For our second Rundown article, we’ll look at Original Score. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Original Score as well as general commentary about the race. Next week, we’ll start off on Monday with Best International Feature.

Best Original Score

Winner Predictions

• Don’t Look Up
• Dune (WL O) (PP O) [New] (TB O) (TL O)
• Encanto
• Parallel Mothrs
• The Power of the Dog

Runner-Up Predictions

• The Power of the Dog (WL O) (PP O) [New] (TB O) (TL O)

(color and symbol key at bottom of page)

Wesley Lovell: Now that voters know that Lin-Manuel Miranda was not the nominee for Encanto, I doubt that film can pull off an upset, though anything is possible. Parallel Mothers and Don’t Look Up were somewhat surprising selections, but in a close race like this one, either could win. I’m leaning towards Dune as the winner. Considering how big and unique the score is, I suspect it will be more favored than the wonderful The Power of the Dog score, which is more sparing. Big often wins out over small, but the people who vote in this category have made surprise decisions in the past, so it’s possible to be wrong here.
Peter J. Patrick: The prolific Hans Zimmer hasn’t won an Oscar since 1995’s The Lion King despite nine nominations in-between. His stellar orchestral score is the king that usually wins. If they go in a different direction, look no further than Jonny Greenwood for his understated score for The Power of the Dog.
Tripp Burton: This category comes down to which Best Picture nominee is the stronger crafts contender. My guess is that this win will go along with a big, below-the-line Dune sweep, or else with The Power of the Dog picking up a lot of awards on its way to a Best Picture win. Alberto Iglesias, however, has never won an Oscar, and this category has given us some small upsets before. Let’s just hope we get to see the winner on TV.
Thomas La Tourrette: Hans Zimmer had looked poised to finally earn his second Oscar for his score of Dune. He has been a prolific and well-respected composer for over 30 years, racking up 12 nominations and one win, which was 27 years ago. His work on Dune has collected the most precursors including the Golden Globe. Dune did receive 10 nominations, showing love across a wide range of categories, but The Power of the Dog did even better with 12, so there is a strong possibility that it could win the Oscar. Jonny Greenwood does not have as long a history in film music and only one previous nomination. But this year he wrote three scores for major movies, The Power of the Dog as well as Spencer and Licorice Pizza. There had been talk about him getting a double nomination with Spencer being the second one, but luckily that atonal score was not nominated. I personally had found it distracting. The Power of the Dog boasts a simpler, more melodic score. It was more recently released, which might keep it in voters’ minds a bit more, but I think Dune will scrape by with the win. Neither Don’t Look Up or Parallel Mothers stands a chance at winning. Encanto probably does not either, though love of the songs might carry it over to an unexpected win. Look for Dune to win in a squeaker of a race. (Editor’s Note: the film composer, Germaine Franco, did not write any of the film’s songs)

KEY: