My God, she doesn’t even inhale! Takes a drag, blows it out a second or two later — obviously not attuned to the potential cannabis experience.

Yes, I realize that Roger Durling‘s decision to invite The Blind Side star Sandra Bullock to take part in a Santa Barbara Film Festival dog-and-pony show means he’s betting that she’s got some serious Best Actress heat. (Tapped out on iPhone at AMC Lincoln Square before Up In The Air all-media.)

Envelope/Gold Derby columnist Tom O’Neil is claiming that the forthcoming Best Picture win by Precious at the indie Spirit Awards next March (O’Neil believes it’s a foregone conclusion) is as much if not more about the Spirits’ rivalry with the New York-based Gotham awards as the quality of Lee Daniels‘ film.

“As expected, Independent Spirit Awards lavished nominations upon Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire today, thereby addressing the film’s ridiculous snub by the other, rival prize for independent films, the Gotham Awards, which gave their top trophy last night to The Hurt Locker,” O’Neil writes.

“This year’s clash between the two awards — bestowed by rival factions of an organization that split in 2006 — marks the height of absurdity in awards land. Each side is embracing one of the two top indies — The Hurt Locker or Precious — to the exclusion of the other. In the end, both awards look foolish and everybody loses.

“The Hurt Locker isn’t eligible at the Indie Spirits this year so it won’t be going head to head with Precious on awards night, but it was eligible last year and failed to be nominated for best picture. How clueless is that?

“Jeremy Renner and Anthony Mackie received lead- and supporting-acting bids, so we know that it was on voters’ radar. They just didn’t think it was worthy of consideration for the top prize. Instead, the Spirit nominees were Ballast, Frozen River, Rachel Getting Married, Wendy and Lucy and the winner, The Wrestler.

“In recent months, The Hurt Locker has built up deafening buzz. The Gotham Awards — based in Manhattan — saw their chance to swoop in and give The Hurt Locker the kudos love it should have received from their Los Angeles counterpart, but, strangely, the Gothams decided to snub the other top indie film in the process: Precious.”

(Which I incidentally feel was an okay move.)

“Get the picture? Can you guess what’s going to win the Indie Spirit Award this year? Does it even matter that there are four other nominees: (500) Days of Summer, Amreeka, Sin Nombre and The Last Station?

Among Empire‘s gallery of iconic movie role portraits, this shot struck me more than any other. What, honestly, was your first reaction to it? Your second reaction, most likely, was that Daniel Radcliffe is wearing the most complex, adult-seeming, wised-up expression among the three. But initially…?

Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grinch.

The N.Y. Times has posted an amusing, very clever little video piece about how David Carr has handed the Carpetbagger reins to Melena Ryzik. Refresh Content’s Nick Dawson graciously sent the embed code along [which I had to remove due to an automatic launch function], and yet the fact remains that somebody in the Times pipeline is refusing to make the code easily available.

It would be one thing if the piece was easily findable on YouTube, but it’s not…if it’s there at all. I’d prefer to grab a YouTube code because the one Dawson sent me automatically launches the video whenever a reader refreshes the HE page.

I called the Times a few times and left messages…nothing. An embed code is not going to re-direct traffic to someone else’s site, and yet the Times — increasingly isolated in its mule-like refusal to roll with the 21st Century swing of things — refuses to let dumb guys like me (i.e., who can’t figure how to capture the code inside the guts of the Times website) access their codes and post their videos.

Can someone from the Times at least send me a code that won’t automatically launch the video?

The week’s least intriguing Avatar article comes from Vanity Fair‘s usually engaging Julian Sancton, who interviews the guy hired to crate the Na’vi language — i.e., Paul Frommer, Professor of Clinical Management Communication at U.S.C.

Sanction: “How would you greet someone who called you on the phone in Na’vi, if there were such things as phones on Pandora?” Frommer: “I would say, ‘Kaltxi. Ngaru lu fpom srak?’ Which is kind of, ‘Hello, how are you?'” The piece includes a sound file of Frommer saying this.

Movieline‘s Kyle Buchanan: “You have your ingenue (Carey Mulligan), your unknown (Gabby Sidibe), and you have Meryl Streep doing a character role, but The Blind Side‘s Sandra Bullock brings star power, and she’s never been nominated for Best Actress. My question to you is, do you think she deserves it?

Movieline‘s Stu Van Airsdale: “I actually do. It’s a very difficult role in the first place. There’s the accent, the swagger, the tenderness, and a benign sort of dogma that she gently tosses around, making it Christian catnip without alienating the secular audience, which is all this film wants to do in the first place. Moreover, she makes everyone around her better.”

In other words, the Academy actors branch needs to nominate Bullock because (a) it’s good for ratings and therefore good for business — no matter how they feel about The Blind Side — because a Bullock nomination will lure the hinterlanders, and (b) because actors who really get it aren’t the ones who hog the spotlight but make the film work as best they can, any way they can. As Meryl Streep said last night at the Gotham Awards, “Every actor in a supporting actor.”

Good things about today’s Spirit Awards nominations: (a) A Serious Man will get a special Robert Altman award (and not a Best Picture nomination?); (b) Sin Nombre was nominated for Best Picture, and Cary Fukunaga was nominated for Best Director; (c) Greg Mottola‘s Adventureland screenplay was nominated; (d) Tom Ford‘s A Single Man was nominated for Best First Feature (and is almost guaranteed to win in this category — trust me); (e) Big Fan and Humpday were nominated for the John Cassaevetes Award (i.e., best feature made for under $500,000); (f) Sacha Gervasi‘s Anvil! The Story of Anvil was nominated for Best Doc (and will almost certainly win).

Curious/weird things: (a) The Cove wasn’t nominated for Best Doc….what?; (b) Congrats to Ginsberg-Libby for scoring the p.r. gig but why, I’m wondering, did the Spirits jettison Mark Pogachefsky‘s MPRM after so many years of sterling service?; (c) The Hurt Locker is missing because it was nominated last year, and that happened because somebody on the team submitted it — go figure; (d) Yes, of course — A Serious Man lead Michael Stuhlbarg should have been nominated for Best Actor (and I’m starting to realize why people are cool to his performance — it’s because his character doesn’t stand up and get angry and fight against God’s wrath, and because he doesn’t make a move on the hot pot-smoking lady next door); (e) That Evening Sun‘s Hal Holbrook was denied a Best Actor nomination..why?

“Epic..incredible honor…meansa great deal to me,” etc. Obviously, Kathryn Bigelow‘s remarks at the podium last night upon receiving a Gotham Film Awards tribute trophy sound a little echo-y. That’s hand-held Canon Elph video for you. I was sitting at table #6, struggling to keep the camera rock still, an un-sampled fish and pasta dinner to my left.

“The evidence is indisputable, writes Vanity Fair‘s Leslie Bennetts, “that Meryl Streep, at age 60, has become the industry’s new box-office queen.” Absolutely, yes…for over-35s who go to the movies. Educated couples, singles, women in groups, etc. It’s a different story with most of the under-25 Eloi, of course. They know Streep as the white-haired bitch in The Devil Wears Prada, I would presume, but she’s not of their own and therefore a “meh” in terms of marquee value.

The Eloi are not just another age group — they’re another species.

But yes, of course — Streep matters big-time with older viewers. The mostly grotesque Mamma Mia!, Bennetts reminds, has grossed $601 million worldwide. Prada has earned $324 million around the world. This year Julie & Julia has tallied $121 million. And everyone knows that It’s Complicated is going to clean up.

Streep “broke the glass ceiling of an older woman being a big star — it has never, never happened before,” says director Mike Nichols.

Updated: As predicted last night during the ceremony, The Hurt Locker won the best feature as well as best ensemble award at the Gotham Independent Film Awards, held at Manhattan’s Cipriani Wall Street. And director Kathryn Bigelow was given a career tribute. As if the Summit release needed a further boost for a Best Picture nomination. It’s locked, certified…next?

(l. to r.) Hurt Locker producers producers Nicolas Chartier and Greg Shapiro, director Kathryn Bigelow, costars Anthony Mackie, Brian Gerahty, producer-screenwriter Mark Boal, star Jeremy Renner.

If those ladies I spoke to at the Regency hotel last week or those waitresses at Extra Virgin are reading this, I have a question: have you guys heard of The Hurt Locker now?

Congrats to Bigelow, producer-screenwriter Mark Boal, producers Nicolas Chartier and Greg Shapiro and costars Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, Brian Geraghty, Ralph Fiennes, Guy Pearce, David Morse and Evangeline Lilly.

The Gothams’ breakthrough actor award went to The Maid‘s Catalina Saavedra, beaing out The Hurt Locker‘s Renner. Robert Kenner‘s Food, Inc., a Magnolia release, won the best documentary prize. Big Fan director-screenwriter Robert Siegel won the breakthrough director award. And Ry Russo-Young‘s You Won’t Miss Me was handed the Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You trophy.

In addition to Bieglow, career tribute honors were presented to actors Natalie Portman and Stanley Tucci and producers Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner.

The emcee was Kumail Nanjiani, a very funny guy whose name no one in the U.S. will ever be able to pronounce, much less spell or remember. He needs to change his name to Donnie Darker or Ken H. Doll (an allusion to CREEP finance guy and Watergate co-conspirator Kenneth H. Dahlberg) or whatever. Or…you know, Homie Kume. I could remember that.

Posted Last Night: Kathryn Bigelow‘s The Hurt Locker has just won the Best Ensemble trophy at the Gotham Film Awards, which is now about halfway through the program at Cipriani Wall Street. This means The Hurt Locker will also win the Best Feature award. Trust me — I know how this stuff works.