- guardian.co.uk, Tuesday February 15 2000 15.07 GMT
The principal nominations for the 72nd Academy Awards were announced at 1.38pm GMT in a brief ceremony co-hosted by two-time Oscar winner Dustin Hoffman. The nominations are as follows:
Best film
American Beauty, The Cider House Rules, The Green Mile, The Insider, The Sixth Sense
Best director
Sam Mendes (American Beauty), Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich), Lasse Hallstrom (The Cider House Rules), Michael Mann (The Insider), M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense)
Best actor
Russell Crowe (The Insider), Richard Farnsworth (The Straight Story), Sean Penn (Sweet and Lowdown), Kevin Spacey (American Beauty), Denzel Washington (The Hurricane)
Best actress
Annette Bening (American Beauty), Janet Mcteer (Tumbleweeds), Julianne Moore (The End of the Affair), Meryl Streep (Music of the Heart), Hilary Swank (Boys don't Cry)
Best supporting actor
Michael Caine (Cider House Rules), Tom Cruise (Magnolia), Jude Law (Talented Mr. Ripley), Michael Clarke Duncan (The Green Mile), Haley Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense)
Best supporting actress
Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense), Catherine Keener (Being John Malkovich), Chloe Sevigny (Boys don't Cry), Angelina Jolie (Girl, Interrupted), Samantha Morton (Sweet and Lowdown)
Best original screenplay
American Beauty, Being John Malkovich, The Sixth Sense, Topsy-Turvy, Magnolia
Best adapted screenplay
Cider House Rules, Election, The Green Mile, The Insider, The Talented Mr. Ripley,
Best foreign language film
All About My Mother, East West, Caravan, Solomon and Gaenor, Under the Sun
Art direction
Anna and the King, The Cider House Rules, Sleepy Hollow, The Talented Mr Ripley, Topsy-Turvy
Cinematography
American Beauty, The End of the Affair, The Insider, Sleepy Hollow, Snow Falling on Cedars
Costume
Anna and the King, Sleepy Hollow, The Talented Mr Ripley, Titus, Topsy-Turvy
Visual effects
The Matrix, The Phantom Menace, Stuart Little
Editing
American beauty, The Cider House Rules, The Insider, The Matrix, The Sixth Sense
Make-up
Austin Powers: the spy who shagged me, Bicentennial Man, Life, Topsy-Turvy
Sound
The Green Mile, The Insider, The Matrix, The Mummy, The Phantom Menace
Original score
American Beauty, Angela's Ashes, The Cider House Rules, The Red Violin, The Talented Mr Ripley
Original song
Blame Canada (South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut), Music of my Heart (Music of the Heart), Save Me (Magnolia), When She Loved Me (Toy Story 2), You'll be in My Heart (Tarzan)
Best documentary
Buena Vista Social Club, Genghis Blues, On the Ropes, One Day in September, Speaking in Strings
The most notable surprise is the poor showing of The Talented Mr. Ripley, with Minghella's film missing out in the nominations for Best film and Best director. Matt Damon was also tipped to be nominated for Best actor. In the event, Ripley has only a cursory nod in the category of Best adapted screenplay, and Best supporting actor for Jude Law.
Other big losers include Star Wars Episode 1: the Phantom Menace (with two minor nominations), Angela's Ashes (one nomination), Man on the Moon, and Stanley Kubrick's posthumous Eyes Wide Shut.
As predicted, American Beauty leads the field with eight nominations in all, closely followed by Michael Mann's The Insider and the unheralded The Cider House Rules, both with seven nominations apiece.
For trivia buffs, Meryl Streep enters the record books with her twelth nomination for acting - an achievement that ties her with Katherine Hepburn. Meantime, 79-year-old Richard Farnsworth becomes the oldest man ever to be nominated for the Best actor oscar for his turn as a lawnmower-driving traveller in David Lynch's The Straight Story.
