun. Other period contenders include Bobby, The Good German, Miss Potter, The Painted Veil, The Prestige and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

Best Editing
Babel
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
United 93

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, The Queen

Brokeback Mountain's failure to land a nomination here last year turned out to be a warning sign of the foul play yet to come. So watch this one closely.

Best Makeup
Apocalypto
Pan's Labyrinth
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: The Prestige, X-Men: The Last Stand

The only other films qualified are Click and The Santa Clause 3. I feel pretty confident in my three choices.

Best Score
Babel
The Da Vinci Code
The Good German
The Illusionist
The Painted Veil

Alternates: Notes on a Scandal, The Queen

Philip Glass is responsible for Notes and Illusionist and Alexandre Desplat is behind Painted and Queen. So either, or both, could easily be double nominees. I was also thinking of Apocalyto and Volver here.

Best Song
I Need to Wake Up (An Inconvenient Truth)
Listen (Dreamgirls)
Never Gonna Break My Faith (Bobby)
Our Town (Cars)
Song of the Heart (Happy Feet)

Alternates: Patience (Dreamgirls), Til the End of Time (Little Miss Sunshine)

Ugh, this category is always frustrating. It could wind up with less than five nominees, like last year. Voters could show an unexpected fondness for indie rock and go for the Sunshine song, especially since it's a Picture contender. Dreamgirls has one other original song: Love You I Do. Sheryl Crow has songs from both Cars (Real Gone) and the instant-disaster Home of the Brave (Try Not to Remember). I also feel like mentioning Ordinary Miracle from Charlotte's Web and O Kazakhstan from Borat as potential spoilers.

Best Sound
Babel
Blood Diamond
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Casino Royale, The Departed

Best Sound Editing
Apocalypto
Cars
The Departed
Flags of Our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Casino Royale, Superman Returns

Best Visual Effects
Casino Royale
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Superman Returns

Alternates: Night at the Museum, Poseidon

The only other possibilities are Eragon and X-Men: The Last Stand, both frightening. I wouldn't be surprised if Pirates and Superman were the only nominees.