Place your bets

The unthinkable is about to happen in Hollywood. Two old movies look certain to figure prominently in the Oscar nominations to be announced in Los Angeles on Tuesday at the crack of dawn - 5.30 a.m., local time; 1.30 p.m. in Ireland. One of these movies, Gladiator, is so old that it was released in the US last May; the other, Erin Brockovich, is more than a month older.

It's been 10 years since a movie released in the first half of the calendar year made a major sweep at the Oscars, since The Silence of the Lambs, a February release in the US, took the top five awards: picture, director, actress, actor and screenplay. The general view in Hollywood is that the Academy members have unnaturally short memories and are more likely to reward the most recent releases. However, with many of last year's Oscar-aimed, end-of-year US releases underwhelming audiences and critics, those old spring movies are firmly placed for contention this year.

This is widely regarded as the most open Oscar race in many a year and, with so much uncertainty abroad and so many potential upsets on the way, the studios and distributors have been swamping the trade papers with glossy advertising emblazoned with the traditional euphemism, "For your consideration". As ever, Miramax is to the forefront, even though they have no obvious best picture winner this year. That has not deterred them from taking out reams of advertising for Lasse Hallstrom's Chocolat. After all, it worked last year when Hallstrom's The Cider House Rules surprised everyone except Miramax by taking seven Oscar nominations and two awards. Irish interest is minimal this year, with the fast-rising 24-year-old Dubliner, Colin Farrell, the strongest possibility for his breakthrough role in Tigerland. He's up against some of the world's most acclaimed performers in the best actor category, but then, that is the most open of all the acting sections this year.

Best Picture

Only six foreign-language productions have secured a best picture nomination in the history of the Oscars, the most recent being Life is Beautiful in 1998, but Ang Lee's exhilarating Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which is in Mandarin, has built up a massive groundswell of critical and public support which should propel it on to the shortlist, and it even has a serious shot at the award itself. The one sureshot here is Ridley Scott's hit epic, Gladiator, while the other contenders are Almost Famous, Cast Away, Chocolat, 13 Days, Billy Elliot, and the two Steven Soderbergh pictures, Traffic and Erin Brockovich. Long-shots include You Can Count On Me, Wonder Boys and the animated Chicken Run. A very tough one to call.

Prediction: Gladiator, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Almost Famous, Traffic, Chocolat

Best Director

Steven Soderbergh has pulled off a rare double by taking two of the five nominations for this year's Directors' Guild of America (DGA) feature film award. Soderbergh has been nominated for both Erin Brockovich and Traffic, making him only the second double nominee in the history of the DGA awards. (The other was Francis Ford Coppola in 1974 for The Godfather Part II and The Conversation.)

Soderbergh's fellow DGA nominees this year are Cameron Crowe for Almost Famous, Ang Lee for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and Ridley Scott for Gladiator. Since the inception of the DGA awards in 1949, the winner has gone on to win the best directing Oscar in all but four cases. The principal opposition should come from Robert Zemeckis (Cast Away), Philip Kaufman (Quills), Curtis Hanson (Wonder Boys), and a quartet of first- or second-time directors: Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliot), Julian Schnabel (Before Night Falls), Darren Aronofsky (Requiem For a Dream) and Kenneth Lonergan (You Can Count One Me).

Me, I'm throwing in my lot with the DGA here.

Prediction: Ang Lee, Cameron Crowe, Ridley Scott, Steven Soderbergh (twice)

Best Actress

The most certain nominee in any of the acting categories is Julia Roberts, whom many feel already has the Oscar in the bag for her gritty performance in Erin Brokcovich. It will be her third nomination, after a supporting actress nod for Steel Magnolias in 1989 (when Brenda Fricker took the Oscar for My Left Foot) and a best actress shortlisting for Pretty Woman in 1990 (when Kathy Bates won for Misery). There seems to be a consensus that Requiem For a Dream is too wrenching an ordeal for all those sensitive souls who make movies and vote in the Oscars, but Ellen Burstyn's superb portrayal of a lonely widow helplessly addicted to diet pills has to get a place on the shortlist. It will be Burstyn's sixth nomination; she won the award in 1974 for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. Laura Linney could well secure a place for her sensitive performance as a smalltown single mother in You Can Count On Me, and the Miramax publicity drive for Chocolat should see a place for Juliette Binoche, winner of best supporting actress for The English Patient in 1996.

That leaves a crowded field for the fifth slot: Joan Allen (The Contender), Gillian Anderson (The House of Mirth), Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger), Renee Zellweger (Nurse Betty), Cate Blanchett (The Gift), Lena Endre (Faithless), newcomer Michelle Rodrigeuz (Girlfight) and, perish the thought, Bjork (Dancer in the Dark). This is wide open, but the wellrespected Allen should scrape a place over Anderson and Yeoh.

Prediction: Julia Roberts, Ellen Burstyn, Laura Linney, Juliette Binoche, Joan Allen

Best Actor

For his almost-solo performance in Cast Away, Tom Hanks is the only certainty in this category, as he aims to add a third Oscar to those he won in 1993 and 1994, for Philadelphia and Forrest Gump. The Spanish actor Javier Bardem, best known here for Jamon Jamon, well-deserves a nomination for his portrayal of the persecuted gay Cuban novelist and poet, Reinaldo Arenas, in Before Night Falls. Two former best actor winners are back in contention: Michael Douglas (Wall Street, 1987) for Wonder Boys, and Geoffrey Rush (Shine, 1996) for playing the Marquis de Sade in Quills. Then there are Sean Connery (best supporting actor for The Untouchables in 1987) for Finding Forrester, Denzel Washington for Remember the Titans, Russell Crowe (a nominee last year for The Insider) for Gladiator, George Clooney for O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Ralph Fiennes for playing three characters in Sunshine, relative newcomer Mark Ruffalo for You Can Count On Me (if he is not in the supporting actor category), and Ed Harris directed by himself in his labour of love, Pollock.

The dark horse here is the youngest contender, Jamie Bell, the boy from Billy Elliot. And Colin Farrell has a shot here, too, for Tigerland. This is by far the toughest category to predict, but here goes . . .

Prediction: Tom Hanks, Javier Bardem, Russell Crowe, George Clooney, Jamie Bell

Best Supporting Actress

Goldie Hawn won this award in 1969 for her movie debut in Cactus Flower, and her daughter, Kate Hudson, looks very likely to take a place here for her first substantial Hollywood role in Almost Famous. That film should secure another nomination here for Frances McDormand, winner of the best actress Oscar for Fargo in 1996. (McDormand is also in the running here for Wonder Boys).

Winner of the best supporting actress award two years ago for Shakespeare in Love, Judi Dench will be back in contention for Chocolat, and may well be joined by another English actress, Julie Walters (previously nominated for Educating Rita in 1983) for Billy Elliot.

Playing painter Lee Krasner in Pollock, Marcia Gay Harden has a good deal of support to take the fifth slot, although the Crouching Tiger bandwagon might well give the place to young Zhang Ziyi instead. The other strong contenders are Kate Winslet (Quills), Elaine May (Small Time Crooks), Catherine Zeta Jones (Traffic), Laura Linney (The House of Mirth) and Jennifer Ehle (Sunshine).

Prediction: Frances McDormand, Kate Hudson, Judi Dench, Julie Walters, Zhang Ziyi

Best Supporting Actor

The front-runner here has to be first-time nominee Benicio del Toro for Traffic, closely followed by Willem Dafoe (nominated for Platoon in 1986) for Shadow of the Vampire. Four-time nominee Albert Finney has a strong chance for Erin Brockovich. Joaquin Phoenix could get in for Gladiator, if he doesn't split his vote with his performance in Quills. And Jeff Bridges, cast as the US president in The Contender, will probably oust his co-star from that film, Gary Oldman.

The only sure-shots are del Toro and Dafoe, however, and the competition includes Jack Black (High Fidelity), Bruce Greenwood (playing JFK in 13 Days), Jeffrey Wright (Shaft), William H. Macy (State and Main), Gary Lewis (Billy Elliot), Michael Caine (Quills), Hollywood bad boy Robert Downey Jr (Wonder Boys), and the late Oliver Reed (Gladiator).

Prediction: Benicio del Toro, Willem Dafoe, Joaquin Phoenix, Jeff Bridges, Albert Finney

Best Foreign-Language Film

This is probably the most unpredictable Oscars' category, given that it generally produces any number of surprises in terms of both omissions and inclusions. However, it will be astonishing if this year's Taiwanese entry, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, is not nominated. From the 46 national entries, the other likely front-runners include In the Mood For Love (Hong Kong), A Time of Drunken Horses (Iran), Me, You, Them (Brazil), Maelstrom (Canada), The Taste of Others (France), Angels of the Universe (Iceland), Amores Perros (Mexico), Life as a Sexually Transmitted Disease (Poland), Sky Hook (Yugoslavia), Songs From the Second Floor (Sweden), Vertical Ray of the Sun (Vietnam), The 100 Steps (Italy) and Chunhyang (Korea).

This could very well be the year of the Asian invasion, with Taiwan, Hong Kong and Korea making the grade, along with France and Mexico.

Prediction: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Chunhyang, In the Mood For Love, The Taste of Others, Amores Perros

The nominations for the 73rd Academy Awards will be announced on Tuesday. The Oscars ceremony will be held in Los Angeles on March 25th.