Beasts of the Southern Wild, the masterpiece by Benh Zeitlin ’04, just scored four Academy Award nominations this morning, including Best Picture, Best Director (Zeitlin), Best Adapted Screenplay (Zeitlin and Lucy Alibar), and Best Actress (Quevenzhané Wallis).

Wallis, just five years old during filming and now age nine, is the youngest person ever to receive an Oscar nod for Best Actress; the old “record” was held by Keisha Castle-Hughes, who was nominated for Whale Rider in 2004 at the age of thirteen. Following her Beasts success, Wallis has been cast in the film Twelve Years A Slave, which also stars Hollywood heavyweights Brad Pitt and Paul Giamatti.

In addition to his Oscar nods, director and writer Zeitlin has won a slew of prestigious film prizes at several film festivals, including Sundance and Cannes. The film has received universal acclaim, even catching the eyes of President Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey, who proclaimed Beasts was one of the best films of the year. Zeitlin and one of the film’s producers, Dan Janvey ’06, also made the trek to Wesleyan this past semester to discuss the film, which was screened during the Wesleyan Film Series.

All I can say is, cue the brag-heavy Facebook statuses and tweets: