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 Callum: Hello, I'm Callum Robertson and this is entertainment. Well, it's that time of year

again – movie awards time. In January there were the Golden Globes, on February
11th it's the BAFTAs, the British film awards and on February 25 the most famous
of all awards shows, the Oscars, the more common name of the Academy of
Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Awards.
The nominations 1 for the 79th Oscars were announced last week. The nominations –
the films that have been chosen to have a chance of winning. Every year many
films are released but not all of them have a chance of winning an Oscar. A few
films in different categories are nominated or chosen and on Oscar night the
winners are revealed.
Compared to the award ceremony the announcement of the nominations is a very
low-key event. Low-key. It doesn't have a lot of glamour 2. Listen to BBC presenter 3
Simon Mayo and film critic Mark Kermode discussing the announcements. Listen
out for this information; the announcement is being made in Los Angeles, but what
time is it there when they are made? What time are the Oscar nominations
announced?
Simon and Mark
The nominations will be revealed at the Samuel Goldwyn Theatre. Mark this always strikes me as
a very strange event because it's very very early, in the morning in Los Angeles, it's a very very
important set of nominations and it's usually read out to a hall with about six people in it
I know because what happens is obviously the nominations are broadcast around the world, and
also they only announce the key nominations, you have to get the full list handed to you. It is very 
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very important but it is 5.30 in the morning and in the Sam Goldwyn Theatre you have a bunch of
journalists sort of wiping the sleep out of their eyes, frantically 4 trying to write down the
nominations.
Callum: The nominations were announced very early in the morning, very very early in fact.
Just after 5.30 in the morning. What else is unusual about such an important
announcement is that there are not many people there. Simon Mayo says it is read
out to a hall with about six people in. There are certainly more people there than
that, but it's not a big audience. Mark Kermode talks about a bunch of journalists,
a bunch. A bunch is an informal word for a small group of people, a bunch.
Listen again to Simon and Mark talking about the announcement of the Oscar
nominations.
Simon and Mark
The nominations will be revealed at the Samuel Goldwyn Theatre. Mark this always strikes me as
a very strange event because it's very very early, in the morning in Los Angeles, it's a very very
important set of nominations and it's usually read out to a hall with about six people in it
I know because what happens is obviously the nominations are broadcast around the world, and
also they only announce the key nominations, you have to get the full list handed to you. It is very
very important but it is 5.30 in the morning and in the Sam Goldwyn Theatre you have a bunch of
journalists sort of wiping the sleep out of their eyes, frantically trying to write down the
nominations.
Callum: Well, the nominations were announced and it was a good day for the British. Three
British performers were nominated in the Best Actress category as well as
nominations for Best Film, best director and many others. David Willis was in Los
Angeles for the BBC and he commented on the nominations, what does he think
about the competition this year, does he think the winners will be easy to predict?
And what does he think will be said about the number of British nominations? 
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David Willis
I think they're going to be saying, the Brits are finally coming, we've heard it before but three
good nominations in the best actress category, that's fantastic. And I think we'll see a lot of
attention paid to the film The Queen which has got I think four, I counted four top nominations.
That's obviously a front-running film this year. So all in all it looks like being an extremely
interesting year, a very tight race.
Callum: David thinks it's an interesting year and he says it'll be a very tight race, a tight
race. This means it'll be very close competition for the awards. One film which
will get a lot of attention he says is 'The Queen', a film about Queen Elizabeth. He
says this film is a front-running film, a front-runner. This expression comes from
horse racing 5. Imagine a horse race and during the race a horse is running at the
front, leading, this is a front-runner. It might not win, but it is getting a lot of
attention and is a favourite.
The film the Queen received quite a few nominations and as well as the other
nominations for British performers, directors, writers and technicians he thinks
people will the thinking The Brits are coming! The British are invading the Oscars!
Listen again.
David Willis
I think they're going to be saying, the Brits are finally coming, we've heard it before but three
good nominations in the best actress category, that's fantastic. And I think we'll see a lot of
attention paid to the film The Queen which has got I think four, I counted four top nominations.
That's obviously a front-running film this year. So all in all it looks like being an extremely
interesting year, a very tight race.
Callum: So will the Brits leave the ceremony clutching the golden statuettes? We'll have to
wait until February 25th to find out.
That's all from this edition of Entertainment