Best Original Screenplay
Nominees:
Mark Boal, The Hurt Locker
Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman, The Messenger
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, A Serious Man
Bob Peterson, Pete Docter and Thomas McCarthy, Up
*Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Boal won the Writers Guild award, which should give him the lead here, but the Guild disqualified Inglourious Basterds because Tarantino isn't a member. (What is the WGA, the Teamsters?) Now that QT is on the ballot, he ought to win. Since Boal based his script on the nonfiction story "Bomb Suit," which he wrote for Playboy in 2005, shouldn't The Hurt Locker be in the Adapted category? Boal has other worries: Master Sergeant Jeffrey Sarver, the centerpiece of Boal's article, is suing him and the production company. This news came after the Academy voting closed, so it won't be a deciding factor. But Tarantino is the front runner.