Oscar Nominee: Best Achievement in Sound Mixing

During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is presumed dead after a fierce storm and left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on the hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive. Millions of miles away, NASA and a team of international scientists work tirelessly to bring "the Martian" home, while his crewmates concurrently plot a daring, if not impossible rescue mission.

As with the great John Ford (Young Mr. Lincoln) before him, it would be out of character for Steven Spielberg to construct a conventional, cradle-to-grave portrait of a historical figure. In drawing from Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals, the director instead depicts a career-defining moment in the career of Abraham Lincoln (an uncharacteristically restrained Daniel Day-Lewis). With the Civil War raging, and the death toll rising, the president focuses his energies on passage of the 13th Amendment.

I was born under unusual circumstances.' And so begins The Curious Case of Benjamin Button adapted from the 1920s story by F. Scott Fitzgerald about a man who is born in his eighties and ages backwards: a man like any of us who is unable to stop time. We follow his story set in New Orleans from the end of World War I in 1918 into the 21st century following his journey that is as unusual as any man's life can be. Directed by David Fincher and starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett with Taraji P.

Director Paul Greengrass has made a career out of not holding back, with a series of films (including United 93 and The Bourne Supremacy/Ultimatum) that forcibly propel the audience out of bystander mode and into a visceral duck-and-cover reaction. (If he were a history teacher, his students would constantly be picking old gum out of their hair.) Captain Phillips, Greengrass's collaboration with a rarely better Tom Hanks, shows the filmmaker further refining his style, telling a true-life story of heroism with an immediacy that puts most movies based on fact out to staid pasture.

There are only so many filmmakers fearless or foolhardy enough to tackle a challenging novel, like Yann Martel's Life of Pi, but adaptation specialist Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain) was well positioned to take it on. As a structuring device, he uses an interview between a journalist (Rafe Spall) and Pi Patel (The Namesake's Irrfan Khan), a Montreal immigrant with an unusual back story.

Based on real events the dramatic thriller Argo chronicles the life-or-death covert operation to rescue six Americans which unfolded behind the scenes of the Iran hostage crisis focusing on the little-known role that the CIA and Hollywood played-information that was not declassified until many years after the event. On November 4 1979 as the Iranian revolution reaches its boiling point militants storm the U.S. Embassy in Tehran taking 52 Americans hostage. But in the midst of the chaos six Americans manage to slip away and find refuge in the home of Canadian Ambassador Ken Taylor.

It's amazing that Moneyball makes baseball statistics seem fascinating--but that's because it's not really a movie about numbers, and it's not really a movie about baseball, either. It's about what drives people to take risks--in this instance, Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt), general manager of the Oakland A's, who's just had his best players poached by teams that can afford to pay a lot more.

Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron) knows little about family. Less about football. What the homeless teen knows are the streets and projects of Memphis. Well-to-do Leigh Anne Tuohy (Sandra Bullock) knows little about his world. Yet when she and Michael meet, he's found a home. And the Tuohys have found something just as life-changing: a beloved new son and brother. This real-life story of family and of Michael's growth into a blue-chip football star will have you cheering with its mix of gridiron action and heartwarming emotion.

Angelina Jolie confirms her status as action-heroine supreme in the sinewy thriller Salt. Evelyn Salt (Jolie) is a respected high-ranking CIA agent… until a defecting Russian operative declares that she's a Russian mole in deep cover, launching her on the most delicious chase sequence since the Bourne movies. When the film's over you'll realize the motivations for much of what happened didn't make much sense, but while the movie's going on the pell-mell pace will brush such concerns from your mind.

The future begins in J.J. Abrams' smash hit Star Trek. When Romulan Nero comes from the future to take revenge on the Federation, rivals Kirk and Spock must work together to stop him from destroying everything they know. On a thrilling journey filled with incredible action, the U.S.S. Enterprise will voyage through unimaginable danger in one of the biggest and best reviewed movies of the year.