Trivial Pursuits: Oscars 2010

Illustration by Pablo Lobato for The New Yorker
It's Oscar trivia time, 2010 edition!:

- Women at the Top: For the first time in Academy Award history, a lesbian-themed film — The Kids Are All Right — is nominated for Best Picture. It is also the first time that two Best Picture nominees — Kids and Winter's Bone — were directed by women (Lisa Cholodenko and Debra Granik, respectively).

- On the Other Hand: Three of the Best Picture nominees — 127 Hours, True Grit and Winter's Bone — feature characters with severed arms or hands.

- Top Toon: Toy Story 3 is not only the third animated film to be nominated for Best Picture (following previous nominees Beauty and the Beast and Up), it is also only the third "Part 3" to be nominated (following previous nominees The Godfather Part III and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King).  Plus, it is the only sequel to be nominated for Best Picture when the original film was not.

Illustration by Philip Burke for The New Yorker
- Head Games: Three Best Actress nominees — Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right, Natalie Portman in Black Swan and Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine — were on the receiving end in steamy oral sex scenes in their movies. Their partners in said scenes — Julianne Moore, Mila Kunis and Ryan Gosling, respectively — weren't so lucky though; all strong contenders in each of their races, none of them were nominated.

- Join the Club: Speaking of Annette Bening, she now joins the ranks of acting nominees recognized for playing GLBT characters, a group that also includes her fellow 2010 nominees Javier Bardem, Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman.

- Double Down: With both The Social Network and True Grit nominated, producer Scott Rudin has twice the chance to take home another Best Picture Oscar; he previously won for No Country for Old Men.

Illustration by Luis Grañena for The New Yorker
- Best Actor Take 2: Jeff Bridges (True Grit) and Colin Firth (The King's Speech) are both nominated for Best Actor again after facing off last year in this category, where Bridges won for Crazy Heart over Firth for A Single Man. This year, Firth is the front-runner. Meanwhile, their competition from last year, Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker) is the only other repeat nominee, this time in the Supporting Actor category for The Town.

- Lucky Rooster: Speaking of Jeff Bridges, he is nominated for playing Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, the same role that won John Wayne the Oscar in the original Grit forty-one years ago.

- Two Times a Lady: For the sixth time in the past ten years, two performances from the same film were nominated for Best Supporting Actress: Amy Adams and Melissa Leo for The Fighter.

Illustration by Robert Risko for The New Yorker
- Music Man: If composer Alan Menken wins for his Tangled song "I See the Light", it will be his 9th Oscar, securing his status as the most Oscared person still living.

- Isn't That Special: For the first time since 1979, there are more than three nominees for Best Visual Effects.

Trivial Pursuits: Oscars 2009

It's Oscar trivia time, 2009 edition!:

- If either Best Picture front-runners Avatar or The Hurt Locker win, they would either be the highest or lowest grossing winners, respectively, in Academy Award history.

- The last time that there were 10 nominees for Best Picture was 1944, when the winner was a little film called Casablanca.

- Two Best Picture nominees — An Education and The Hurt Locker — were directed by women (Lone Scherfig and Kathryn Bigelow, respectively).

- Bigelow is only the fourth woman to be nominated for Best Director, joining Lina Wertmüller (Seven Beauties), Jane Campion (The Piano) and Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation). No female director has won ... so far.

- Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire's Lee Daniels is only the second African American to be nominated not only for Best Director, but also as a co-producer of a Best Picture nominee. Previous nominees were John Singleton (Boyz N the Hood) and Quincy Jones (The Color Purple), respectively.

- Precious is also the first Best Picture nominee to be directed by an African American.

- Avatar and District 9 join A Clockwork Orange, Star Wars and E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial as the only science fiction Best Picture nominees.

- Up is only the second animated feature to be nominated for Best Picture (Beauty and the Beast was the first) and the first to do so since the Best Animated Feature category was created in 2001.

- All in the family: Father and son Ivan and Jason Reitman are nominated for producing Up in the Air, as are brothers Joel and Ethan Coen for producing and writing A Serious Man.

- Best Picture nominees The Blind Side and A Serious Man received only one other nomination. The last time a Best Picture nominee received only two nominations was in 1994 with Four Weddings and a Funeral.

- Best Actress nominee Gabourey Sidibe was recognized for her film debut in Precious.

- With her nod for Julie & Julia, Meryl Streep not only broke her own record of overall acting nominations (16 total), but she also bested Katharine Hepburn's reign as the most nominated Best Actress contender (13 total).

- Along with Streep's Julia Child, six of the acting nominees portray real people: Sandra Bullock as Leigh Anne Tuohy in The Blind Side, Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela and Matt Damon as François Pienaar in Invictus, and Christopher Plummer and Helen Mirren as Leo and Sofya Tolstoy in The Last Station.

- Double duty: Plummer can also be heard in Up, while lead acting contenders Streep and George Clooney (Up in the Air) led the voice cast of Fantastic Mr. Fox.

- Nine's Penélope Cruz and Streep are the only repeat acting nominees from last year, when Cruz won Best Supporting Actress for Vicky Cristina Barcelona and Streep was a Best Actress contender for Doubt.

- And finally: the last time Streep won an Oscar (for Sophie's Choice in 1983), her competitors Carey Mulligan (An Education) and Sidibe weren't even born yet!

Illustration by Tom Bachtell for The New Yorker.