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How did Pride and Prejudice manage a Golden Globe nomination for Best Picture (Musical/Comedy)? It’s spirited and infectious and “romantic,” okay, but I don’t see how anyone could try to call it a dramedy even. The Broadcast Film Critics Association wants to be the new Golden Globes and elbow the GG’s aside….fine. But to get there the BFCA nominations have can’t just be numerous — they also have to veer into the ridiculous and be joked about around town. And right now, the Globes are way in front.

We all expected that Brokeback Mountain, The Constant Gardener and Good Night, and Good Luck would be among the five Golden Globes Best Picture (Drama) nominees. And I guess A History of Violence‘s inclusion isn’t all that surprising. But I’m especially gratified (and welcomely surprised) that Woody Allen’s Match Point is one of the five. This should boost the box-office when it opens on 12.28 and add to the Oscar nomination momentum.

Those two Golden Globe Munich nominations — Steven Spielberg for Best Director and Tony Kushner (and Eric Roth?) for Best Screenplay — are ceremonial/political gestures meant to compensate for the lack of a Best Picture (Drama) nomination. I think this is really the end of the road for Munich. No critics awards, no Golden Globe noms to speak of…where can it go from here? There is no joy in Mudville this morning. The “presumptive Best Picture winner” made by the Mighty Steven has struck out.

I spoke to New York Film Critics Circle president Gene Seymour a little while ago about this morning’s “shockingly convivial” balloting, and particularly the Brokeback Mounain trifecta — Best Picture, Best Director (Ang Lee) and Best Actor (Heath Ledger). Here it is…

Brokeback Mountain has been named the Best Picture of 2005 by the New York Film Critics Circle, following the same decision announced by the Los Angeles and Boston film critics, and Ang Lee has been named Best Director. And Heath Ledger has put a stop to Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s unbroken winning streak by being named Best Actor for his inhabiting of Brokeback‘s Ennis del Mar. And isn’t it great that Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man won yet again for Best Feature Documentary, on top of getting the same award from the L.A. and New York Online Film Critics? (The honorable Oscar Documentary committee didn’t even include Grizzly Man on its preliminary contender list.) Wong Kar Wai’s 2046 was named best Foreign-Language Film and the Best First Award went to Capote‘s director Bennett Miller. And Reese Witherspoon was named Best Actress for Walk the Line, agreeing with the Boston Film Critics vote last weekend. William Hurt won for Best Supporting Actor in A History of Violence and his costar Maria Bello won for Best Supporting Actress. The Best Cinematography award went to Christopher Doyle, Lai Yiu Fai and Kwan Pun Leung for 2046 and Noah Baumbach womn the Best Screenplay award for The Squid and the Whale.

New York Times reporter Sharon Waxman has delivered a well- reported timeline piece about how the Paramount acquisition of DreamWorks came together earlier this month, and in the process snatching the opportunity from Universal. A $1.6 billion invest- ment in the future — a purchase of the DreamWorks name, of the company’s film library and the prestige factor of having Steven Spielberg working on the Paramount lot and….what else exactly? Spielberg and his two DreamWorks partners David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg will each pocket around $172 million…great. But can someone explain to me how the DreamWorks purchase is going to inject $1.6 billion worth of assurance and vitality into Paramount’s quest to supply big-screen diversion to the dream-seeking, ticket-buying public? The core value of any entertainment company is about generating magic-spark elements and X-factor alchemy, and I’m very skeptical about these middle-aged guys supposedly having a Midas-touch ability in this regard. I mean, I really don’t get it, especially considering the growing belief that Spielberg is past his prime (Munich certainly doesn’t argue against this thesis) and the fact that he’s been talking to friends about wanting to downshift out of directing down the road and putting more of his time and energy into altruistic pursuits, like improving the opportunities for education among third-world peoples. What Paramount’s Brad Grey has purchased, bottom line, is a certain notion of connected- ness (talent relations, industry relationships, a presumptive talent pipeline) and faith in dream-factory fertility.

New York Times reporter David Halbfinger has run a story about being invited down to the flat marshy area south of Marina del Rey to see the not-quite-right, slightly fake-looking object d’art recontruction of the collapsed World Trade Center towers for Stone’s (and Stacy Sher and Michael Shamberg’s) World Trade Center, about the two buried Port Authority workers who were the last (or among the last) to be rescued from the Ground Zero rubble. Could the producers have come up with a lumpier, more on-the-nose title? An idea, a plea…call it Underground already. A little understatement tends to go a long way.

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Wait a minute…someone else (Newsweek‘s David Ansen) has seen Down to the Bone, that hide-and-seek movie that opened with zero fanfare in New York and Los Angeles about three weeks ago, and has come away impressed by Vera Farmiga‘s lead performance. Ansen says Farmiga is “a revelation as a working-class junkie struggling to get clean.” Yesterday (Saturday, 12.10) the Los Angeles Film Critics proclaimed Farmiga Best Actress of the Year for the same performance. This is fascinating. I was invited to three screenings by Lisa Danna of the GS Entertainment Marketing Group in early November, but I was too busy being busy.

Seconding Saturday’s L.A. Film Critics decision, the Boston Film Critics have proclaimed Brokeback Mountain as the Best Picture of 2005 and Ang Lee as Best Director. For the third time, Capote‘s Phillip Seymour Hoffman was named Best Actor by a critics group and, for the first time, Walk the Line‘s Reese Witherspoon won for Best Actress. And Cinderella Man‘s Paul Giamatti was named Best Supporting Actor, also for the first time. The Beantowners also seconded LAFCA’s handing their Best Supporting Actress award to Capote‘s Catherine Keener and their Best Screenplay award to Capote‘s Dan Futterman. And the Best Documentary award went to ThinkFilm’s Murderball…yay.

The nominations put out today by the Broadcast Film Critics Association are too easy and all-embracing. Ten nominations for Best Picture? Six nominations in each major acting category? And six Best Director noms? Why not seven in each category? Why not eight? Wait…why not nine or ten? Spread the love around! Kiss everyone’s ass! Get as many people to come to the BFCA awards as possible….wheeeeeeee!

By naming Keira Knightley as 2005’s Best Actress for her perf- ormance in Pride and Prejudice, The New York Online Film Critics have splooged all over their reputation as a serious quality- judging entity. The fact that Knightley is a lightweight attitude actress, a flirt, a woman who conveys no sense of even a stream (much less a river) running through her is incontestable and not open for discussion. The members of the NYOFC need to take a couple of days off, take a bus to the Pennsyvania countryside, check into a reasonably priced motel and get together and ask themselves how this could have happened. Otherwise, good calls all down the line. A nice pat-on-the-back attaboy for director-writer Noah Baumbach by proclaiming The Squid as the Whale as Best Picture. Capote‘s Phillip Seymour Hoffman was named Best Actor…but of course! The Constant Gardener‘s Fernan- do Meirelles was named Best Director…very cool. Casanova‘s Oliver Platt was named Best Supporting Actor…fine. Junebug‘s Amy Adams was named Best Supporting Actress, the great Terrence Howard was named Best Breakthrough Performer, Paul Haggis got the Best Debut Director and Best Screenplay award, Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man was named Best Documen- tary (that’s two Best Doc awards for this absolutely first-rate film, which the perceptive Academy documentary committee didn’t even put on their short list), and Downfall was named Best Foreign Film.

Good move by the Los Angeles Film critics Association in giving the great Terrence Howard its “New Generation” award because ’05 was such a great breakout year for the guy (Hustle & Flow, Crash, Get Rich or Die Tryin’). Then again, the fact that Howard has been kicking around for quite a while makes the notion of him being a “New Generation” anything sound like a stretch. And LAFCA’s decision overlooks the very noteworthy fact that 2005 was Rachel McAdams‘ breakout year as much as anyone else’s. She stepped right up last summer and became the new Julia Roberts…signed, sealed, done deal. No, a better Julia Roberts!