Fantasy "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring," about an epic battle for world domination among wizards and sorcerers, earned 13 Oscar nominations, including best picture, on Tuesday, putting it ahead of the pack in the race for Hollywood's highest film honors, the Academy Awards.

With one less than the record 14 of "Titanic" in 1997 and "All About Eve" in 1950, "Rings" outpaced mental illness drama "A Beautiful Mind," with eight Oscar nominations. Musical "Moulin Rouge," a fantasy film set in the sexy nightlife of 19th Century Paris, also earned 8 Oscar nods.

Those three films are locked in a tight race with "Gosford Park" and independent hit "In the Bedroom" for best film.

"Beautiful Mind" and "Moulin Rouge" had distanced themselves from rivals earlier this year by snagging such awards as the Hollywood foreign press's Golden Globes and critical acclaim. But after "Ring's" impressive nominations, experts said the race was too close to call.

"This exceeds even our best expectations," said New Line Cinema executive and "Rings" producer Mark Ordesky. Peter Jackson, who earned a nomination for best director for "Rings," said the nominations proved a great victory for cast and crew.

Mixing actors with a large number of computer generated special effects, "Rings" earned many of its nominations in secondary categories such as costume design, cinematography and art direction that put it ahead of the Oscar pack.

The Oscars are awarded each year by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The 74th Annual Academy Awards will be televised live around the world on March 24 from Hollywood.

"It is a real horse race all the way around," said Frank Pierson, Academy president.

WHERE WERE BAZ AND BILLY BOB?

Annually Oscar nominations narrow industry debate over best films, actors and directors, but this year's list is notable for no-shows like "Rouge" director Baz Luhrmann.

The extravagant musical was Australian director Luhrmann's brainchild and the final chapter of his "Red Curtain" trilogy of musicals. While the film claimed eight nods and earned Luhrmann early critical honors, Oscar passed him up.

"I always find it strange when a film is nominated and not the director," said "Rings" director Jackson, "I feel particularly bad about that."

Other best director nominees were Ron Howard of "Beautiful Mind," veteran Robert Altman for "Gosford Park," Ridley Scott for military drama "Black Hawk Down" and David Lynch for this year's critical hit, the love story "Mulholland Drive."

Oscar also snubbed Billy Bob Thornton, who was widely praised for playing the lonely barber in "The Man Who Wasn't There."

But Will Smith, in a surprise of his own, earned a best actor nomination as legendary boxer Muhammad Ali in "Ali." His performance gained much "buzz" heading into awards season, but the film received mixed reviews and a relatively low box office, leading some experts to think Smith might be an Oscar TKO.

"It's almost like a win, you know. It's like you won something" Smith said, "truly, the nomination is huge."

Crowe, last year's best actor for playing a Roman general-turned-slave in "Gladiator," was nominated again, as expected. Sean Penn gained a best actor nomination for playing a mentally challenged man in "I Am Sam," as did Denzel Washington as a corrupt cop in "Training Day.

Along with Halle Berry, a best actress nominee for the racially charged "Monster's Ball," the trio of Smith, Washington and Berry mark the first time since 1972 that three African American actors have been nominated for lead acting roles.

"Blacks in America are a 13 percent minority ... it's that much harder we have to work and that much more we have to shine," Smith said. "For a month, at least, there's going to be some nice smiles in the African American community."

British actors were among the many international celebrities making the Oscar cut, including Britain's Tom Wilkinson as the grieving father in "In the Bedroom."

"I would like to say, 'I jumped in the air,' but frankly it was disbelief," Wilkinson said after hearing about the nomination. "You don't expect to see your name there and can't take that sort of thing for granted. Although, I suppose maybe you can if you are Jack Nicholson or someone like that."

As expected, Wilkinson's co-star Sissy Spacek earned a nomination for best actress as the grieving mom in "Bedroom."

MORE BRITS

She is joined by Berry and Australian-raised Nicole Kidman, who played an ill-fated nightclub singer in "Moulin Rouge." Also in the best actress category were Briton Judi Dench for playing English novelist Iris Murdoch in "Iris" and American Renee Zellweger in the British comedy "Bridget Jones's Diary."

Supporting actress nominations were given to Jennifer Connelly for "Beautiful Mind," Marisa Tomei for "In the Bedroom" and Kate Winslet in "Iris." Helen Mirren and Maggie Smith also won nominations for their roles in "Gosford Park."

In the widely watched new category for best animated feature film were DreamWorks' smash hit "Shrek," Walt Disney Co.'s computer animated "Monsters, Inc." and Paramount's "Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius."

Foreign language film nominations went to France's "Amelie," Norway's "Elling," India's "Lagaan," Bosnia's "No Man's Land," and Argentina's "Son of the Bride."

Oscar thinks 'Beautiful' thoughts
Richard Corliss
TIME.com

If David Letterman were hosting the Academy Award ceremony this year — and he is only slightly more likely than Ken Lay to get that gig — he wouldn't have to do his notorious "Oprah ... Uma" routine, where at the 1995 ceremony he introduced two celebrities who had nothing in common but eccentric names. Instead, he could say, "Opie ... Oscar."

This looks like the year Ron Howard gets a little respect. The former child star has directed movies ("Apollo 13") that have been nominated for Best Picture, but he personally has not received any mention from the Academy. Now, with his "A Beautiful Mind" the clear front runner, and with his first Oscar nomination, he finally looks ready to graduate in the eyes of the Academy membership from the kid from Mayberry to the man of the hour.

"A Beautiful Mind," the cleverly romanticized biography of mathematician John Nash, earned eight nominations, the same number as Baz Luhrmann's swoony, moony "Moulin Rouge." That's five less than Peter Jackson's keenly-told Tolkien epic "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" gleaned, and in 16 of the past 17 years the film with the most nominations has won Best Picture. But if "A Beautiful Mind" doesn't walk home happy on March 24, most people will be surprised, and Howard can go back to being the directorial Rodney Dangerfield.

Of course, in Hollywood, as screenwriter William Goldman so cogently put it, nobody knows anything. That certainly applies to any Academy crystal-ballery. The Oscar nominations are not a game that can be won by marshalling stats — like, say, rotisserie baseball. It is a game involving quirky prejudices, obscenely large marketing campaigns and an appeal to the lowest median denominator — like, say, politics. So you will hear no critical whining here; we have 364 other days for that. Just a few cogent morning-of observations from the Olympus of our wisdom.

1. In most years, four of the top five films have their directors nominated. This year, there was twice the usual amount of divergence. Two films nominated for the top prize, "In the Bedroom" and "Moulin Rouge," did not get nods for their directors, Todd Field and Baz Luhrmann; and two directors, David Lynch and Ridley Scott, did not see their films, "Mulholland Dr." and "Black Hawk Down," make the final five for Best Picture. In one sense, the Academy made judicious choices. "Mulholland Dr." was too goofy, and "Black Hawk Down" too bloody, for the Academy membership (average age: 112), but at least they were recognized as imaginative, daring directorial achievements. As for Luhrmann, well, that omission is just peculiar. "Moulin Rouge" may not be the year's best-directed film, but it is surely the most -directed one.

2. Bizarre, too: "Moulin Rouge," the year's one prominent musical, snagged a nomination for Best Sound but not for Best Score or Best Song (and there were only four, not the usual five, cited in that category).

3. In the new Animated Feature category, two of the three slots were easy to predict: "Shrek" and "Monsters, Inc.," each of which earned critics' huzzahs and more than $250 million at the domestic box office. Some thought that the Academy might cede the third listing to Richard Linklater's "Waking Life," which won the New York Film Critics Circle prize. But apparently the only people who could sit through that philosophy-major peyote dream were the reviewers who voted for it. The Academy went a safer route, giving a nomination to "Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius," the third highest-grossing cartoon of the year (about $80 million).

"Shrek" is a slight favorite to win the first longform cartoon Oscar, but the folks at DreamWorks can't be thrilled. When the film was in just a few theaters last month (it was released in May), DreamWorks spent a wad on monster-size newspaper ads, with the clear aim of winning a best-picture nomination. That didn't happen. It was eased off the list of finalists by "In the Bedroom" and "Gosford Park," two "small" films released late in the year. In fact, "Moulin Rouge" was the only Best Picture nominee released before November. What's the opposite of short-term memory loss?

4. The usual ignorance attended the selections for Best Foreign-Language Film. Except for "Amelie" and "No Man's Land," the foreign pictures that earned most critics' plaudits were absent. In their place we got an Argentine melodrama ("Son of the Bride"), a Norwegian film about an insane couple ("Elling") and a 4hr. Indian film about cricket ("Lagaan"). If any of these turns out to be faaaabulous, I promise to apologize in this space.

5. "Gosford Park" took seven nominations (though not for the one it deserved: best score, with all those lovely Ivor Novello tunes). But this was the big party for Robert Altman's haughty house party. Bet it doesn't win a single Oscar.

6. After all the noise about Australians commandeering the Golden Globes, it was the Brits who held onto their familiar pre-eminence in the acting categories. Aussies Russell Crowe ("A Beautiful Mind") and Nicole Kidman ("Moulin Rouge") picked up their expected scrolls; but Her Majesty's subjects corraled six of the ten slots for supporting actor (Jim Broadbent, Ben Kingsley, Ian McKellen) and actress (Helen Mirren, Maggie Smith, Kate Winslet), and another two in the lead categories (Tom Wilkinson for "In the Bedroom" and Judi Dench for still being Judi Dench). Texas actress Renee Zellweger may have acquired some gilt by association with her persuasive comic turn as an English spinster in "Bridget Jones's Diary." In some places, impersonating a Brit could get you arrested; in Hollywood, it gets you an aisle seat on Oscar night.

Indeed, three of the five Best Picture films — "Gosford Park," The Lord of the Rings" and "Moulin Rouge" — speak with variations on an English accent, and the other two star an English or Australian man speaking American. (They're good at that, because they've watched our movies all their lives. Imitation is the sincerest form of acting.)

Which only proves how little relevance Oscar has to the boys-goofing-around movies that audience flock to see or to the weirder-than-thou films that critics say they love. These are middle-aged movies, most of them, and love stories, most of them, chosen by people who want to see more of the same. That's why Oscar choices typically fall somewhere between blockbusters and classics.

Now we get six weeks of campaigning, Hollywood style. Hit-and-run perp Halle Berry, a Best Actress nominee for "Monster's Ball," kicked off her campaign by crying for Brian Gumbel on CBS, minutes after the nominations were announced. Over on ABC, bad boy Crowe was declaring his love for babies (well, for smelling them) in a taped segment with Diane Sawyer. And on NBC, there was Ron Howard, chatting up Matt Lauer. Opie is determined not to go back to Mayberry.