Full list of nominations

The British film Atonement picked up seven Oscar nominations today, although its young star, Keira Knightley, missed out on a nod.

The highly acclaimed feature, based on Ian McEwan's tale of unrequited love, was nominated for best picture, best supporting actress, art direction, cinematography, costume design, music and adapted screenplay as the Oscar shorlists were unveiled.

In the best picture category it will be up against this year's two clear heavyweights - No Country for Old Men, the Coen brothers' gory meditation on moral decline, and There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day-Lewis as a pioneering California oilman. Both received eight nominations.

Day-Lewis received the fourth best actor nomination of his career for There Will Be Blood.

The London-born actor picked up the award in 1990 for My Left Foot and was nominated again in 1994 and 2003 for In the Name of the Father and Gangs of New York.

Julie Christie, the veteran British actress who won the Golden Globe for her performance as an Alzheimer's sufferer in Away from Her, is also up for the best actress Oscar, against the French actress Marion Cotillard for La Vie en Rose, Laura Linney for The Savages, and Canadian actress Ellen Page for Juno.

It is Christie's fourth best actress nomination in a career dating back to the early 1960s. She won the Oscar in 1966 for her portrayal of Amanda Scott, the amoral model who sleeps her way to success in the the fashion film Darling.

Cate Blanchett, the Australian star, was nominated in both the best actress and best supporting actress categories for Elizabeth: The Golden Age and her part in the idiosyncratic Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There.

The legal thriller Michael Clayton earned nominations in seven categories, including a best actor nod for its star, George Clooney. It is also made the best picture shortlist alongside the quirky teen comedy Juno.

The animated hit Ratatouille earned five nominations, while Juno and the French-language drama The Diving Bell and the Butterfly scored four each.

Officially, the Oscars will be handed out on February 24 but no-one is quite sure if the biggest night of the Hollywood backslapping season will go ahead as scripted.

The industry has ground to a halt because of a 12-week writers' strike over online fees that has already forced the organisers of the Golden Globes to cancel their red carpet ceremony because of the threat of pickets.

Hollywood will have to hope that the announcement of the Oscar nominations will concentrate minds sufficiently on both sides of the divide for a settlement to be reached by Oscar night.

The acting categories generally played out as expected with a few surprises, including Linney for The Saves and Tommy Lee Jones as best actor for In the Valley of Elah. Neither performance had been high on the awards radar.

Along with Day-Lewis, Clooney and Jones, the other best actor nominees were Johnny Depp, who won the Globe for musical or comedy actor as the vengeful barber in Sweeney Todd and Viggo Mortensen as a Russian mob member in Eastern Promises.

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