From ‘Straight Outta Compton’ To Ridley Scott, 10 Shocking Snubs From This Year’s Oscar Nominations

The nominations for the 88th Academy Awards were announced earlier today (January 14), and while some of Hollywood’s finest are popping bottles, others will be heading home to send a tersely-worded email to their PR team. Here are some of the most surprising omissions from this year’s shortlist.

1. The Martian is nominated in seven categories including Best Picture, but Ridley Scott is inexplicably ignored for Best Director. The veteran film-maker has been nominated for this award three times in the past without ever winning it.

2. Acclaimed NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton receives only one nomination – for Best Original Screenplay. Surely it deserved a a Best Picture nod?

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3. Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight receives nominations for Ennio Morricone’s score, Jennifer Jason Leigh’s gutsy supporting performance and its cinematography, but it’s frozen out of the Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay categories. That’s gotta hurt, QT.

4.Three British actors (Tom Hardy, Mark Rylance and Christian Bale) are nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but there’s no room in this category for Idris Elba, whose forceful performance in Beasts Of No Nation really should have been recognised.

5. In fact, for the second consecutive year, every single acting nominee is white, with Concussion‘s Will Smith and Sicario‘s Benicio del Toro among the deserving non-Caucasian actors to have been snubbed. The #OscarsSoWhite hashtag is already trending again on Twitter.

6. At this Sunday’s Golden Globe Awards, Aaron Sorkin took home the Best Screenplay prize for his smart and typically literate script for Steve Jobs. For some reason, he doesn’t even receive a nomination in the Academy Awards’ Best Adapted Screenplay category.

7. The Best Actor category is especially strong this year, with Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Eddie Redmayne, Bryan Cranston and Michael Fassbender filling up the shortlist. Even so, Johnny Depp will have been hoping to sneak a nomination for his best performance in years in crime biopic Black Mass.

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8. Two-time winner Jane Fonda should probably have received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her brief but fiery performance in Youth.

9. Former winner Helen Mirren could have nabbed one too for her charismatic work opposite Bryan Cranston in Trumbo.

10. Wiz Khalifa’s ‘See You Again’ from Fast & Furious 7, written in tribute to the late Paul Walker, spent 12 weeks at Number One in the US last year. But that’s not enough to earn it a nomination for Best Original Song, where other big names Lady Gaga, Sam Smith and The Weeknd are all recognised.

This year’s Academy Awards winners will be announced at a ceremony in Los Angeles on February 28, hosted by Chris Rock. Check out the full list of nominees here.

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