For our ninth Rundown article, cut into Film Editing. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Film Editing as well as general commentary about the race. Wednesday, we’ll cover Production Design.

Best Film Editing

Winner Predictions

• Don’t Look Up
• Dune (WL O) (TB R) [New] (TL O)
• King Richard
• The Power of the Dog (PP O)
• tick, tick…BOOM!

Runner-Up Predictions

• Dune (PP O)
• King Richard (TL R) [New]
• tick, tick…BOOM! (WL O) (TB R) [New]

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Wesley Lovell: With King Richard and tick, tick…BOOM! taking the ACE Awards, I’m no longer sold entirely on Dune as the frontrunner here. I think it still has an edge, but if BAFTA goes a different direction, all bets are off. I lean towards tick, tick…BOOM! being Dune‘s biggest competition, but King Richard could be cruising towards a win in this category. Once again, we’ll wait to see how BAFTA goes.
Peter J. Patrick: Should be down to the wire between The Power of the Dog and Dune with The Power of the Dog winning out.
Tripp Burton: Even after losing the ACE award last weekend, I still think Dune will pick up this Oscar. If anything surprises it, tick, tick…BOOM! is the flashiest of the nominees and could win.
Thomas La Tourrette: This has turned into a perplexing category. The pundits all decreed that Dune was the heavy favorite, and nothing really could stand in its way, even though West Side Story had actually won more precursors. But it was felt that if not Dune then surely it would be The Power of the Dog. In my mind, both Dune and Dog felt a little slow and could have had some snappier editing, but I am not a voter. West Side Story did have a lot of movement and exciting editing and would be a worthy nominee and winner, but it did not get a mention. Then the guild went with King Richard in the drama category and tick, tick…Boom! in the comedy/musical one. Both of these are Oscar nominated as well, which makes me wonder if the Academy might go a different way entirely. King Richard does boast better shot-and-edited tennis matches than the 2017 release Battle of the Sexes did, though I wonder if that is enough for an Oscar win. Or are people thinking that a feel-good film like King Richard should get the best picture Oscar as editing often goes along with that category. On the whole it seems likely that Editing and Picture will fall to different films this year. I will stay with Dune to win but will move King Richard into the runner-up spot, though I could imagine an even bigger surprise on Oscar night.

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