By KATHLEEN ADAMS, CHARLOTTE FALTERMAYER, JANICE M. HOROWITZ, LINA LOFARO, MICHAEL QUINN, ALAIN L. SANDERS AND SIDNEY URQUHART

WINNERS & LOSERS THE OSCAR NOMINATIONS

[WINNERS]

RICHARD NIXON The man can't be laid to rest! Anthony Hopkins' blood-curdling portrayal gets a nod

FOREIGN LANDS Four of five Best Pictures are set overseas--and the fifth is set in outer space

HOOKERS Played by Best Actresses Elisabeth Shue and Sharon Stone and supporting bet Mira Sorvino

[& LOSERS]

SCIENTOLOGISTS John Travolta and Nicole Kidman, shoo-ins for Get Shorty and To Die For, are shooed out

BOX-OFFICE HITS Oscar again frowns on films people actually bother to see: Batman and Die Hard sequels

SAD ENDINGS Best Director choices Leaving Las Vegas and Dead Man Walking snubbed for Best Picture

HOST IN A HURRY

Jim Johnson knows whence his design concept flowed. "It had to be an idea from God," he says. To God the Creator, then, add God the Packager: Johnson has brought out Celebration Cup, the world's first prefab Communion kit.

The cup is a plastic purple container that might normally hold a shot of creamer, filled instead with the grape juice most American Protestants use to celebrate the Lord's Supper. The Communion wafer nestles between layers of a pull-tab lid. The item, assures Johnson, is "liturgically correct." The cups cost 10-c- each. "No waste, no hassle," says Johnson. And no germs. The cup's press kit notes that it may help prevent the spread of meningitis, although Johnson says, "We are careful not to sell fear. That's not what this cup is about."

HEALTH REPORT

THE GOOD NEWS

A study of 44,000 males confirms that dietary fiber fights heart disease. Men who ate more than 25 g of fiber daily from fruits, vegetables and cereal reduced their risk of heart attack 36%. What's 25 g of fiber? One cup of bran, 11/2 cups of cooked beans or, gulp, seven apples.

The debate over whether coffee is harmful to the heart may seem like the same old grind. But now a 10-year study finds that women who drink as much as six cups a day bear no increased risk of heart disease. Unlike some previous reports that fingered coffee, this time scientists factored in that java junkies are more likely to smoke, a known risk factor.

Starting in April, men and women with shiny pates will be able to buy the well-known hair-growth drug Rogaine without a prescription. It will cost around $30 a month. Still, Rogaine does not work for everybody. And when it does, the drug must be applied indefinitely, lest the effect is reversed.

THE BAD NEWS

Parents who tool kids around in shopping carts, consider this. A study of children treated for shopping-cart injuries finds that 40% of the time the carts--even ones with safety features, like restraining belts--tipped over, causing head injuries, lacerations and skull fractures.

Cooking with gas, British researchers say, appears to increase a woman's--but not a man's--risk of developing respiratory ills such as wheezing, asthma and hay fever. Women may simply be more susceptible to the by-products of gas combustion--or they may just spend more time at the stove.

Despite calls for safe sex, the AIDS virus appears to be spreading among males in their teens and early 20s who have had homosexual encounters. Preliminary research suggests that one-third of young homosexual and bisexual men reported having had anal sex without condoms in the past six months, and 7% are infected with HIV.

Sources--GOOD NEWS: Journal of the American Medical Association; Journal of the American Medical Association; Food and Drug Administration BAD NEWS: Pediatrics; Lancet; U.S. Centers for Disease Control

THE TALK OF THE STY

In the last week of the Year of the Pig, fully seven Oscar nominations went to Babe, a movie starring a talking pig. It is the latest example of a passion for chattering porkers.

"That's all, folks!" Porky Pig Debuting in the 1935 Warner Bros. cartoon I Haven't Got a Hat, he was soon stammering the sign-off for the entire Warner Bros. animated oeuvre--despite the depredations of Daffy Duck.

"It is hard to be brave when you're only a Very Small Animal." Piglet A.A. Milne's 1926 children's classic Winnie-the-Pooh introduced a petite porker with the fortitude to match. In 1992 Piglet found fans among New Age enthusiasts in The Te of Piglet, a book linking Christopher Robin's toy to Taoism.

"My beauty is my curse." Miss Piggy The sensual sow has rooted about in television (The Muppet Show), film (Muppet Treasure Island opened last weekend) and even publishing (Miss Piggy's Guide to Life). Alas, she has never been nominated for an Oscar.

"No more delays, comrades! There is work to be done." Napoleon A stand-in for Stalin in George Orwell's 1945 political fable Animal Farm, this hog--and heavy--was unmistakably intended for adult audiences. Later he starred in a 1955 animated version.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

MARIA ESTELA MARTINEZ DE PERON, 65 Former President of Argentina Her days of risque cabaret dances and shrill public speeches gone, the third wife of General Juan Domingo Peron now keeps quiet--and out of sight. Peron, known as Isabel, succeeded her husband as President upon his death in 1974. Despite dyeing her hair blond, Peron never won the wild popularity of her predecessor, Juan's second wife Eva ("Evita") Duarte de Peron, who died of cancer in 1952. Isabel was overthrown by the military in 1976, placed under house arrest for nearly five years and sent into exile in Spain. Recently she has traveled between Madrid and Buenos Aires, tangling in court with Evita's sisters over Juan Peron's multimillion-dollar estate. "The Duarte sisters took everything I had," Peron told Gente magazine in a rare interview. She claims to live modestly on the $4,200 a month she collects as ex-President. But don't cry for her; last year she rented a Buenos Aires apartment for $10,000 a month. In Madrid she lives on a ritzy street near the Prado and passes time shopping and art-gallery hopping.

40 YEARS AGO IN TIME

A LORD OF HOLLYWOOD

In Picnic, as in real life, William Holden is every woman's dream: "'Is this what the women of America want?' asks a Hollywood producer. 'You mean...that the great lover of our time is a civic booster who recently served on the Los Angeles Park Commission?...No blue suede shoes, no moldy sweatshirts. He doesn't walk down Sunset Boulevard with an ocelot. He doesn't even have a Filipino houseboy. This is a movie star? He goes to P.T.A. meetings. He has been married to the same woman for 15 years. His swimming pool is not in the shape of a grand piano or a thyroid gland. And have you heard? He wears the tops and bottoms of his pajamas, both.'" --Feb. 27, 1956