For we the movie fanatics of the world, the Academy Awards are just as exciting as the Super Bowl. Many of us throw or attend Oscar parties, and even go so far as to print out that ballot and lock our picks into place.

Over the past few years, this and a lot of other awards shows have kind of lost their flare. It has become apparent that deciding nominees and voting for winners is not about who is the best and who is most deserving, but about what has the best side-story and what the popular names and titles are. This massive flaw is hard to swallow, and the appeal of the whole event is bordering on non-existent.

To help bring more appeal to the game, the folks behind the Academy Awards chose to make a few changes in the format of the show. The biggest of these alterations was of course changing the amount of Best Picture nominees from 5 to a whopping 10, which meant that all of the deserving but not-so-traditional contenders (The Dark Knight) could get their chance to be underdog heroes.

Continue reading on for more and to check out the full list of this year’s nominees!

The list of nominees for the 67th annual Golden Globe Awards were announced earlier today, and you can check out the whole list below.

The Globes aren’t the most respected of all awards ceremonies (not that many…if ANY are these days), but they are good for one important thing: Academy Awards potentials. Many of the nominees and winners of Golden Globes will go on to land Oscar nominations as well, so movie fans watch with sharp eyes.

Just a glance over the list of nominees, you can see why so many people have trouble taking awards like this seriously. There’s a select group of movies that feel like they’re given these nods just because of their status and not due to their quality. These movies could in fact be the very best of the best this year — I do not know for sure — but when you see films like Nine which hasn’t even been released yet getting so many nominations, you scratch your head, especially knowing how much love musicals get JUST for being musicals. Or maybe even Avatar grabbing a massively unexpected nod in the Best Motion Picture Dramas category. Hopefully the majority of these are indeed the most deserving of the honor, and may the best films win.

Head on over to the other side to see the entire rundown of Golden Globe nominees and please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below!

Yahoo! Movies has put out a new teaser trailer for the Robert Zemeckis motion capture holiday remake of Charles Dickens‘ A Christmas Carol. It was just announced that Zemeckis would be giving this treatment to a remake of the 1968 Beatles’ movie, Yellow Submarine, so this trailer is an instant example of what can be done using the technology.

The movie stars Jim Carrey multi-tasking like a mad man, filling the roles of Ebenezer Scrooge, and the three ghosts: the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come. It of course tells the classic tale of a wicked, greedy, bitter old man who’s cruel to all who interact with him. One holiday season, his wretched treatment of others goes too far and eventually sees him visited by three ghosts who take him on a trip through time, observing his entire life in hopes that this outside perspective of himself will alter how he treats others.

Click on over to see the trailer here, or click the source above for HD options.

Empire has exclusively premiered the poster for Dorian Gray, the big-screen adaptation of the Oscar Wilde classic The Picture of Dorian Gray. Check out the site to see the full version.

Last month, the international teaser trailer for the Oliver Parker film, starring Prince Caspian‘s Ben Barnes, was debuted at STYD, which you can watch here below.

The story revolves around the handsome young Dorian (Barnes) who’s swept away by a hedonistic lifestyle in Victorian London after meeting the charismatic Lord Henry Wotton (Colin Firth). After an artist paints his portrait, Dorian says he’d do anything to keep his youthful beauty captured in the painting, even sell his soul.

The film, which also stars Colin Firth, Ben Chaplin, Rachel Hurd-Wood, and Rebecca Hall, will be released in the UK on September 9; no date has been confirmed yet for the U.S. release.

The first footage of Disney’s A Christmas Carol premiered today at Cannes.

Director Robert Zemeckis and stars Jim Carrey and Colin Firth were on-hand to debut the footage for the upcoming 3D motion-capture animated film, based on the classic Christmas tale by Charles Dickens.

Watch the 19-second video clip here below.

Ebenezer Scrooge (Jim Carrey) begins the Christmas holiday with his usual miserly contempt, barking at his faithful clerk (Gary Oldman) and his cheery nephew (Colin Firth). But when the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come take him on an eye-opening journey revealing truths Old Scrooge is reluctant to face, he must open his heart to undo years of ill will before it’s too late.

A Christmas Carol arrives in conventional and IMAX theaters on November 6, 2009.