The Help and The Artist are the current Oscar frontrunners after sweeping the board at the Screen Actors Guild and Critics' Choice award nominations. Tate Taylor's civil rights-era drama and Michel Hazanavicius's homage to silent film received four and three nominations apiece at the SAG ceremony in Los Angeles, while Clint Eastwood's Hoover biopic J Edgar, Paul Feig's wedding comedy Bridesmaids, Alexander Payne's George Clooney-starring family drama The Descendents and Simon Curtis's My Week With Marilyn trailed with two.

The Help's SAG haul was lead by Viola Davis, who was nominated alongside Glenn Close for Albert Nobbs, Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady, Tilda Swinton for We Need to Talk About Kevin and Michelle Williams for My Week With Marilyn in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor category. The film received further nominations in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role category, where Jessica Chastain and Octavia Spencer got a nod, alongside Bridesmaid's Melissa McCarthy, The Artist's Bérénice Bejo and Janet McTeer for Albert Nobbs.

The Artist's Jean Dujardin was nominated alongside Leonardo DiCaprio (J Edgar), George Clooney (The Descendents) and Brad Pitt (Moneyball) in the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role category. Demián Bichir proved a surprise inclusion - he was nominated for his role in Chris Weitz's LA-set father-son morality tale A Better Life. The best supporting actor category included nods to Kenneth Branagh, for his role as Sir Laurence Olivier in My Week With Marilyn; Armie Hammer as J Edgar Hoover's right-hand man, Clyde Tolson; Jonah Hill as sports stats whizz Peter Brand in Moneyball; Nick Nolte as an alcholic former boxer in Warrior and Christopher Plummer as a gay man who comes out in his 70s in Beginners.

The SAG's ensemble nominations (a group award shared by the on-screen talent) went to the casts of The Artist, Bridesmaids, The Descendents and Midnight in Paris.

Meanwhile, The Artist picked up 11 nominations at the Critics' Choice awards nominations, alongside Martin Scorsese's Hugo. The awards, run by the largest film critics organisation in the US and Canada, the Broadcast Film Critics Association, handed eight nominations apiece to The Help and Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive yesterday. The Descendants and Steven Spielberg's first world war tear-jerker War Horse received seven nominations each. All of the above were also named in the best picture category, which like the equivalent Oscars section, features 10 nominees. Joining them were Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris, Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, Bennett Miller's Moneyball and Stephen Daldry's Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close.

Daldry's adaptation of Jonathan Safran Foer's 2005 novel about a nine-year-old boy who loses his father in the September 11 terrorist attacks also gave him a best director nomination. He was joined by Hazanavicius for The Artist as well as Payne for The Descendants, Winding Refn for Drive, Scorsese for Hugo and Spielberg for War Horse. The latter is also adapted from an original novel: in this case Michael Morpurgo's 1982 book about a Devon stable hand who searches the trenches of No Man's Land for his beloved colt, Joey.

War Horse might have surpassed The Artist and Hugo at the Critics' Choice had it not failed to pick up any nominations in the acting categories. Instead, Clooney was picked in the best actor category alongside Moneyball's Brad Pitt, J Edgar's Leonardo DiCaprio, The Artist's Jean Dujardin, Shame's Michael Fassbender and Drive's Ryan Gosling. Best actress will go to one of Viola Davis for The Help, Elizabeth Olsen for Martha Marcy May Marlene, Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady, Tilda Swinton for We Need to Talk About Kevin, Charlize Theron for Young Adult and Michelle Williams for My Week with Marilyn. Of those, Streep, Swinton and Williams are the current Oscars frontrunners.

In the supporting categories, favourite Albert Brooks (Drive) will fight it out with Kenneth Branagh (My Week with Marilyn), Nick Nolte (Warrior), Patton Oswalt (Young Adult), Christopher Plummer (Beginners) and Andy Serkis (Rise of the Planet of the Apes) for best supporting male. The choice of the latter suggests that Serkis may just be on course to achieve his stated aim of becoming the first person to be recognised by the Academy for an entirely motion-captured performance. He plays Caesar, an intelligent ape, in the science fiction reboot. Bérénice Bejo (The Artist) is up against Jessica Chastain (The Help), Melissa McCarthy (Bridesmaids), Carey Mulligan (Shame), Octavia Spencer (The Help) and Shailene Woodley (The Descendants) for best supporting actress.

Following the weekend's announcement of end-of-year lists by critics' bodies in New York, LA, San Francisco and Boston, there was some positive news for Angelina Jolie, whose controversial directing debut In the Land of Blood and Honey has so far been roundly ignored by awards groups. The Producers Guild of America said it would be honouring the Oscar-winning star of Girl, Interrupted and Salt with its Stanley Kramer award, which is handed to film-makers who successfully shine a light on important social issues. Jolie's drama, which exists in both English and Serbo-Croat versions, "is an extraordinary film that portrays a complex love story set against the terrors of the Bosnian war, especially towards women," said PGA presidents Hawk Koch and Mark Gordon in a statement.

In the Land of Blood and Honey centres on a Serbian soldier who re-encounters a Bosnian woman with whom he was once romantically involved at the concentration camp where he is a commander. It was criticised by Bosnian victims of sexual violence during the Balkan conflict of the 1990s following erroneous reports in local media that the film featured scenes in which a Bosnian rape victim falls in love with her Serbian attacker. Permits for Jolie to film in the country were withdrawn and later re-instated. Jolie has described the experience as upsetting for someone who was attempting to highlight the suffering of Bosnian women in a positive way, so the PGA award may provide some solace.

Finally, the African American Film Critics Association named Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life its best film and handed acting awards to Woody Harrelson (Rampart), Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer (The Help) and Albert Brooks (Drive). The Golden Globe nominations are announced tomorrow.

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