Every year, when you think you’ve seen every new film release worth seeing, you get a surprise when the time comes around for the Academy Awards. 2013 will probably be no exception if you cast your eye down the official Oscar nominations lists, which were announced early this month.

Here we look at five films that you may have overlooked when they came out as new releases, but now they’ve got an Oscar nomination or two, you may be more interested in watching them!

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Best actress nominee Quvenzhané Wallis is now only nine years old. She was six when Beasts of the Southern Wild was filmed and was ‘just a kid’, not a formally-trained actress. The drama fantasy is set in a bayou community at risk from melting ice-caps and mythical beasts called aurochs. Wallis plays a child called Hushpuppy who finds her courage in a moment of crisis, searching for her lost mother.

Amour

Now there are some people who simply won’t consider going to a foreign language movie, but when the main character’s actress has been nominated for Best Actress at the age of 85, perhaps it’s time to get reading those subtitles. Emmanuelle Riva plays Ann, a retired music teacher who has a stroke. The film shows the effect that the stroke has on her family.

Silver Linings Playbook

A surprise success at nomination time was Silver Linings Playbook, which received Best Supporting Actor nomination for Robert de Niro and Best Supporting Actress nomination for Jacki Weaver. It is also in the running for Best Picture and Jennifer Lawrence is nominated for Best Actress. The rom-com is based on a former teacher’s rehabilitation to society by moving in with his parents after a period in a mental institution.

Zero Dark Thirty

If you like feel-good films, you may not in a rush to watch Zero Dark Thirty (in cinemas this Friday). The story follows the hunt for Osama bin Laden through the eyes of a gutsy CIA agent who won’t let the trail go cold. Her personal experience of terrorism inspires Maya (Jessica Chastain) to find bin Laden, even though that may mean relying on instinct rather than following the rules. This film is from the team of Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal (scriptwriter) who won Best Picture and Best Director for Hurt Locker in 2009.

Frankenweenie

Unless you have kids, you’re unlikely to have volunteered to go to see Frankenweenie back in the autumn. However, now it’s been nominated for Best Animated Picture, you might give this Tim Burton film a chance. The story is a remake of a film Burton made in the 1980s and will have a familiar ring to it for anyone who knows the story of Frankenstein. It centres on a boy who decides to bring his road-accident dog Sparky back to life through science.

Which films are you hoping will win awards at this year’s ceremony? Let us know below…

So, there we have it, a round-up of some of the movies nominated for Academy Awards this year that you may not necessarily have chosen to see when they were first released. Get down to your local cinema and check them out!