The nominations for the 80th annual Academy Awards were announced in Los Angeles early Tuesday morning, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences president Sid Ganis and Kathy Bates announced the nominees, including for best picture of the year: "Atonement," "Juno," "Michael Clayton," "No Country For Old Men" and "There Will Be Blood." The complete list of nominees is available at indieWIRE.com.

The nominations the inaugural Cinema Eye Honors For NonFiction Filmmaking after the jump.

On the morning that the 2008 Sundance Film Festival kicks off in Park City, UT, Zeitgeist Films has announced its acquisition of Yung Chang's acclaimed first feature, "Up The Yangtze," a documentary about the effects of the construction of the massive Three Gorges Dam that is displacing millions and destroying national landmarks in the country. Set for its U.S. premiere tomorrow (Friday) in Sundance's world documentary competition, the film debuted back in November at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) and will be released theatrically by Zeitgeist in April. The film, produced by Mila Aung-Thwin, John Christou and Germaine Ying Gee Wong, is from the National Film Board of Canada, which also handled the Zeitgeist release, "Manufactured Landscapes." [Eugene Hernandez]

Get the full story at indieWIRE.com.

The striking Hollywood writers guild likely will bar its members from working on next month's Grammys telecast, a union spokesman said Tuesday. Solvej Schou reports for Associated Press.

The Golden Globes are not the Oscars. Reporting on the event in the New York Times, David Carr talks with "No Country For Old Men" producer Scott Rudin. “I really care about the fact that the strike is still ongoing,” [Rudin] said. “That is much more important than the Globes or any parties. There’s a real battle with real stakes that simply has to outweigh the temporal pleasures of both a party and an awards show.”

The Golden Globe award winners were announced tonight during a press conference in Los Angeles. "Atonement" won the prize for Best Picture - Drama and "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" winning Best Picture - Musical or Comedy

The list of winners is available now at indieWIRE.com.

Harvey Weinstein is preparing to announce his company's pact with striking WGA writers, saying -- in the New York Times -- "We need to get people back to work."

Three organizations, SAG, WGA and HFPA, each issued statements tonight regarding the upcoming Golden Globe Awards, set for Sunday, January 13th:

SAG President Alan Rosenberg: After considerable outreach to Golden Globe actor nominees and their representatives over the past several weeks, there appears to be unanimous agreement that these actors will not cross WGA picket lines to appear on the Golden Globe Awards as acceptors or presenters. We applaud our members for this remarkable show of solidarity for striking Writers Guild of America writers. As I have said since this strike began on November 5th, we must stand united with our brothers and sisters at the WGA.

WGAW President Patric M. Verrone: We are grateful to our brothers and sisters in SAG for their continued solidarity and support. The entire awards show season is being put in jeopardy by the intransigence of a few big media corporations. We urge the conglomerates to return to the bargaining table they abandoned and negotiate a fair and reasonable deal with writers to put this town back to work.

HFPA President Jorge Camara: The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has been placed in an extremely difficult position with the ongoing Writers Guild strike. We are making every effort to work out a solution that will permit the Golden Globes to take place with the creative community present to participate. We hope to announce a resolution to this unfortunate predicament on Monday.

"Online video-rental service Netflix and giant LG Electronics on Wednesday said they will develop a set-top box that lets consumers stream video content from the Internet to high-definition TVs," reports USA Today.

Actor/director Sean Penn has been named president of the jury for the 61st Festival de Cannes, taking place May 14 - 25, festival organizers announced early Thursday morning local time in France, where his acclaimed directorial effort "Into the Wild" will open on January 9, 2008.

Get the latest at indieWIRE.com.

"Sequels had their day in the sun in 2007, but specialty films found dwindling auds," Variety is reporting in their year end look at the Indiewood company box office grosses, noting a 4% drop overall from last year. Pamela McClintock includes the following ranked list of reported annual grosses for each company in '07 and '06:

1) Fox Searchlight
2007: $136.2 million
2006: $161.6 million

2) Miramax
2007: $125.4 million
2006: $46.2 million

3) Focus Features
2007: $124.8 million
2006: $178.6 million

4) Paramount Vantage
2007: $60.9 million
2006: $46.9 million

5) Picturehouse
2007: $58.3 million
2006: $24 million

6) Sony Pictures Classics
2007: $37.8 million
2006: $59.7 million

7) Warner Independent
2007: $15.6 million
2006: $27.4 million