French hit film, The Artist, set for Oscar glory

The Artist has already been nominated for best film by the Directors Guild of America and won the top prize from the Producers Guild of America last week - both seen as key indicators of Oscar's glory.

The film, a tribute to the silent movie era in which a non-talking star battles to save his career after it is torpedoed by the arrival of the "talkies," also won the best picture Golden Globe on 15 January.

French actor Jean Dujardin, who plays struggling silent star George Valentin, has proved a big-hit stateside wooing audiences with his appearance on chat shows such as Jimmy Fallon on the NBC channel.

He is already a well-known, respected actor in France who made his name in a popular TV series, Un gars, Une fille, where he played one half of a married couple opposite his real-life wife, Alexandra Lamy.

On the big screen, he has created a range of characters including an arrogant surfer in Brice de Nice and a clumsy secret agent in the spoof spy movie, OSS 177, also directed by Michael Hazanavicius.

The film's first success was at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival where Dujardin won the Best Actor award. RFI's Laura-Angela Bagnetto described the film as "rich and believable" and said it brought the audience to their feet.

If he wins the Best Actor, he follows in the footsteps of French actress Marion Cottilard who won the Best Actress Oscar in 2008 for her role as iconic, French singer, Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose.

 Unfortunately; French TV station, i>Télé, jumped the gun following the nominations already attributing the Best Actor award to Dujardin despite - a case of wishful thinking?