At Oscar time, writers are as good as their word

The writers’ branch is not only one of the larger voting blocs in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, it is consistently the most adventurous as well.

Year in and year out, the 400-plus writers have had the perspicacity to nominate some of the most audacious of films, films that often as not don’t get a shot at Oscar’s higher-profile categories.

Last year, for instance, when “Chicago” raked the best picture Oscar, the writers voted for “The Pianist” and “Talk to Her.”

Yes, the writers nominate big-budget blockbusters, and they have tapped their share of head-scratchers as well. But over the past half-dozen years their selections have included “Y Tu Mama Tambien,” “Ghost World,” “Memento,” “Wonder Boys,” “You Can Count on Me,” “Almost Famous,” “Election,” “Being John Malkovich,” “Wag the Dog,” “Boogie Nights” and “As Good As It Gets.” It doesn’t get much better than that.

This year, the nominations for best adapted screenplay alternate between the big and the small. “Seabiscuit” and “Mystic River” are both major-studio prestige releases, while “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” joined a studio budget and earning power to an independent pedigree.

On other hand, there is “American Splendor,” the unusual Sundance grand prize winner, and “City of God,” an impressive Brazilian film that the foreign-language committee passed up last year.

The original screenplay list is even bolder. Four of the five nominees are independent films and three of those -- Britain’s “Dirty Pretty Things,” French Canada’s “The Barbarian Invasions,” Ireland’s “In America” -- come from abroad. Sofia Coppola’s “Lost in Translation” is the only American independent, and the only American studio film, “Finding Nemo,” is a cartoon. That’s about as unconventional as you can get.

Kenneth Turan can be reached at weekend@latimes.com.