The first precursors will be going out in just over a month, which means our predictions are becoming more and more solid. Although there’s still a lot of disagreement until the critics start weighing in, most of the categories differ only slightly. That is except Supporting Actress, which seems to be all over the place still.
Below are our predictions for October adding in the Film Editing award predictions as well.
As is our tradition, May begins our first predictive look at the year’s Oscar hopefuls. A lot of factors will play into how well our guesses hold up. Expect many of them to fall by the wayside as the year progresses and new contenders to rise into their places.
With Telluride, Toronto, and Venice in the rear view mirror, Oscar season has shifted to its final stretch before the critics awards. In this timeframe, we should learn more about the films no one has seen yet (The Irishman, Little Women, and 1917 specifically). Those three films could upend some of the conversation that’s come out of the festival circuit, namely the emergence of films like Waves, Jojo Rabbit, The Two Popes, Just Mercy, Marriage Story, and more. While our predictions have are now sitting on a better foundation of critical response, our selections have widened, with Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress becoming far more polarized than they had been previously. We have added one new category to the list: Cinematography
As is our tradition, May begins our first predictive look at the year’s Oscar hopefuls. A lot of factors will play into how well our guesses hold up. Expect many of them to fall by the wayside as the year progresses and new contenders to rise into their places.
Most categories are starting to coalesce, but we won’t know much for certain until after the late summer festivals of Telluride, Toronto, and Venice where most of this year’s Oscar contenders will either fly or falter. Matter of fact, these will be our final predictions before that trifecta of events. Venice is Aug. 28 through Sep. 7, Telluride is Aug. 30 through Sep. 2, and Toronto is Sep. 5 through 15. The three festivals overlap, but by the time our deadline arrives for September predictions, all three will be done and the true shape of this year’s Oscar competition will be known.
We’re back for our mid-year look at the state of the Oscar race. While a lot of things are still rather fluid, a few titles continue to show up each month on our predictions list. This month we’re adding Best Visual Effects with two films, Avengers: Endgame and Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker both debuting with unified predictions. Little has changed this month, though Woman in the Window has been pushed to 2020, which removed it from a number of our predictions. Otherwise, it’s just a lot of hemming and hawing from prior months.
As is our tradition, May begins our first predictive look at the year’s Oscar hopefuls. A lot of factors will play into how well our guesses hold up. Expect many of them to fall by the wayside as the year progresses and new contenders to rise into their places.
For our second month of predictions, we look at how little has changed. With few films having been released to give us a glimpse into the fall, the only notable is that The Irishman may be delayed due to some last-minute de-aging effects. That could completely change our predictions. For now, however, we seem fairly unified on its inclusion, though not much agreement for many other films.
As is our tradition, May begins our first predictive look at the year’s Oscar hopefuls. A lot of factors will play into how well our guesses hold up. Expect many of them to fall by the wayside as the year progresses and new contenders to rise into their places.
As Spring turns into Summer, thoughts of next year’s Oscars start trickling into our subconscious thoughts. With our first predictions, it’s always interesting to see where everyone stands, where the early consensus is, and then compare later to the end results. Looking at only six categories (Picture, Directing, and the four acting awards), it’s interesting to note that six films make all four of our lists. Another fifteen appear on three. Out of a total of 35 potential nomination slots, that’s a surprisingly strong group of aligned predictions. We’ll see how things change over the months as we hope to have new predictions up every month through the end of the year, adding more categories as we go.
And here we are at the end of the road. Oscar Season 2018 ends this weekend and we have our final predictions to present to you. Before we get into the meat of the predictions, here are some introductions written by our contributors. After you finish reading our introductions, head into the predictions and see where we stand and how you compare.
Wesley Lovell: Compared to the low suspense year that was 2016 (which ended up with one major suspenseful conclusion) and 2017’s back-and-forth races, 2018 has been comparatively a nail-biter. Even with several major categories locking into winners. Many categories, though, seem to be up in the air still, or at least seem like anyone could win even if a frontrunner is almost certain. In several races, I could have swapped first and second (and even third or fourth) place finishers with one another and still felt I had a solid prediction set. I’ve spent a lot of time writing about these categories. If you want to read my thoughts in more detail, take a look at my article Oscar Guy’s Final Thoughts to know more about what I see as this year’s best bets, runners-up, and my personal opinions.
Peter J. Patrick: I can’t recall a year in which I had no clear idea of what would win Best Picture while at the same time being sure of most of the other categories. If that’s not a good reason to stay awake until the last envelope is opened Sunday night, I don’t know what is.
Tripp Burton: The guilds have all awarded a different film this year, and things are more up in the air than any year I can remember. The show might be a disaster this year, but we are sure in for a lot of surprises, mostly because there aren’t a lot of consensus predictions going on. I could get half of these wrong and not be surprised!
Thomas La Tourrette: Having seen all but three of the nominees, it is time to put my predictions to rest. While some categories are easy, there are several including best picture, that are proving to be bears this year. Editing, documentary feature, sound mixing and editing, and costume and production design are all categories that could go one way or another. It keeps it both interesting, but also difficult. I am still second guessing some of my choices even as I get ready to send this. It has been a decent year for films, though not an exceptional one, but there are still lots of good choices in most categories. I just found that I liked more movies in 2017 than I did in 2018. I have never been on the Roma bandwagon, and I still do not know why it is the frontrunner in many categories. And many will not agree with me, but I thought Black Panther was just another Marvel film. Many of the other best picture nominees were enjoyable, but not what I would consider worthy of winning. Of the eight nominees, BlacKkKlansman and Green Book are probably my favorites, with BlacKkKlansman being the better made film. Though I doubt it could win. No film will truly dominate this year’s awards, which probably makes it harder to predict. But here are my predictions and I will call it good, though I may change my mind on a couple before Sunday night.
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And here we have the final precursor of the 2018 Oscar season. The Spirit Awards are often the first and always the last precursor (the Razzie awards are too, but they don’t precurse anything). While we always look at how they could influence the Oscars (after all, five of the last seven winners have also won the Best Picture Oscar), this year’s list seems to be surprisingly bereft of major Oscar players. The Best Feature slate doesn’t have a single Best Picture nominee on it, the first time in a decade that’s happened (2008 was the last time and before that was 2002 and 2001). We won’t know the winners until the night before the Oscars and the overlap is minimal, so the end results won’t be terribly instructive.
Eighth Grade (Tripp, RU:Thomas)
First Reformed (RU:Wesley)
If Beale Street Could Talk (Wesley, Thomas, RU:Peter, RU:Tripp)
Leave No Trace (Peter)
You Were Never Really Here
Wesley Lovell: It’s hard to say which of these films will win. While If Beale Street Could Talk came the closest to an Oscar nomination for Best Picture and is the only film of these to earn more than one Oscar nomination (First Reformed is the only other one with a single nomination), so it should be leading. However, all of them have been incredibly well received this season and any of them could win.
Peter J. Patrick: With no Oscar nominees in the running this year, this could go to any of the nominees, but they really like Debra Granik’s films at the Spirits, so I see her Leave No Trace taking it over former winner Barry Jenkins’ If Beale Street Could Talk.
Tripp Burton: With no Oscar Best Picture nominee in this bunch, this is a real free-for-all category this year. Beale Street seems like the safest contender here, but Eighth Grade keeps surprising us with guild wins and could win an upset here.
Thomas LaTourette: If Beale Street Could Talk was probably close to an Oscar nomination, so it seems the likely winner.
For our twentieth Rundown article, we look at the final category. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Picture as well as general commentary about the race.
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There’s not much time left. Sunday, we will find out just how much we did and did not know about this Oscar season. While I’ve contributed quick thoughts to our Rundown articles, I always like to do more with my final prediction post of the year. This will include how I think the races will finish out, what has the best chances of surprising, and what I overall felt about the nominees, non-nominees, and other general thoughts. Please note that I have not made it through all of the Oscar nominees, so my thoughts will be based on what I have seen and what I see as problem nominees if that applies.
The categories below are sorted in order from least competitive to most competitive.
I will not be sharing my personal thoughts on the quality of the foreign language and documentary categories, but I’ve seen both short film categories, so I can offer my thoughts on those. I don’t know that my guesses would have much impact. I have still written a little something on each.
For our nineteenth Rundown article, we look at a category that is frocking amazing. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Costume Design as well as general commentary about the race. Friday, we’ll cover the big one.
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For our eighteenth Rundown article, we examine categories whose innovation was in their infancy when the Academy was founded. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Sound Mixing and Best Sound Editing as well as general commentary about the race. Thursday, we’ll cover a frocking amazing category.
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For our seventeenth Rundown article, we review an inventive category where something is created where nothing existed before. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Visual Effects as well as general commentary about the race. Wednesday, we’ll cover categories whose innovation existed in its infancy when the Academy was founded.
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The Costume Designers Guild has three chances to predict the Oscars, though you really only need to look at two of them as the winners for Period and Fantasy Costume Design each have a historical potential of winning.
BlacKkKlansman
Bohemian Rhapsody (RU:Peter)
The Favourite (Wesley, Peter, Tripp, Thomas)
Mary Poppins Returns (RU:Tripp, RU:Thomas)
Mary Queen of Scots (RU:Wesley)
Wesley Lovell: With such a broad range of periods to be recognized with this award, The Favourite is closets in style to many of the other winners in this category and I’d be surprised if it lost. If it did, I could imagine Mary Queen of Scots being the most likely beneficiary simply because it’s also from a long-ago period this group likes to recognize.
Peter J. Patrick: The Favourite is the clear, er hem, favorite, here. I doubt there will be an upset, but Bohemian Rhapsody‘s 1970s and ’80s designs might win over some of the designers.
Tripp Burton: The creative and vibrant period work of The Favourite should win handily here.
Thomas LaTourette: The Favourite should easily be the favorite to win here. The Marys, Poppins, and Queen of Scots, will be in the running, but I do not expect either to win.
For our sixteenth Rundown article, we glimpse at the foundation of all movies. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Original Screenplay and Best Adapted Screenplay as well as general commentary about the race. Tuesday, we’ll cover the most inventive of categories, creating something where nothing exists.
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