As the 84th Academy Awards move closer, we’re starting to get a better sense of how things will pan out. We recently shared the 39 songs that will contend for the Best Original Song category, and now the Academy has announced the 97 original scores eligible for the Best Original Score award. AMPAS is notoriously picky when it comes to eligibility in this category, and as we feared the scores for both Drive and Attack the Block have been deemed ineligible. Also disappointing is the ineligibility of Alexandre Desplat’s mesmerizing score for The Tree of Life.

While it’s upsetting to see some of the year’s best work side-lined, there’s plenty to be happy about. I was a huge fan of Howard Shore’s work in Hugo and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s score for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, as well as The Chemical Brothers’ brilliant work in the criminally underseen Hanna. Hit the jump for the full list, as well as who I think will make the cut.

In the war drama In the Land of Blood and Honey, which marks the writing and directorial debut of Angelina Jolie, Danijel (Goran Kostic) is a Bosnian Serb police officer and Ajla (Zana Marjanovic) is a Bosnian Muslim artist. Together before the Bosnian War that tore the Balkan region apart in the 1990′s, their relationship quickly changes, as violence engulfs the country. When Ajla is taken from the apartment that she shares with her sister, Lejla (Vanesa Glodjo) and Lejla’s infant child, she comes face-to-face with Danijel and his troops, under the command of Danijel’s father, General Nebojsa Vukojevish (Rade Serbedzija). As the conflict takes hold, their connection to one another grows uncertain, and the war takes a physical and emotional toll that neither of them will ever recover from.

At the film’s press day, co-stars Goran Kostic and Zana Marjanovic talked about revisiting this war for the experience of making the film, the difficulty of getting through some of the more emotionally intense scenes, the experience of shooting in both Bosnian and English, and the importance of having somebody like Angelina Jolie bring this particular chapter of history to the world’s attention. Check out what they had to say after the jump:

Set against the backdrop of the Bosnian War in the 1990′s, In the Land of Blood and Honey tells the story of Danijel (Goran Kostic) and Ajla (Zana Marjanovic), who are on very different sides of the brutal ethnic conflict. As that conflict takes hold of their lives and their relationship changes, their connection to one another becomes strained and their allegiances grow uncertain. Portraying the incredible emotional and physical toll that the war takes on individuals, the unrelenting brutality is intended to make audiences question why it took so long for anyone to intervene in a society plagued by such horrific acts.

At the film’s press day, Angelina Jolie talked about making her writing and directorial debut with this war drama, what led her to tell this particular story, cutting the film down from the initial four-and-a-half-hour version that was way more brutal, deciding to shoot the film in two different languages (Bosnian and English), that writing is a cathartic process for her, and that this experience taught her how much she loves being on the other side of the camera. She also talked about a script she’s written about Afghanistan, but said that she doesn’t know if it’s any good, or if she’ll ever show it to anybody. Check out what she had to say after the jump:

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced today that 39 eligible songs will contend for the Best Original Song Oscar this year. Important to note is that a relatively recent rule change states that songs must be judged in the capacity that they appear in each film. In early January the voting body will get together and watch clips from each eligible movie in which the 39 songs are featured, after which they will determine the nominees. The list of eligible songs include three tracks from The Muppets, Sigur Ros frontman Jonsi’s song “Gathering Stories” (which director Cameron Crowe co-wrote) from We Bought a Zoo, and composer/songwriter/eight-time Oscar-winner Alan Menken’s “Star Spangled Man” from Captain America: The First Avenger. I’m partial to Jonsi’s work or “Man or Muppet” from The Muppets, but we’ll see how the Academy’s taste stacks up towards the end of January.

Hit the jump to check out the full list of eligible songs. The 84th Academy Award nominations will be announced on January 24th.

Last week, we brought you this stylish poster from Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut, In the Land of Blood and Honey. Now we have a host of new images and clips to share with you from the Bosnian war drama. Set against a backdrop of the Bosnian War in the 1990s, the story centers on the relationship between a Serbian soldier, Danijel (Goran Kostic) and a Bosnian native, Ajla (Zana Marjanovic). In the Land of Blood and Honey explores how the dynamics between the two change with the outset of the war, in which Ajla becomes a captive at a camp overseen by Danijel.  Also starring Rade Serbedzija, the film will be released both in English and BHS, the native language of Bosnia.  In the Land of Blood and Honey opens in limited release on December 23^rd with a wider release in January.  Hit the jump to check out the clips and images.

We’ve got a couple of new posters to share with you today. First up is a new one sheet for Andrew Stanton’s John Carter. In anticipation of the new trailer (which his Thursday), a few new images debuted this weekend and now we’ve got a new poster. I kind of liked the teaser poster for what it was, but this new one seems a bit dull and is sure to further confuse those who know nothing about the movie. At least they’re starting to hint at the whole Mars thing with the red background, because the first trailer did nothing to inform audiences that Taylor Kitsch was on another planet and not just wandering around a weird desert.

On the flip side of things, we’ve got a gorgeous poster for Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut In the Land of Blood and Honey. It effectively conveys the plot (centered around the Bosnian war) in an incredibly pretty and artful manner. Hit the jump to check out the posters. John Carter opens in 3D on March 9th, and In the Land of Blood and Honey opens in NY and LA December 23rd.

With the holiday movie season upon us, a few new images from some of the upcoming Oscar contenders have been unveiled. We’ve got a new look at Michael Fassbender in the extremely well-received drama Shame. Fassbender plays a sex-addict opposite Carey Mulligan, and our own Matt Goldberg loved the flick. There’s also a new image of Rooney Mara from David Fincher’s highly anticipated adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, another look at Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady, and an ominous image of Gary Oldman from the spy thriller Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Additionally, we’ve got another look at Michelle Williams as Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marilyn, and an image of Sandra Bullock and Thomas Horn in the adaptation of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

But that’s not all! We’ve also got new images from We Bought a Zoo, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, Haywire, Underworld: Awakening, In the Land of Blood and Honey, New Year’s Eve, and One for the Money. Hit the jump to check them out.

While the first trailer for In the Land of Blood and Honey is in English, the war drama by writer/director Angelina Jolie will be released in the native language of Bosnia. Although it was shot in both the native language of Bosnia (Bosanski/Hrvatski/Srpski or BHS) as well as English, Jolie decided to go with the more authentic version. The film will obviously have English subtitles for those of us who don’t speak BHS, or Serbian-Croatian, as it was known during the war.

Jolie’s directorial debut, In the Land of Blood and Honey is set against the Bosnian War of the 1990s, in which the conflicted relationship of Ajla (Zana Marjanovic) and Danijel (Goran Kostic – Taken) evolves. The film opens in New York and Los Angeles on December 23^rd, but you have until January to brush up on your BHS when In the Land of Blood and Honey widens its release. Hit the jump for more.

FilmDistrict has released the first trailer for Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut In the Land of Blood and Honey.  The drama centers on a Muslim woman (Zana Marjanović) and a Serbian soldier (Goran Kostic) who fall in love days before Bosnian war.  If I didn’t tell you that Jolie was the movie’s writer-director, you would still want to see the movie based on the trailer.  That’s not to say that Jolie is a distraction, but plenty of actors step behind the camera or try to write screenplay, but not all of them are successful.  Jolie looks like she’s nailed not only a serious war movie, but also a tender, heartbreaking love-story.  The trailer has certainly put the film on my radar.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  In the Land of Blood and Honey opens in limited release on December 23rd.

No studio has kept busier over the past few days then FilmDistrict.  On Thursday, FilmDistrict announced the acquisition of U.S. distribution rights to Arabian Nights, the 3D period action adventure led by Liam Hemsworth, and Playing the Field, the little league soccer comedy starring Gerard Butler and Jessica Biel.

Today the studio announced two more pickups: the time travel thriller Looper and Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut In the Land of Blood and Honey.  Looper is the latest from writer/director Rian Johnson (The Brother’s Bloom), and we’ve geeked out about the production pretty extensively here at Collider — good to know it has distribution secured with Tri Star.  Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, and Emily Blunt star.

Today FilmDistrict also gave Jolie’s Bosnian Civil War drama a title and a release date: In the Land of Blood and Honey is scheduled for an Oscar-friendly December 23 release.  More on all four movies after the break: