"Mank," David Fincher's black-and-white ode to "Citizen Kane," comfortably led this year's Oscars nominations Monday with 10 nods including for best picture and best director, as female filmmakers smashed Academy records.

The Netflix reimagining of Hollywood's Golden Age was far ahead of the competition following the live-streamed announcement, which saw six films receive six nominations apiece.

Six films tied for second place with six nods each: "The Father," "Judas and the Black Messiah," "Minari," "Nomadland," "Sound of Metal" and "The Trial of the Chicago 7."

Among performers, it's the most diverse slate of nominees ever – and a far cry from the all-white acting nominees that spawned the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag five years ago. 

Nine of the 20 acting nominees are people of color, including a posthumous best-actor nomination for Chadwick Boseman, and nods for Riz Ahmed ("Sound of Metal"), Steven Yeun ("Minari"), Daniel Kaluuya and Lakeith Stanfield ("Judas and the Black Messiah"), Leslie Odom Jr. ("One Night in Miami"), Viola Davis ("Ma Rainey's Black Bottom"), Andra Day ("The People vs. Billie Holiday") and Yuh-Jung Youn ("Minari").

Chinese director Derek Kwok-cheung Tsang's romantic crime "Better Days" was nominated for International film.

Nominations were announced Monday from London by presenters Nick Jonas and Priyanka Chopra Jonas. The film academy and ABC, which will telecast the Oscars on April 25 (delayed two months due to the pandemic), will hope that the nominees can drum up more excitement than they have elsewhere. 

Interest in little golden statuettes has nosedived during the pandemic. Ratings for a largely virtual Golden Globes, with acceptance speeches by Zoom, plunged to 6.9 million viewers – a 64 percent drop from 2020 – last month.

(With input from agencies)