An Oscar milestone?

Of the five movies nominated earlier this week for Best Picture, just one hasn't yet earned back the money invested in its production yet.

The nominated movies are `Brokeback Mountain,' `Capote,' `Crash,' `Good Night, and Good Luck,' and `Munich.'

The Wall Street Journal observes that the first four nominees "were inexpensive independent or boutique productions that struck a chord with moviegoers. The combined production budgets of those four films add up to half that of the fifth nominee, the $70 million `Munich.' All four have shown a profit even without help from Oscar."

`Munich' - no knock on the merit of the film - has only earned about $40 million at the U.S. box office thus far.

Of course, that could change once the overseas numbers for `Munich' are in - or if the movie wins a few Oscars. The movie was a production of Universal Pictures and DreamWorks Pictures. It's also the only major studio release in the Best Picture category this year.