Oscar Watch: The nominees are in!

They're here! Woowee, and there are some surprises. Big disappointment for Dreamgirls, not getting best picture nomination, and I'm also surprised that Volver was shut out of the foreign film category. The nominees haven't been posted on www.oscar.com yet, so here it is in brief:

Best picture: Babel, The Departed, Letters from Iwo Jima, Little Miss Sunshine and The Queen.

Best director: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Babel, Martin Scorsese, The Departed, Clint Eastwood, Letters from Iwo Jima, Stephen Frears, The Queen, and Paul Greengrass, United 93.

Best actor: Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond, Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson, Peter O'Toole, Venus, Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness, and Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland.

Best actress: Penelope Cruz, Volver, Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal, Helen Mirren, The Queen, Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada, and Kate Winslet, Little Children.

Best supporting actor: Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine, Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children, Djimon Honsou, Blood Diamond, Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls, and Mark Wahlberg, The Departed.

Best supporting actress: Adriana Barraza, Babel, Cate Blanchett, Notes on a Scandal, Abigail Breslin, Little Miss Sunshine, Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls, and Rinko Kikuchi, Babel.

Original screenplay: Babel, Letters from iwo Jima, Little Miss Sunshine, Pan's Labyrinth, and The Queen.

Adapted screenplay: Borat: Cultural Learnings..., Children of Men, the Departed, Little Children, and Notes on a Scandal.

Best foreign film: Denmark: After the Wedding, Algeria: Days of Glory, Germany: The Lives of Others, Mexico: Pan's Labyrinth, and Canada: Water.

Best animated film: Cars, Happy Feet and Monster House.

Sheesh! I think I got 'em all right. I'll get you a link as soon as it's available, and then I'm probably going back to bed. Dreamgirls was robbed!