The Writers Guild of America, one of the toughest groups to earn nominations with, has announced its nominees for the best of 2012. The reason it’s so tough to get in is that if your film wasn’t made under a WGA contract or under the contract provided by a sister organization from another country, you’re out of luck. While most other groups recognize anyone for awards, regardless of affiliation, the WGA is very strict. This is why you won’t see major Oscar contenders Amour, Django Unchained or Beasts of the Southern Wild on the list below.

All three are very likely to be oscar nominees this year, so the question is which films to dump for these. First, drop Flight from the Original Screenplay list and replace it with Django Unchained. From there, Original Screenplay becomes tougher. While Looper has gotten plenty of acclaim and precursor awards, the film just doesn’t seem like something the Academy typically recognizes. And with Zero Dark Thirty and The Master virtually guaranteed nominations, the only other film Amour could displace would be Moonrise Kingdom and since Moonrise has been heavily in the conversation for the past several months, my guess would be Looper could be dropped. Of course, there’s no guarantee either Amour or Django Unchained will be nominated and while I’m fairly certain Flight won’t make it to the Oscars, that one slot will be more likely taken by Django than by Amour.

Only one film has to be dumped from Adapted Screenplay to make room for Beasts of the Southern Wild, but with scant dialogue, Beasts is probably very vulnerable. Argo, Lincoln and Silver Linings Playbook seem like safe bets and The Perks of Being a Wallflower is just the kind of film the Academy’s writers like to recognize, which makes Life of Pi one of the weaker selections. Yet, Pi has been chugging along this year and I would not be at all surprised if it got nominated. And if Beasts were ultimately left out, I also would not be surprised considering there isn’t a lot of dialogue in the film…though, it could be the only way to recognize Benh Zeitlin.

The Nominations

Best Original Screenplay

Flight
Looper
The Master
Moonrise Kingdom
Zero Dark Thirty

Best Adapted Screenplay

Argo
Life of Pi
Lincoln
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Silver Linings Playbook

Documentary Screenplay

The Central Park Five
The Invisible War
Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God
Searching for Sugar Man
We Are Legion: The Story of the Hactivists
West of Memphis

Writers Guild of America Data

Year Founded: 1933
First Awards: 1948 (65)