Oscar 2008 Nominations

Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men

A few brief remarks about the Oscar 2008 nominations:
The top nominees are: There Will Be Blood (8 nominations), No Country for Old Men (8), Atonement (7), Michael Clayton (7), Ratatouille (5), The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (4), Juno (4).
***
Whether in dramas or in comedies, dark themes dominated in just about every category:

greed (There Will Be Blood, American Gangster),
murder (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Sweeney Todd, Eastern Promises, No Country for Old Men, In the Valley of Elah),
corruption (Michael Clayton, Sicko, Charlie Wilson’s War),
war (No End in Sight, War/Dance, Beaufort, Katyn),
illness (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The Savages, Away from Her),
political/religious [...]