Blockbusters making way for critical darlings at 2015 Oscars

Alejandro Iñárritu's "Birdman," starring a re-emerging Michael Keaton, and Wes Anderson's "The Grand Budapest Hotel," with its ensemble cast, emerged from the January 15 Academy Award nomination announcement with nine nods apiece.

Fellow Best Picture contender "The Imitation Game" (Morten Tyldum, Benedict Cumberbatch) accrued nine, while Clint Eastwood war film "American Sniper" and Richard Linklater coming-of-age poem "Boyhood" received six.

Joining them in the Best Picture category were civil rights account "Selma," Stephen Hawking biopic "The Theory of Everything" and musical tour-de-force "Whiplash."

All apart from "Selma" -- whose low count outside of the Best Picture category has stirred a wider controversy about race and gender representation -- can be found populating the Oscars' other most prestigious categories.

Thirty-five nomination slots can be found across the categories for best director, actor and actress, supporting roles, screenplay and adapted screenplay, but outside of Best Picture's octet, only nine more films are named. Of those, four make their way in from the Best Actress award's five berths: "Two Days, One Night," "Still Alive," "Gone Girl," and "Wild."

These eight Best Picture nods are favorites across the board. That's to be expected.

But here's where 2015 stands out. Of the eight, only "American Sniper" commanded a production budget north of US$30 million, with movie veteran Eastwood behind the camera and Hollywood A-lister Bradley Cooper in front of it; even then, its $60m foundation was a significant step up from the $26m of next in line, "The Grand Budapest Hotel."

That's in stark contrast to previous years. In 2014, the likes of "American Hustle," "Captain Phillips," "Gravity" and "The Wolf of Wall Street" were jostling for the Best Picture category, lending their considerable weight to a $41m average budget.

The year before, when $44.5m "Argo" took the premiere prize statue, the financial colossi "Django Unchained," "Life of Pi" and "Les Miserables" contributed to a $51.3m average.

Box office revenues tell a similar tale: "The Grand Budapest Hotel" leads 2014's crop on $59m, with the nominees together on an average gross of $25m (boxofficemojo.com), while at this time last year "Gravity" had accrued $256m by January 16, 2014. "American Sniper," put on general release the same day in 2015, at least has a chance of approaching that mark.

But come February 22, producers at the Academy Awards show will have an opportunity to show why smaller productions such as "Birdman," "Boyhood," "Whiplash" and "The Imitation Game" deserve our attention but also the Academy's plaudits.

Meanwhile, titles that were subject to serious marketing oompf and corresponding box office returns in 2014 -- "Guardians of the Galaxy," "Interstellar," "X-Men: Days of Future Past," "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" and "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" -- look to clinch the award for Best Visual Effects. And that's about it.