So who did Oscar snub?

In theaters Friday: Big Miracle, Chronicle, W.E., The Woman in Black

New on Blu-ray/DVD: The Big Year, Drive, In Time, The Thing

Maybe it is some tangential influence ricocheting off the return Billy Crystal as host of the ceremony, but this year’s Oscar’s are shaping up to be a giant seen-it-all-before love fest for bygone eras of Hollywood. Just take a look at the 10 films up for Best Picture. Yes, remember there are 10 ever since the 2008 snub of The Dark Knight, that year’s highest grossing film that also pulled better ratings on review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes than all five of the actual Best Picture nominees.

So, what do we have? A list that looks like the Academy checked all its “like” boxes in mere seconds. A war movie set in Europe directed by Steven Spielberg? Check. A civil rights era drama? Check. A surprisingly intelligent sports drama with heart? Check. Did Woody Allen make a film this year? Right, check.

The Help and War Horse are accomplished genre pictures, sure, and stands as true ambassadors of Oscar-friendly fair. I may not agree with their selection, but I can’t say I am surprised. Even Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a film I genuinely liked for its plentiful wit and for walking an admirably nuanced high wire act between tragedy explored and exploited, is in its very marrow, a classic, cookie-cutter Oscar choice.

Though The Artist is certainly well-acted and directed, is Hollywood at such a creatively stalled, identity-crisis-riddled point that a silent movie that looks like it was written by Preston Sturges and directed by Howard Hawks is considered the best and most innovative and entertaining motion picture that the year had to offer? When did the Academy stop giving nominations to films that wowed us with something we’ve never quite seen before?

About this time of year everyone weighs in with their own lists of who should have been nominated and why. So I’ll join the chorus with my list of Top 5 snubs of the 2012 Oscars. Ready the popcorn.

5. Paul Giamatti may be the best character actor working today. His turn in the indie coming of age wrestling drama Win Win is one of the most conviction-laced performances of the year and well worth a look in the Best Actor category instead of A Better Life’s Damien Bichir or even Best Supporting Actor slot instead of Moneyball’s deer-in-the-headlights Jonah Hill.

4. Bridesmaids may have been hilarious (and a nice rare showcase of female talent), but much of its gags and monologues were improvised. And there’s a telling fact. The nominees for Best Screenplay aren’t based on the actual screenplays but on what happens and what is said on screen. If voters actually read the screenplays, I have no doubts that Sean Durkin’s festival darling Martha Marcy May Marlene or Will Reiser’s script for 50/50, based on his own intense battle with cancer, would have been nominated instead.

3. The Ides of March is the kind of picture Hollywood doesn’t make anymore. Apparently, it’s the type they don’t nominate anymore either. A throwback to the political dramas of the 1970s, this campaign trail intellectual thriller co-written and directed by George Clooney ought to have nabbed a Best Picture nomination, and probably one for lead Ryan Gosling, too.

2. Here’s Gosling again, back for a double snub. Drive was one of the best, most intriguing and re-watchable films of the year. It was violent. It was romantic. It was suspenseful and gorgeous, and the music was brilliant. Every frame felt heroic. Bryan Cranston and Gosling were fantastic, but funny man-turned-ruthless mobster Albert Brooks is the one that really got robbed of a nod for Best Supporting Actor.

1. If the picks for Best Picture confuse me, then those chosen for Best Documentary have my head spinning. The Interrupters an intimate, unflinching look at crime and gun violence and reformed gangsters striving to stop the cycle in inner city Chicago ought to have made the list. Directed by Steve James, the filmmaker behind the similarly un-nominated Hoop Dreams—a film now regarded as one of the best sports documentaries ever made—it is unexplainable how this powerful film failed to land on the Academy’s radar.