'Frost/Nixon' sweeps Vegas

Between bouts of being shoppertunistic -- that means taking advantage of insolvent retailers to snap up cut-rate gifts for friends and loved ones -- we're still keeping track of movie critics from near and far who keep doling out their annual kudos.

Today's offering includes Houston and Las Vegas and finally there's a little divergence in the findings. Not much, but a tad. Houston reviewers gave "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" its top award, but skipped David Fincher (that movie directed itself?) and picked Danny Boyle as best director for "Slumdog Millionaire." They chose no actors from those films, instead giving awards to Sean Penn for "Milk" and Anne Hathaway for "Rachel Getting Married."

Vegas critics loved "Frost/Nixon" enough to vote the ticket, so to speak, giving it best film, best actor (Frank Langella), best director (Ron Howard), along with screenplay (Peter Morgan) and film editing. They singled out Marisa Tomei from "The Wrestler," and continued the Heath Ledger romp. Full list here.

In other bits today...

File this under "great holiday week time waster." Awards Daily has an extensive display of "For Your Consideration" ads, with everything from the seared-into-our-brains Frank Langella-as-disgraced-president profile from "Frost/Nixon" to campaigns that are an outright waste of money (take a guess!). At any rate, there's some nice artwork there.