Like so many things involving feisty Variety film writer Jeff Sneider, the info was divulged suddenly and without warning via Twitter:

Then came a story on TheWrap about Sneider’s dismissal, written by Alexander C. Kaufman with input from Sharon Waxman. The article gets a critical fact wrong; a tweet referenced was not connected to Robopocalypse but rather was the sixth and final component of Sneider’s rapid-fire expression of dismay on Twitter when he learned he had lost an entirely different long-simmering scoop to The Hollywood Reporter (about Christopher Nolan planning to direct Interstellar).

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Over the weekend, New York Post reporter Maureen Callahan shared a fairly sizable Hollywood scoop: an interview with “Enty,” the pseudonymous operator of showbiz gossip blog Crazy Days and Nights (CDaN). In recent weeks, the site has received a lot of coverage because of the Robert Downey Jr. identity-claims made by commenter “Himmmm.”

Callahan’s article was published April 1, leading a number of observers to speculate that the piece is a joke. More precisely, that the interview did properly occur but was a vehicle for misinformation. Sure enough, after vetting the details given to her by this alleged 43-year-old wills and probate attorney, Callahan came to the following conclusion:

Nearly everything Enty says doesn’t check out… It all indicates that Hollywood and the media have been punked – duped by a soft-spoken probate lawyer with delusions of grandeur. And he’s only getting bolder, accusing aging and dead stars of a rape, murder, pedophilia.

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Yesterday, a pair of University of British Columbia students got to chat for ten minutes with Inception director Christopher Nolan. All because their video entry in a contest sponsored by Canadian mobile services provider WIND was judged the best.

The video by Yuri Cabrera and Ian Holliday (pictured) runs just over a minute. FishbowlLA thinks what probably won them the prized connection with Nolan is their hilarious vocal imitations of  Hans Zimmer‘s colossal Inception bass chords. The pair of third-year film students told CTV News that Nolan advised them to enjoy their artistic freedom while they can:

“He told us to enjoy filmmaking while you’re in a situation to be free to film-make, because once you get in a studio and big budget movies, while they’re bigger films, you’re also fighting to have the freedom you had when you were a student filmmaker,” Holliday said.

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Beyond the general consensus that Julianne Moore was robbed this morning by being passed over in the Best Actress Academy Awards category in favor of Nicole Kidman, we thought we’d peruse the first wave of 2010 Oscar nominations reporting to determine who deserves journalistic kudos. Without further musical-number delay, the five FishbowlLA nominees are:

Best Foreign Language Feature Tidbit / Richard Brody, The New Yorker:

Last night I spoke with a friend who’s an astute longtime Oscar-parser, and he said something fascinatingly cynical about the category of Best Foreign Film: if a movie had a New York release, it’s much less likely to win, because the Academy’s mainly Los Angeles-centered voters want to make their pick without the help of New York critics. He reminded me that the last four winners (The Secret in Their Eyes, Departures, The Counterfeiters, and even The Lives of Others) came out first in Los Angeles for a qualifying run and opened in New York only after the announcement of their nominations. This means that, this year, advantage is to In a Better World and Incendies.

Best Meaningless, Out-of-Left Field Headline / Rick Marshall, MTV.com:

“Iron Man 2 Nabs Only Oscar Nomination of 2010 Comic Book Movies – Should There Have Been More?

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The great character actor Pete Postlewaite has died after a long battle with cancer. He was 64. Postlethwaite broke into Hollywood in 1993, starring alongside Daniel Day-Lewis in “In the Name of the Father.” Postlethwaite was nominated for an Academy Award for “best supporting actor” for his performance. He also appeared in the “The Usual Suspects” and was once called “probably the best actor in the world” by Steven Spielberg.

Postlethwaite was most recently in the much-acclaimed Christopher Nolan movie “Inception,” as well as Ben Affleck‘s “The Town.”

Not bad, sir.

Postlethwaite was one of the few actors out there who could actually pull off playing working class characters. No tattoos necessary. The guy was legit.

Of all the people sharing fond remembrances of murdered Hollywood publicist Ronni Chasen, perhaps none was closer to her from a client point of view than German born composer Hans Zimmer.

Shortly after his big Hollywood break in 1988 with Rain Man, which earned him his first of seven Academy Award nominations, the one-time Buggles band member hooked up with Chasen on Driving Miss Daisy the following year. From his twin contributions to back-to-back Best Picture winners, it was off to the races for Zimmer with The Lion King, Gladiator, Inception and much more. Through it all, Chasen was at his side.

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On Sunday, October 24th, members of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association will gather to decide who is going to receive their 2010 Career Achievement award. As with all matters involving LAFCA, the man at the helm of the proceedings will be President Brent Simon, truly one of the nicest-guy film critics out there.

Because LAFCA has had a history with this award and others of thinking outside the publicist box – past Career kudos for example have gone to editor Dede Allen, cinematographer Conrad Hall, executive John Calley and French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo – they are fairly impervious to the full-court PR press. But that doesn’t mean it won’t get heated this coming weekend.

“We frequently have around two dozen Career candidates,” reveals Simon via e-mail interview with FishbowlLA. “Any member who nominates an individual speaks for a bit about their reasoning, and we typically have at least eight to ten solid candidates who garner the majority of the vote. Sometimes, candidates make strong showings several years in a row before being selected. Other times, they remain perennial bridesmaids.”

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The mayor of Batman, Turkey, is suing Christopher Nolan and Warner Bros., accusing The Dark Knight producers of using the city’s name without permission.

According to Variety:

“The mayor is prepping a series of charges against Nolan and Warner Bros., which owns the right to the Batman character, including placing the blame for a number of unsolved murders and a high female suicide rate on the psychological impact that the film’s success has had on the city’s inhabitants.

Former natives of Batman are also said to have encountered obstacles when attempting to register their businesses abroad.”

Batman has been around since 1939, why the lawsuit now? As Variety notes, “Undoubtedly the fact that Dark Knight is about to pass the $1 billion mark at the B.O. played a part in stirring the ire of the Turkish hamlet.”

We’re sure Bruce Wayne has pocket deep enough to make this thing go away.

New York University adjunct associate professor Reed Martin wanted to clarify the aim and the scope of his new book, “The Reel Truth,” which FBLA wrote about last week. To be honest, we gave an honest interpretation. As marketing books are extremely difficult to market and having contributed to several marketing texts in the past, we simply told him Good Luck. That wasn’t enough.

To wit, we’ll let Mr. Martin have it his way:

“NYU adjunct associate professor Reed Martin has written a new book he hopes will help first- and second-time indie filmmakers navigate the current economic downturn. ‘The Reel Truth,’ (Faber & Faber, Jan. 2009) draws from more than 100 interviews with leading names in the independent film world, which has seen its share of hard times of late. This past year alone saw the closings of New Line Cinema, Picturehouse, Paramount Vantage, and Warner Independent Pictures, as older audiences stayed home with Netflix rentals and TiVo while younger moviegoers found it hard to pull away from Facebook updates and Xbox LIVE.”

See more below:

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Prizes Given to Not-Yet-Released Films: The Hollywood Film Festival sounds kinda lame.

The Hobbit, in IMAX? Director Guillermo Del Toro says he’s “not ruling out” the possibility of a 3-D, IMAX Hobbit movie because “IMAX is a fantastic medium,” it’s innovative and “I am a shareholder.” Wow. And we didn’t think we could get more jaded.

More Batman: Geoff Boucher continues his three-part interview with Batman director Christopher Nolan.