Ebert' folks, the only critic group Crash won last year:

Best Picture
"Babel"
"The Departed"
"Little Miss Sunshine"
"The Queen"
"United 93"

Best Foreign Language Film
"Apocalypto"
"Letters From Iwo Jima"
"Pan's Labyrinth"
"Tsotsi"
"Volver"

Best Director
Clint Eastwood for "Letters From Iwo Jima"
Stephen Frears for "The Queen"
Paul Greengrass for "United 93"
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu for "Babel"
Martin Scorsese for "The Departed"

Best Original Screenplay
"Babel" — Guillermo Arriaga
"Letters From Iwo Jima" —Iris Yamashita
"Little Miss Sunshine" — Michael Arndt
"The Queen" — Peter Morgan
"United 93" — Paul Greengrass

Best Adapted Screenplay
"The Departed" — William Monahan
"Little Children— Todd Field & Tom Perrotta
"Notes On A Scandal" — Patrick Marber
"A Prairie Home Companion" — Garrison Keillor
"Thank You For Smoking" — Jason Reitman

Best Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio for "The Departed"
Ryan Gosling for "Half-Nelson"
Peter O’Toole for "Venus"
Will Smith for "The Pursuit of Happyness"
Forest Whitaker for "The Last King of Scotland"

Best Actress
Penelope Cruz for "Volver"
Judi Dench for "Notes on a Scandal"
Maggie Gyllenhaal for "Sherrybaby"
Helen Mirren for "The Queen"
Meryl Streep for "The Devil Wears Prada"
Kate Winslet for "Little Children"

Best Supporting Actor
Ben Affleck for "Hollywoodland"
Jackie Earle Haley for "Little Children"
Eddie Murphy for "Dreamgirls"
Jack Nicholson for "The Departed"
Brad Pitt for "Babel"
Michael Sheen for "The Queen"

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza for "Babel"
Cate Blanchett for "Notes On a Scandal"
Abigail Breslin for "Little Miss Sunshine"
Toni Collette for "Little Miss Sunshine"
Jennifer Hudson for "Dreamgirls"
Rinko Kikuchi for "Babel"

Best Original Score
"Babel" — Gustavo Santaolalla
"The Fountain" — Clint Mansell
"Letters From Iwo Jima" — Kyle Eastwood and Michael Stevens
"Notes On a Scandal"— Philip Glass
"The Queen" — Alexandre Desplat

Best Cinematography
"Babel" — Rodrigo Prieto
"Children of Men" — Emmanuel Lubezki
"The Departed" — Michael Ballhaus
"The Fountain" — Matthew Libatique
"Letters From Iwo Jima" — Tom Stern

Best Documentary
"Deliver Us From Evil"
"An Inconvenient Truth"
"Jesus Camp"
"Shut Up and Sing"
"Wordplay"

Most Promising Performer
Ivana Baquero for "Pan’s Labyrinth"
Sacha Baron Cohen for "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan" and "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby"
Shareeka Epps for "Half-Nelson"
Rinko Kikuchi for "Babel"
Keke Palmer fro "Akeelah and the Bee"

Most Promising Director
Rian Johnson for "Brick"
Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris for "Little Miss Sunshine"
Gil Kenan for "Monster House"
Jason Reitman "Thank You For Smoking"
James McTeigue for "V For Vendetta"


Numerical Breakdown
Babel - 9 nominations
The Departed - 6 nominations
The Queen - 6 nominations
Little Miss Sunshine - 5 nominations
Letters From Iwo Jima - 5 nominations
Notes on a Scandal - 4 nominations
Dreamgirls - 3 nominations
Little Children - 3 nominations
United 93 - 3 nominations
The Fountain - 2 nominations
Half-Nelson - 2 nominations
Pam's Labyrinth - 2 nominations
Thank You for Smoking - 2 nominations
Volver - 2 nominations

Good looking Oscar ballot.

Chicago (the film) only got one nomination (Supporting Actress) back in 2002.

Dreamgirls is totally this year's Munich.

And that's the first mention is Breslin in Supp. Actress, and it's with Globe nominee Collette. She REALLY needs SAG if she wants any hope of getting in.

And I'm beginning to think that I'm gonna have to predict double noms in Sup.. Actress for Babel. (I've been using this smilie a lot lately haven't I?)

Waitaminute, that's TWO double nominees in Supp. Actress! Nutty.

Am I allowed to laugh at Dreamgirls again? It didn't make Best Picture even though Letters wasn't allowed for the category...

Another Babel sweep (nominations-wise). And people still think it won't be nominated? Looks like it might win its first Critics Circle award here (just like Crash last year)

I really, really like this list.

Chicago film critics, I know Ebert and Roeper, is there alot more than that? Ie should this list likely be similar to what Roeper's fav's are?

Every film got a piece. It's clearly down to 7 films now.

Pedro's name has been missing in these critic awards, and as a result, the Director race is down to 6.

I have the exact Actor lineup for oscar and am sticking to it all the way now.

Maggie looks like the only possible alternative to spoil Winslet's 5th nom, but I'll still go with the big 5 in Actress.

Arkin is snubbed again. Supporting Actor is down to the six nominated here plus him and Whalberg, and they pretty much have all the contenders for Supporting Actress.

And Original and Adapted Screenplay and Score; I'm not going to be surprised to them all match the Oscar lineups.

It's really turning into this year's Crash, even though interestingly, it trails Crash on both the critical and financial fronts.

RT: Babel - 70% (60% COTC), 6.9 (6.4 COTC); Crash - 75% (76% COTC), 7.1 (7.1 COTC)
MC: Babel - 69 (2 100s); Crash - 69 (5 100s)
BFCA: Babel - 94; Crash - 88

The chance of it winning appears to be much smaller, although that could certainly change if it wins GG Drama and got like 8-9 nominations from academy.

I'm assuming this refers to...

Departed
Dreamgirls
Queen
U93
Little Miss Sunshine
Babel
Iwo Jima

?

Yep.

Is Ben Affleck really that good in Hollywoodland? Didn't see it.

He's alright. Nothing that will blow you away. I think some people in the industry really like him and have just been waiting for an opportunity to give him some kudos.

Yeah, I haven't really understood the Affleck praise, he seemed pretty wooden to me in the role... I think it's definitley true that people really wanted to support him again, get him going. I can't believe Ben Affleck will be an Oscar nominee this year.

I'm still not sold on an Oscar nomination. I think he could get in now but I'm not predicting him just yet. The last 2 spots for Supporting actor could really go so many ways.

I think Jennifer Garner has done alot of career damage-control for Affleck

Dude, Babel is still racking up all the mentions. Is there anyone who still seriously thinks this has no chance at a Best Picture nomination? Because I still really think it can and is in a good position do get that 5th slot.

Peace,
Mike.

Lots of scantily-clad avatars up in here.

Well, can't talk for anybody else but myself, but I've maintained that's it's always been in the race and in the 6th spot for a few weeks now.

It has to knock off Little Miss sunshine to get in. I'm not predicting it as of yet but I'm starting to think it's a really big possibility with it dominating these early awards nominatoons and LMS having a pretty weak showing in all except maybe one of these critics nominations.

OR... somehow Letters doesn't manage to get in the Best Picture race.

But I think Dreamgirls, Departed, and Queen are almost all solid locks. Then again, to be honest, I wouldn't be completely surprised to see The Queen snubbed for Babel. I'd have to see Dreamgirls before I can say the same.

By the way Mike... LOVE your avatar. Just saw the documentary last night.

It can't be written off anymore, that's for sure.

But I'm still betting against it.

Oh, what'd you think of it?

Well, I enjoyed it because I've always really wanted the facts or what actually happened. And you get alot of backstage and sort of home video footage which was great. And of course, hearing and seeing them work on what I thought was the best album this year didn't hurt.

That being said... from a documentary standpoint, I think it could have been a bit sharper and emotional. Then again, wasn't this put together by a friend of theirs? I'm not really sure who was behind the production. I'd probably give it a B/B+