The nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards have finally been unveiled. Many of the categories have fallen in line just as most have predicted (I fared alright with my predictions, but not great), with Hugo scoring 11 nods, followed closely by The Artist with 10. The biggest surprises are War Horse and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close getting in for Best Picture, the exclusion of The Adventures of Tintin from Best Animated Feature, and The Tree of Life nabbing Best Picture and Best Director nods (hooray!). On the snub side of things, despite landing the most precursor critics awards of any other actor in the race thus far, Albert Brooks was denied a Best Supporting Actor nod for his stellar work in Drive (boo). Additionally, Tilda Swinton was overlooked for giving the best performance of the year in We Need to Talk About Kevin, and AMPAS has no love for Michael Fassbender‘s haunting work in Shame.

There’s still plenty to be happy about, as Gary Oldman has his first ever Oscar Nomination (yes, that’s right) and Melissa McCarthy is a Best Supporting Actress nominee. Hit the jump to check out the full list of nominees. The 84th Academy Awards will be presented by Billy Crystal on February 26th.

The Oscar countdown continues as AMPAS announced today that nine films have advanced in the Best Foreign Language Film category for the 84th Annual Academy Awards. Early favorite A Separation (Iran) made the cut, as did the modern dance documentary Pina (Germany). Shockingly, Zhang Yimou’s period epic The Flowers of War starring Christian Bale was left off the shortlist. The Chinese entry was the most expensive film in the country’s history, and many had pegged it as a shoo-in for a nomination. Also missing the cut were Mexico’s Miss Bala and the Finland dramedy Le Havre.

Voters will screen the nine shortlisted films this weekend, after which they’ll make their official selection. The five nominees will be announced alongside all the other Oscar nominees on Tuesday morning. The 84th Annual Academy Awards will be held on February 26th. Hit the jump to read the full press release.

The prestige of the Telluride Film Festival continues to rise each year.  It’s the waypoint between the Venice Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival and it’s a great opportunity to see the hot fall films without travelling internationally.  Last year, Telluride showed off Best Picture winner The King’s Speech, Best Picture nominees Black Swan and 127 Hours, and a variety of other films that picked up Oscar nominations.  The line-up for this year’s festival has been announced and it looks like it will be equally exciting if not more so.  Movies playing at Telluride this year include Alexander Payne’s The Descendants, David Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method, the critically acclaimed silent film The Artist, Steve McQueen’s Shame, Werner Herzog’s Into the Abyss, Martin Scorsese’s documentary Living in the Material World, Rodrigo Garcia’s Albert Nobbs, and Lynne Ramsay’s We Need to Talk about Kevin.  And keep in mind that these are only the films with pre-festival buzz.  No one was paying much attention to The King’s Speech until it kicked off at Telluride and landed at TIFF.  Plus there’s the TBA screenings to consider (Black Swan and 127 Hours were both TBA films).

Hit the jump for the line-up.  The 2011 Telluride Film Festival runs from September 2 – 5th.

A task can’t get “more impossible”, but the prospect of seeing everything I want at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival just got more impossible.  We’ve already shown you the incredible line-ups for the Galas & Special Presentations, Real-to-Reel (Documentary), Midnight Madness, Vanguard, TIFF Kids, City to City, Canadian Features, and Canada First! programs. Now even more must-see movies have been thrown into the mix.  TIFF has announced that the spy thriller Page Eight (starring Bill Nighy, Rachel Weisz, and Ralph Fiennes) will be the closing night film in the Galas section.  Other films added to Galas and Special Presentations include Sleeping Beauty (starring Emily Browning), Winnie (starring Jennifer Hudson and Terrence Howard), Intruders (starring Clive Owen), Violet & Daisy (starring Saoirse Ronan and Alexis Bledel), and more.

Hit the jump to check out the additions to the Galas and Special Presenations line-up.  The 2011 Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 8 – 18th.  Click here for all of our TIFF 2011 coverage.