Biggest Oscar 2015 Snubs

by Helen Earnshaw | 17 January 2015

The Oscar nominations were announced yesterday and while many will be excited and stunned by their nomination, there will be some that will be feeling a little disappointed.

Jennifer Aniston in Cake

Every year there are some surprise exclusions from the nominations... and 2015 is not different with some big stars and movies that have not received the nominations that were being predicted.

Jennifer Aniston: Ever since Cake started press screening, the critics have been raving about Jennifer Aniston's central performance. This is a performance that we have never seen from Aniston before and it is set to change the direction of her career.

Aniston picked up Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Awards for Best Actress and was expected to be in the Oscar mix when the nominations were revealed yesterday. However, Aniston was overlooked in favour of Marion Cotillard in Two Days, One Night.

While the movie itself was never expected to be in the running, it would have been great to seen Jen get her first ever Oscar nod. Cotillard has done virtually no campaigning and her performance is one that has not been discussed as a potential Oscar contender.

Julianne Moore (Still Alice), Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything), Reese Witherspoon (Wild), Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl) and Marion Cotillard (Two Days, One Night) make up the Best Actress category.

Jake Gyllenhaal: Jake Gyllenhaal may be feeling a little disappointed as well after he missed out on a Best Actor nod for his central role in Nightcrawler.

The actor lost a great deal of weight to play journalist in the Dan Gilroy, in what was one of the strongest performances of his career.

He has won over the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild, and Bafta by picking up Best Actor nominations but was one of the five men in contention for Best Actor. Instead, Bradley Cooper was inserted into the race despite no nominations at any of the other big awards ceremonies.

Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything) Michael Keaton (Birdman), Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game), Bradley Cooper (American Sniper), and Steve Carell (Foxcatcher) are all in the hunt for Best Actor.

Selma: Selma was one of the movies that was expected to do very well when the nominations were announced, and yet it only picked up two nominations.

While it is in the running for Best Motion Picture and Best Original Song, the likes of Ava DuVernay and David Oyelowo both missed out for Best Director and Best Actor. Sadly for Oyelowo, there were just too many great leading performances that had to be whittled down to just five and he & Gyllenhaal were the ones that missed out.

Selma really is a topic that the Academy usually loves as it is a biopic, based on a real story, and deals will an important issue of race and equality. However, all the talk about historical inaccuracies in recent weeks could have done the damage.

Foxcatcher: Don't get me wrong, Foxcatcher did do quite well when the nominations were announced with five nominations: Bennett Miller, Steve Carell, and Mark Ruffalo were recognised for Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Supporting Actor.

However, the movie was overlooked in the Best Picture category, which did come as a bit of a surprise. The Academy could nominate up to ten films for Best Picture, but decided to select just eight this time around - resulting in Foxcatcher missing out.

American Sniper, Birdman, Boyhood, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game, Selma, The Theory of Everything, and Whiplash will all battle it out for Best Picture this year.

The Lego Movie: The Lego Movie may have picked up Golden Globe and Bafta nominations for Best Animated Feature, but that did not stop is being snubbed by the Oscars.

Yes, the critical and commercial success was overlooked in the Best Animated Feature category, which did come as a surprise to many.

The Lego Movie was regarded by some critics as one of the best movies of 2014, and you do have to wonder why the Academy chose to overlook it. However, it did pick up one nomination for Best Song.

Big Hero 6, The Boxtrolls, How To Train Your Dragon 2, Son of the Sea, and The Tale of the Princess Kaguya were all nominated.

Gone Girl: Gone Girl was one of the must see movies of autumn 2014, as the Gillian Flynn novel was adapted for the big screen. Not only did the movie enjoy box office success, but it also won over the critics.

The movie had already picked up a couple of Bafta nominations and four Golden Globes nods - including Best Director for David Fincher and Best Adapted Screenplay for Flynn - but it managed just one nomination yesterday.

Rosmaund Pike secured a Best Actress nomination for her performance, but the movie was not recognised in any other categories.