‘Brokeback Mountain’ scores 8 Oscar nods

updated 2:55 p.m. ET Feb. 7, 2006

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - The cowboy love story “Brokeback Mountain” led the Academy Awards field Tuesday with eight nominations, among them best picture and honors for actor Heath Ledger and director Ang Lee.

Also nominated for best picture were the Truman Capote story “Capote”; the ensemble drama “Crash”; the Edward R. Murrow chronicle “Good Night, and Good Luck”; and the assassination thriller “Munich.”

The Johnny Cash biography “Walk the Line,” considered a likely best-picture nominee, was shut out of that category, though Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon earned acting nominations.

Three films were tied with six nominations each — “Crash,” “Good Night, and Good Luck” and “Memoirs of a Geisha,” though “Geisha” was shut out in the top categories.

“Munich,” which had fallen off many awards analysts’ best-picture picks after a lukewarm reception, scored well with five nominations, including director for Steven Spielberg.

“King Kong,” directed by “Lord of the Rings” creator Peter Jackson, earned only technical nominations, losing out in the major categories.

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George Clooney picked up three nominations: as supporting actor for his role as a steadfast CIA undercover agent in “Syriana” and best director and co-writer for “Good Night.”

It was the first time ever that a contender was honored with acting and directing nominations for two different movies.

Along with best-actor contender Ledger, and directing nominee Lee, “Brokeback Mountain” scored nominations for Michelle Williams as supporting actress, Jake Gyllenhaal as supporting actor and Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana for their screenplay adaptation of Annie Proulx’s short story.

Familiar and new faces
The acting categories were a mix of familiar Oscar faces such as past winners Judi Dench and Charlize Theron, veterans like Clooney, Witherspoon, Rachel Weisz, David Strathairn and Felicity Huffman gaining their first academy attention, and young performers such as Williams and Amy Adams as a big-hearted Southern waif in “Junebug.”

Philip Seymour Hoffman, the best-actor favorite for his remarkable embodiment of Capote, joined Ledger in the best-actor category. Hoffman has triumphed at earlier film honors, including the Golden Globes.

Along with Hoffman, Ledger and Phoenix, the other nominees were Terrence Howard as a small-time hood turned rap singer in “Hustle & Flow” and Strathairn as newsman Murrow in “Good Night, and Good Luck.”

The best-actress race presumably will shape up as a two-woman contest between Huffman in a gender-bending role as a man about to undergo sex-change surgery in “Transamerica” and Witherspoon as singer June Carter, Cash’s musical companion and future wife, in “Walk the Line.”

Huffman won the Golden Globe for best dramatic actress, while Witherspoon earned the Globe for best actress in a musical or comedy. Witherspoon beat Huffman on Sunday for the best-actress prize at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Also nominated for the best-actress Oscar: Dench as a society dame who starts a nude stage revue in 1930s London in “Mrs. Henderson Presents”; Keira Knightley as the romantic heroine of the Jane Austen adaptation “Pride & Prejudice”; Charlize Theron as a mine worker who leads a sexual-harassment lawsuit against male co-workers in “North Country.”

“I am so thrilled to be nominated for something I loved working on every single day,” Dench said.

Indies score
“Brokeback Mountain” led a wave of independent films that scored big in the nominations, instead of the studio fare that normally dominates the Oscars. Other than “Munich,” most bigger budget movies that had been on the best-picture radar, such as “Walk the Line,” “Memoirs of a Geisha” and “Cinderella Man,” were overlooked in the top Oscar category.

The year’s biggest hit, “Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith,” earned only one nomination (for makeup) but was shut out otherwise — including the visual-effects category, a blow to the George Lucas franchise that has pioneered special effects.

Lucas’ Industrial Light & Magic outfit did work on two of the visual-effects nominees, “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe” and Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds.” The third nominee was “King Kong.”

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