British stars Helen Mirren, Carey Mulligan and Colin Firth have been nominated for best actress and best actor Oscars.
Previous Academy Award winner Dame Helen gets a go at a second best actress Oscar for her performance as writer Leo Tolstoy's wife in The Last Station.
Newcomer Carey Mulligan, 24, is also up for best actress for her role in An Education, based on the memoirs of journalist Lynn Barber.
The British hopefuls for lead actress compete with Golden Globe winner Sandra Bullock for The Blind Side, who is being tipped as favourite to land the Oscar.
Meryl Streep for her performance in Julie and Julia and Gabourey Sidibe for Precious, the film in which she made her acting debut, are also nominated.
Penelope Cruz (Nine), Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air), Maggie Gyllenhaal (Crazy Heart), Anna Kendrick (Up in the Air) and Mo'Nique (Precious) are the contenders for supporting actress.
Colin Firth is up for his first Oscar for his role as a gay academic mourning the death of his partner in fashion designer Tom Ford's debut feature film A Single Man.
He is up against Jeff Bridges (Crazy Heart), George Clooney (Up in the Air), Morgan Freeman (Invictus) and Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker).
Matt Damon (Invictus), Woody Harrelson (The Messenger), Christopher Plummer (The Last Station), Stanley Tucci (The Lovely Bones) and Christoph Waltz (Inglourious Basterds) are up for best supporting actor.
An Education is nominated for best picture, alongside films including Avatar, The Hurt Locker, District 9, Precious, and Up In The Air.
Avatar director James Cameron is pitted against his ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow, whose film The Hurt Locker has won critical acclaim, in the directing category.
Made for a fraction of the budget of Avatar, The Hurt Locker, a tense movie about an elite bomb disposal team, has won widespread critical acclaim and triumphed at the Directors Guild of America awards.
Cameron and Bigelow were both shortlisted for best director in the Golden Globes, with Cameron taking the prize.
Avatar and The Hurt Locker are leading the nominations with nine apiece.
The nominations for the 82nd Annual Academy Awards were announced by Hollywood star Anne Hathaway in Los Angeles.
© Press Association