For our twelfth Rundown article, we take a stab at the category that brings it all together. After the jump, you’ll find our winner and runner-up predictions for Best Film Editing as well as general commentary about the race. Friday, we’ll cover a category where the person who brings all the disparate parts together is celebrated.

Best Film Editing

Winner Predictions

• Arrival
• Hacksaw Ridge
• Hell or High Water
• La La Land (WL O) (PP O) (TB O) (TL O)
• Moonlight

Runner-Up Predictions

• Arrival (TL R) [New]
• Hacksaw Ridge (WL O) (TB R) [New]
• Moonlight (PP O)

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Wesley Lovell: With the American Cinema Editors in the rearview window, it seems clear that La La Land is the prohibitive favorite to win. Or is it? This Sunday at the British Academy Awards, La La Land went down to Hacksaw Ridge. That loss may have suggested the film is weaker in this category than previously expected. I still give La La Land the edge, but it’s not even close to being a lock at this juncture.
Peter J. Patrick: They tend to go for the most editing here, which means another one for La La Land. Moonlight, which also has a lot of obvious editing in it, is the only one I see as a possible upset.
Tripp Burton: The precursors for this award have been split up fairly evenly, with Arrival and La La Land taking the ACE Awards and Hacksaw Ridge taking the BAFTA. The last time the three awards were split like that was two years ago, when the BAFTA-winning Whiplash took the Oscar. I think Tom Cross will again reign triumphant here, but any of these nominees could make a case for the win and this could be an interesting race to keep an eye on.
Thomas La Tourrette: La La Land has been the favorite here and I do not see anything standing in its way to win. It has the most precursor awards, including one from the highly predictive editors guild. Arrival also won an editors guild award, but I do not see it winning here. I would have thought that the strongest competition would come from Hacksaw Ridge, as war movies, or any movie with lots of action and explosions, can do well here. Since it was not able to win the guild award over Arrival, it would seem unlikely to prevail here either. I would not think that Moonlight or Hell or High Water stand much of a chance of winning. Look for La La Land to win.

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