The top nominations for this year’s Indie Spirit Awards are no surprise. Winter’s Bone continues its march through the woods to find its father and an Oscar with 7 nominations (which is almost all it was even eligible for). In a close second, The Kids Are All Right finds itself with 5 nominations. If you’re a fan of female directors, this year is celebrating a number of them in the top spots, but it’s also incredibly important to point out that Samuel L. Jackson and Bill Murray are finally up for the same award. The Indepdenent Spirit Awards make a good primer for the films that might make their way into the Academy Award nominee pool. In recent tradition, the winner of the Best Feature prize goes on to be an Oscar contender (and occasional winner). Examples of that include Precious, The Wrestler, Juno, and Brokeback Mountain. The full list of nominees continues below:

Last week saw one of my most prolific entries of This Week in Blu-ray, clocking in at over 3,000 words. Part of it was that there were a ton of quality releases to talk about, and the rest had something to do with me being several weeks behind. As promised, we’re back on the punctuality bus this week, speeding down the road to informationville. All poor analogies aside, I’m happy to report that this week’s column is on time. That said, I’m sad to report that there’s nothing great to report. This week’s release slate is a relative bust . Though I will try my best to find something interesting to talk about.

The recent cinema of Wes Anderson and his occasional creative collaborator Noah Baumbach have encountered an interesting play with the ever-blurry line that retains an audience’s empathy for an unlikeable protagonist. This week, the Culture Warrior puts those protagonists in focus.

This week, chubby man about town Kevin Carr takes a look at How to Train Your Dragon, Hot Tub Time Machine (which sounds right up his alley) and Greenberg. You may want to wear a helmet.

Focus Features has released the first trailer for director Noah Baumbach’s upcoming film Greenberg, which stars Ben Stiller as a jobless guy who doesn’t really want to do anything with himself.

In all honesty, I’m not that familiar with the work of 19-year old actress Brie Larson. But after researching this story this afternoon, she has now piqued my interest.