ANALYSIS: OSCAR'S GOOD THINGS COME IN THREES.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

For all the speculation about how the accelerated Oscar schedule would affect this year's 76th annual Academy Awards, one thing was clear well before nominations were announced Tuesday. There were three great films released last year - ``Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King,'' ``Mystic River'' and ``Lost in Translation'' - and no amount of politicking, critical pointing or preliminary awards contests could alter that fact.

This despite one of these movies - now, indisputably, the best picture front-runner - coming from a genre, fantasy, that's never won the top Oscar; another being perhaps the most downbeat big studio release of the year; and the third a work of becoming modesty, which has got to be the least-appreciated virtue in the long history of Academy Awards.

As for the most appreciated non-virtue, well ... hokey historical overproduction still holds too much sway with these guys. I will say that of the three 19th-century war movies that were designed primarily for Oscar consideration, ``Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World'' was clearly more intelligent and formally clever than ``Cold Mountain'' or ``The Last Samurai.'' But a second-best 10 nominations? (``LOTR: ROTK'' leads the field with 11.) I can think of a dozen films from last year that possessed as many or more worthwhile elements, and wove them together into more compelling wholes.

And then there is the prettified Depression era and populist pandering of ``Seabiscuit.'' I know it's well-liked (every square frame of it was designed, like a Greek wedding with saddlery, to be that way) and the racing sequences were outstanding. But really, did a single second of this based-on-a-true-story ring remotely authentic? Even the problem-plagued ``Cold Mountain'' (which was Tuesday's perceived big loser despite garnering more nominations than either ``Mystic'' or ``Translation'' did) doesn't feel as manipulative as this designated dark horse does.

Which may be why ``Seabiscuit'' director Gary Ross was the one best picture helmer left out of the directing race (replaced by Fernando Meirelles, the man behind this year's true dark horse, the Brazilian crime epic ``City of God,'' which came out of nowhere to nab four nominations). Not that it matters. ``Rings'' master Peter Jackson surpassed himself with this final entry in his well-regarded trilogy, and the sentiment to honor him for the whole, three-feature achievement should be strong as well.

Which is a minor shame, since Clint Eastwood registered his most nuanced and powerful behind-the-camera work ever on ``Mystic River.'' But he's already won for ``Unforgiven,'' a film so almost-as-good that voters could be, well, forgiven for not recognizing the subtle improvements. Actually, her status as the first American woman ever nominated in the category makes ``Translation's'' Sofia Coppola a more likely spoiler than Clint, if an apparently diversity-minded academy (check out the record half-dozen ethnic nominees in the acting divisions this year) really feels like sending a message.

At the same time, the academy appears to be sending mixed messages in the form of thespic snubs. It must be some kind of dubious modern record to have three best-picture nominees with none of their actors in the mix. While this probably means little in ``LOTR's'' case (the ensemble is so vast it's more of a group effort, and the film's formal and technical qualities are equal if not dominant strong points). Omitting the actors from ``M&C'' and ``Seabiscuit'' looks more fatal. Russell Crowe did at least as good a job as ``Cold Mountain'' nominee Jude Law in the former, and support man Paul Bettany was sterling. As for the ``Seabiscuit'' team, well, you can't fool all the academy branches all of the time ...

In the actual best-actor race, again, who could deny the career-topping work of ``Mystic's'' Sean Penn and ``Translation's'' Bill Murray (or, for that matter, ``Pirates of the Caribbean's'' Johnny Depp, who gave the most sheerly enjoyable film performance of the year)? It will be interesting to see which of these competition/schmooze-averse actors will overcome the voting members' vanity this year. If quality is the yardstick, it should be Penn by a nose, helped by the fact that more voters will now see his equally great work in ``21 Grams,'' for which co-stars Naomi Watts and Benicio Del Toro have been nominated.

The lead actress category included two of the day's biggest surprises. Both ``Whale Rider's'' young Keisha Castle-Hughes and ``In America's'' Samantha Morton looked headed for supporting actress berths at best. But academy voters rightly recognized Castle-Hughes as the star of the Maori movie, while wrongly reckoning that the hugely talented Morton was permitted to do as much in the Irish immigrant saga as she did in the previous awards year for the brilliant but academy-ignored ``Morvern Callar.''

Unfortunately, both Castle-Hughes and Morton play flat-out lovable lasses in their respective movies. If the academy was really into defying expectations, it would have recognized something completely confrontational, like Uma Thurman's performance in ``Kill Bill - Vol. 1.''

True, inevitable winner Charlize Theron plays quite the nasty piece of work in ``Monster,'' Watts goes to hell and back several times in ``21 Grams,'' and Diane Keaton gave the smartest comic performance (ladies division, anyway) of the year in ``Something's Gotta Give.'' But these three nominations also echo standard academy practices of rewarding alarming physical transformations (a lesson last year's winner, ``The Hours' '' Nicole Kidman, should have remembered while essaying ``Cold Mountain's'' starving yet impossibly gorgeous Southern belle), making up for previous slights (Watts in ``Mulholland Dr.'') and, well, loving Keaton when she's funny.

In the supporting races, ``Mystic's'' deserving Tim Robbins and Renee Zellweger's demented ``Cold Mountain'' turn look like the ones to beat. The men's competition, alas, appears to be in more flux than the women's, in which just about every other actress did outstanding work.

Assorted nice calls - if not wholly unexpected, definitely not sure things, either - include screenwriting nominations for the inventive ``American Splendor'' and the perfectly balanced ``Finding Nemo'' (2003's one other indisputable masterwork and the animated feature shoo-in), an unusually sound slate of five actually good original song nominees (the most successful aspect of ``Cold Mountain,'' which boasts two of them) and Eduardo Serra's Vermeerish cinematography for ``Girl With a Pearl Earring.''

And, as usual, there were way too many craft nominations unimaginatively distributed among a handful of big-budget prestige productions. But that's an academy tradition that a month's less time for contemplation probably wasn't going to change all that much. In a year with barely a handful of masterpieces to choose from, the rest of those ballot slots must be filled with something.

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1) Peter Jackson, center, appears to be the front-runner in the best director category, as academy voters may be inclined to reward him for all three ``Lord of the Rings'' movies.

(2) Sean Penn, left, and Clint Eastwood are strong contenders for best actor and best director, respectively, for ``Mystic River,'' but Eastwood's previous directing Oscar could diminish his chances.