2015 Spirit Awards Nominees: Winners and Losers

No joke, there were a ton of surprises from today's announcement of the 2015 Independent Spirit Awards nominees. That sounds like something someone would write every year after Film Independent reveals the honorees for its awards shrine of American independent cinema, but that's actually not the case.  

Over the past few years the Spirits have become increasingly predictable, focusing on almost every low budget Oscar contender that has “independent spirit.” Sure, you'd get a surprise now and then, but for the most part every nominee was in the Oscar mix (or wanted to be). This year? That's certainly not the case and, frankly, it's sort of refreshing. The Spirits might just be getting back to what they were always meant to be, a celebration of real indie film.  

With that in mind, the In Contention team has broken down the winners and losers of this year's nominee crop in the embedded story gallery below. Of course, “Boyhood” and “Birdman” aren't included, but why would they be? Each film earned the five and six nominations (respectively) that they deserved. Just another day in the long road to Oscar for those two juggernauts.

Share your thoughts in the comments section and tell us what you thought the biggest snub was in our poll.

The 2015 Independent Spirit Awards will be held on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2015 live IFC at 2:00 PM PT/ 5:00 PM ET.

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