THE 2012 OSCAR INJUSTICES:

The nominees who should-have-been at the 84th Academy Awards

Drive for Best Picture

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We accept that not everyone has recognised the godlike genius of Nicolas Winding Refn’s LA noir. It’s even possible that some people – whisper it quietly – found it all a bit slow and mysterious, and didn’t much like the bit where ‘Him from the Notebook’ turned that elevator an interesting shade of head. But we’re confident they’ll come around one day. Sadly, it'll be too late for Academy members who will rue its omission forever. After all, a nod for Drive might finally have made the Academy look cool, hip and in touch with the kids. Instead, they nominated Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. So there you go.

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Kirsten Dunst for Best Actress

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Lars von Trier’s Cannes diatribe meant that he could have made Battleship Potemkin, Citizen Kane and Forrest Gump this year and still been overlooked by the Academy. If the controversy tarnished the film in the eyes of voters – and, let’s be honest, namedropping Hitler hasn’t won anyone Hollywood brownie points recently – it’d pretty rough on Kirsten Dunst. She’s magnetic in a hugely challenging role that calls on her to carry a film while lookingly catatonically at a giant planet. Think Armageddon with Patrick Moore, with Dunst as Patrick Moore.

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The Adventures Of Tintin for Best Animation

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It’s increasingly difficult to define what’s an animated film and what’s not. Tintin was performance captured, so it seems unfair on the likes of Daniel Craig, Jamie Bell and Andy Serkis to call it such – and yet, when it comes down to it, Tintin has to be an animated film. Just ask BAFTA voters. Animators have always used live performance as a basis for their work; the only difference being that it's usually the animators doing the acting, not name stars. And in a year where so-so spin-offs like Puss In Boots can nab a nomination, it’s crazy that an exceptionally well-made, entirely delightful movie like Tintin can’t beat Kung Fu Panda 2 into the top five – even if, admittedly, it doesn’t feature Gary Oldman as a kick-ass peacock.

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The Skin I Live In for Best Foreign Film

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It’s a minor surprise that Pedro Almodovar’s The Skin I Live In still hasn’t picked up an Oscar nod to go with its BAFTA nomination. The Spaniard has previous form in the category, having won for All About My Mother back in 1999, and his wonderfully macabre body horror is all kinds of terrific. Still, with Iranian drama A Separation is garnering huge amounts of buzz among the brainy arthouse crowd, the category is looking like a foregone conclusion. Then again, we said that about A Prophet.

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Excerpt from Empire Magazine article