There's no massive outright travesty this year, though a few big surprises.
Here are some assorted facts and opinions. The full list of nominees is pasted further down.
GENERAL NOTES
Lincoln leads overall nominations with 12 total, making it a heavy favorite for Best Picture and Director.
Life of Pi, which got written off by many for some time (but I called as a mega-multi-category likely nominee in April), follows Lincoln very closely at 11 total nominations.
There are 9 Best Picture nominees.
Skyfall is now one of, if not the most multi-nominated James Bond movie in Oscar history, but didn't pick up a Picture nomination (here's hoping for Song).
Let's congratulate Academy Award nominees Mirror Mirror, Snow White and the Huntsman, Hitchcock, and Seth McFarlane (Best Song for Ted).
Looks like The Weinstein Company spent most of their money on Silver Linings Playbook instead of movies like The Intouchables and others. How unsurprising.
Superhero movies were shut out of tech categories, where they're often heavily favored. No nominations for The Amazing Spider-Man or The Dark Knight Rises, and just one for The Avengers (Visual Effects).
Cloud Atlas got completely shut out, including tech categories like Makeup, Visual Effects, and others that one would think it appropriate for.
DIRECTING
Benh Zeitlin being nominated for Best Director (Beasts of the Southern Wild) over Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck, who were both heavy nominee favorites, was an enormous surprise.
Michael Haneke (Amour) was not picked for nomination by most Oscar handicappers. Seth McFarlane making a Nazi joke when his movie was nominated in the Foreign Film category will probably be a big scandal...in Europe.
Bradley Cooper said on morning TV today "I gotta say, Ben Affleck got robbed".
David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook) was not a solid lock to get nominated, it's good he made it in.
The Master got a few acting nominations here and there, but got snubbed in Picture and Director. Maybe it peaked too early.
It's official: Christopher Nolan never got nominated for Best Director for making a Batman movie.
BEST ACTOR
A solid field, but don't know any of them have a prayer against Daniel Day-Lewis.
Bill Murray didn't get that "gold watch" nomination for Hyde Park on the Hudson.
BEST ACTRESS
Emmanuelle Riva (Amour) is now the oldest ever nominee in this category at 85.
Q Wallis (Beasts of the Southern Wild) is now the youngest ever nominee in this category at 9.
ANIMATION
3 of the 5 nominees are Disney-company movies: Brave, Wreck-It Ralph, and Frankenweenie.
Both Studio Ghibli (From Up on Poppy Hill) and Dreamworks Animation (Madagascar 3, Rise of the Guardians) were completely shut out of Best Animated Feature.
Aardman Animation, whose early success was helped by an Animated short win, has now been nominated for their first Animated Feature, The Pirates! Band of Misfits.
The Simpsons has now been nominated for an Oscar (Animated Short).
SUPPORTING ACTOR
All nominated actors have previously won Oscars.
Samuel L. Jackson and Leonardo DiCaprio were both snubbed for Django Unchained (in favor of Christoph Waltz), even though the movie is good enough for Best Picture.
SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Jacki Weaver (Silver Linings Playbook) was a big surprise in this category, but she's really good.
EDITING
One guy (William Goldenberg) is nominated twice this year (for Argo and with Dylan Tichenor for Zero Dark Thirty).
Only one nominee has previously won: Lincoln's Michael Kahn, who got Oscars for Raiders of the Lost Ark, Schindler's List, and Saving Private Ryan.
SCREENPLAY
Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom got its only nomination here (in Original). At least it got the one.
I'm disappointed that Looper didn't get nominated for Original Screenplay (caveat: the writer/director is a friend of mine).
CINEMATOGRAPHY
The Master, which will probably be the last major release completely shot on 70mm film, did not get nominated.
Wally Pfister (The Dark Knight Rises) got snubbed. Maybe you hated the movie, but that doesn't change the quality of work on display.
If Roger Deakins hadn't gotten nominated for Skyfall, I'd have thrown something at the wall. He's been nominated 9 times and never won.
SOUND
Both Brave and The Hobbit, whose sound editing and mixing was done in the new Dolby Atmos surround format, were snubbed in both audio tech categories.
SONG
There was a new song by Paul Williams ("Still Alive") that didn't get nominated. Huh.
FOREIGN FILM
The Intouchables (from France) was a heavy favorite for nomination, and not just because the Weinstein Company picked it up.
DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Chasing Ice got a Song nomination, but not Doc Feature. Weird.
MAKEUP
Hitchcock was nominated over Lincoln, Looper, Men in Black 3 (Rick "American Werewolf in London" Baker), and Snow White and the Huntsman.
