[quote_colored name=”” icon_quote=”no”]As of next week, this column will be an AwardsDaily weekly feature landing every Monday.[/quote_colored]
Last year, Anne Thompson at Thompson on Hollywood @Indiewire did an interesting thing. She decided to only make predictions about films she had seen as opposed to what 99% of Oscar predictors do — give an assessment of movies already seen and make assumptions and educated guesses about all the rest. I adopted her approach last year to see whether it made a difference as far as being a “good” predictor versus doing more harm than good. The main complaints against Oscar prognosticators come from, well, everywhere. Oscar coverage is one thing but nobody likes to see a sideshow attached to their work. Film distributors have enough headaches managing hype without the added pressure of prediction anticipation. Real journalists throw up in a little in their mouths when they either, 1) have to think about us at all, or 2) have to dwell for financial reasons in our midst. Filmmakers who find themselves thrust into the running are completely annoyed by the whole thing — the dog and pony show of it all. And most voters in the Academy believe we have no impact on the outcome of the awards at all.
And then there is Mark Harris at Grantland who is opposed to the idea of Oscar pundits being sheepherders, as I like to call them. That is, they do what script readers do in Hollywood — they weed out the most likely contenders from the vast number of films that voters need to see each year. Once the Oscar sorting and vetting has been done, a more manageable number of supposedly best-buzzed films remain. These are the movies critics have praised (mostly) and usually have publicists already attached to them because they were either made with awards in mind or else they are impressive enough to seem like films voters will go for. Either way, these are the movies that end up in the pen. Voters then watch THOSE movies and pick from that pre-selected pile as opposed to plucking a film out of thin air that perhaps none of Oscar shepherds was thinking about.
Oscar prognosticators or predictors or bloggers or pundits or -ologists are considered bottom feeders. We are let in through the back door and most respectable folks don’t want to be seen with us. Can you blame them? Almost everyone in Hollywood would love it if we went away except for those rare times when they want under-the-table coverage to help their movie. The game is the game and it hasn’t changed THAT much in decades. What has changed is the amount of visible campaigning.
Before we look at whether Anne Thompson’s method is more reliable, let’s look at a few Oscarwatching principles.
- Nobody knows anything. All we know is what have seen happen countless times before. Until the Producers Guild weighs in we’re mostly in the dark with nothing but our instincts to guide us, and that gut feeling is unavoidably driven by personal preference. More often than not, the PGA winner is a slight surprise but rarely do we encounter as big a surprise as last year’s Birdman win over Boyhood, especially after so many other precursors had gone for Boyhood. We know it had to have been close because a week after Birdman won with the PGA, the BAFTA went for Boyhood. Usually the consensus leans strongly in one film’s favor and we stop seeing major divisions that close to the finish line. Awards groups have become mostly consistent these days as time constraints compress the selection process.
- Money changes everything. Just as in politics, you have to juggle public perception (don’t look like you care enough to overspend = PAC money) with reality (you can’t really get anywhere unless you spend lots of money). We bottom feeders come into healthy play here because we can give a boost to movies without an FYC presence by generating word of mouth for distributors with no money to spend. See, we’re not ALL bad.
- Flying under the radar is one of the hardest goals of an awards strategist because of people like me who get excited about a film and think “this one is going to win.” That expectation builds and sooner or later the film has nowhere to go but down because most of the time people see it and think, “really? That’s it? I was expecting more.” You want to remain lowkey like Argo and not out front, but if you find yourself out front there isn’t much you can do about it except cross your fingers and hope for the best.
- A true consensus is thousands not hundreds. A consensus is a big snowball made up of perception, word of mouth, publicity and likability. You build that consensus via the “dog and pony show.” Just like our presidential election. It takes time for that consensus to build and time is the one thing nobody has enough of during awards season. The nomination period spans literally the one-week extent of the holiday season. Most voters are sitting with their families and a screener pile and wanting to watch movies that the whole varied group will like. How that group responds will often inform how that voter will vote. (That’s a total generalization – take it for what it is). December 30th through January 8th. That’s it. If voters haven’t seen your movie before then, you won’t get in. If they haven’t heard of your movie or if there aren’t any stars in it, they aren’t likely to watch it. Publicists work themselves sick to get those movies seen, at the very least. This is why early is almost always better unless you’re a big name like Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese or Jim Cameron — or Alejandro G. Inarritu and Leonardo DiCaprio. Big names draw eyeballs no matter what.
- Miss Right Now is never Miss Right. The whole thing happens so fast no one really knows what hit them. This is why a year after the Oscars most people can’t even remember what movies were nominated or whether they were really very good or not. There is not enough time anymore, not since the Academy pushed the date back a month and effectively took moviegoer’s reaction out of the Oscar equation. It is takes place in screenings and at parties and during holiday gatherings. It has nothing to do anymore with the zeitgeist unless that zeitgeist exists within the industry bubble.
Having any kind of integrity is hard in this business. Cry me a river, right? Poor us. If we care, we operate by our own set of rules. Kris Tapley doesn’t predict winners until after nominations, only those he thinks have the best chance of being nominated. Anne Thompson only predicts films she’s seen. I keep a contender tracker that lists only films that have been seen or reviewed and have actual buzz. But the majority of pundits out there predict based on the pedigree we see on paper: who directed it, who is the publicist, what is the subject matter, and whether or not we expect the campaigns to spend money on screeners and print advertising. It is naive to think it’s all based on merit alone. It never has been. It never will be. Movies don’t get made on merit alone and there is nothing fair about who gets to make movies and why they make money and why they win awards.
So, let’s look at a few predictions from last year at this time. August, 2014.
Anne Thompson — predicting only films she’d seen, had these:
Anne’s Best Picture predictions in August:
1. Boyhood
2. Foxcatcher
3. The Grand Budapest Hotel
4. Mr. Turner
5. Get on Up
Two out of five got in ultimately.
Susan Wloszczyna predicting several films she hadn’t seen had:
- Boyhood
- Foxcatcher
- Unbroken
- interstellar
- Birdman
- The Imitation Game
- Gone Girl
- The Grand Budapest Hotel
- Mr Turner
- Into the Woods
She got four out of ten and only two if you did 1 – 5 as Anne did.
My own list was:
- Boyhood
- Gone Girl
- Foxcatcher
- Birdman
- American Sniper
- Unbroken
- The Imitation Game
- Selma
- A Most Violent Year
- The Homesman
I got 5 out of 10. So I won that round. But that was before I started predicting Anne’s way, by only making predictions about movies I’d seen. David Poland’s Movie City News Gurus of Gold will be putting out predictions that are divided into categories – films that have been seen and films that haven’t. That should be an interesting experiment to add to the pile.
Here are a few others who had predictions out early last year.
So here’s a little experiment. If I had to predict ONLY films I’ve seen, I would list my predictions thusly:
- Carol
- Mad Max: Fury Road
- Youth
- Pawn Sacrifice
- Inside Out
- Clouds of Sils Maria
- Love & Mercy
- The End of the Tour
- Ex Machina
- Sicario (which I have to see again)
- Alt: The Diary of a Teenage Girl
And predicting films I have not seen based on what’s “on paper” I’d go with what I have on Gold Derby right now:
- Steve Jobs
- Joy
- Bridge of Spies
- The Revenant
- Carol
Beasts of No NationMad Max: Fury Road- Black Mass
- Youth
TrumboThe Hateful Eight- The Danish Girl
I think I need to swap out one of those for Mad Max: Fury Road which I think could have enough buzz and momentum to get it in. So I will have to trade, for now, Beasts of No Nation. I also want to put in The Hateful Eight and will have to take out something else, so I’ll swap out Trumbo for now.
Conclusion: I think it’s always better to strive for integrity in life, no matter what you’re doing. Anne Thompson cares more about sleeping at night than she does about being “right.” I admire that. At the same time, I’m not sure which is the better way to predict the Oscars. For me, it’s a work in progress with the main goal being “first, do no harm.”
Here are how the other pundits are predicting at the moment.
Excellant point NeverTooEarly…I too do not have access to many of the Oscar contenders until well in to the Oscar race. Although It does help to narrow down what you need to see before Oscar night.
I don’t get the MAD MAX Best Picture thing. It was a great first half of the year movie, but it can’t
compete with some the end of the year movies to come.
Sasha, I like that you’re giving us both versions in your experiment.
My main problem with the “can’t predict it til I see it” argument has always been that it doesn’t allow me to play along! Take last year’s Best Actress category for example. Still Alice and Two Days One Night didn’t even open near me until February, so right off the bat it means that my nomination predictions could only have gotten 3 out of 5!
Do I really have to wait until November to say that Daniel Day Lewis playing Lincoln in a film by Steven Spielberg *might* be an awards player? Or wait until Christmas for War Horse? And many of the foreign language nominees don’t even open until after the ceremonies. Am I just supposed to leave them all blank on my Oscar pool?
Do I have to spend January pretending that Taken 3 and The Wedding Ringer are Oscar contenders simply because they’re the only things that have been released? If not, then why should I act like releases that happen from January to August are going to make up such a huge part of the race, when we know that most nominees come out in October to December?
Needless to say, I suspect that your “on paper” predictions are going to be much closer to the actual results. Because even with the added benefit of being a journalist with the sneak peaks and film festival opportunities, only 3 of the films you’ve seen make it into your “on paper” list. (Carol, Mad Max and Youth — with only Mad Max having actually opened to the public). I’d much rather bet on your “on paper” ones, which use all of the skills and knowledge that you’ve gained.
And when I start thinking about it that way — the idea that we turn to Oscar experts in the hopes that they’ll share all of their expertise — it makes me feel like the “must see it first” approach might actually have less integrity in a way, like they’re holding out on us. Suddenly we’re filling up seven spots with films that we don’t actually think will have a shot. And then when I see how many of those spots are filled with small indie films, and realize that the main proponent of this approach works for IndieWire…. Well, I’m sure that’s all just a coincidence. 45 Years and Son Of Saul for the win!
For some reason I’m not interested in THE WALK. I think it’s the same reason I wasn’t interested in RUSH. Both activities seem really stupid to me so I can’t imagine getting emotionally attached to characters who risk their lives like that. At least Evel Knievel had a nifty outfit. Even Fonzie wore his leather jacket when he jumped the shark. I don’t know. I need more pizazz and a better hairdo from that one.
I have catching up to do as well. I realized when I looked at Sasha’s list I couldn’t even remember who ended up playing Steve Jobs. I think twitter’s ruined me. It’s too much news that only comes from sources I chose. So since I can’t even keep up with that, I never get around to stuff I’m sorta interested in. It’s a good thing AD is still here or I wouldn’t know anything.
I feel like people are underestimating Our Brand Is Crisis big time.
I’ve heard some insider talk about The Walk blowing people’s minds. I’d definitely consider it.
My predictions as of now
1. Joy
2. Steve Jobs
3. The Revenant
4. The Danish Girl
5. Suffragette
6. The Walk
7. Inside Out
8. Carol
9. The Hateful Eight
10. Bridge of Spies
Black Mass and Brooklyn could make it. Rooting for Crimson Peak and Star Wars but we know that’s not happening.
Sasha, the silence about Silence is killing me. I think that there’s a good chance that they decide to release it this year of 2015.
My suspicion is based on the fact that Paramount has no player this year for awards season. So they must be rushing Scorsese to get Silence done in time.
Do you think that this theory of mine is silly?
Considering that filming wrapped a few months ago, one would say that it won’t be ready in time. But The Revenant wrapped up less than a month ago and is still set for a 2015 release.
I would love Scorsese to land Silence this year.
And I would also love if an official word about the release date was said soon.
The film no one’s talking about that could be a surprise sleeper is Zemeckis’ THE WALK.
And THE SECRET IN THEIR EYES has a pretty promising trailer.
I don’t know about THE DANISH GIRL, something about it says turkey — could it be the director?
Bummer, Sasha — back to the drawing board! And we await for THE DANISH GIRL trailer.
Considering the ample number of selections by these film writers, I’m surprised at how little love “Brooklyn” is getting considering the terrific critical and audience reception it received at Sundance. A number of these films haven’t even been seen, and yet they’re being trotted out as favs.
In the actress category, Ronan to date has gotten tremendous reviews, as good as any this entire year, but I guess the Oscar predictors feel others are better without actually seeing the performances. It makes a lot of sense. NOT.
@Ryan
I was actually trying to get a grip on what’s going to get out of the gate early. That’s all. If I went by release dates, I think I’d be wrong. Going by the calendar I know, if I were betting today, I’d put it all on BLACK MASS. I’ve said that before but I realize I don’t know the schedule.
Remember when the wretched CRASH won? Do you remember how early that sucker was released? I’m agreeing that viewership, whenever and wherever it happens is likely to tip the scales.
I wasn’t trying to be patronizing, Antoinette so I hope I didn’t come across that way. I know you know how these things unfold. I was only trying to say that it’s not always right to assume that Oscar voters get to see these late-release films very much sooner than the rest of us do. Maybe 3 weeks sooner.
Every year it seems we wonder about movies the NBR might have missed because they want to be “First!” — or other critics groups where all the members missed a screening. We’ve seen actual claims from critics who say they didn’t vote for an important movie because they missed their one chance to see it early.
Remember when the wretched CRASH won? Do you remember how early that sucker was released? I’m agreeing that viewership, whenever and wherever it happens is likely to tip the scales.
Excellent example. The massive DVD saturation that Crash got was the actual retail DVD that was already on store shelves.
Crash was first seen at TIFF in September 2004.
Crash got its theatrical release in May 2005.
Crash DVD was available for everyone in America to buy on September 6, 2005.
Crash won Best Picture on March 5, 2006 — 18 months after it was seen at TIFF.
Here’s what THR said about Crash in September 2004:
“in a slow year”… a slow year where the other competition was Munich and Brokeback Mountain 🙁
Aww, I see. So nobody thinks The Force Awakens has the goods? That’s a shame.
I could see MAD MAX being one of those ones that surprises on the nomination mornings for the guilds and critics awards only to be disappointed on the big day.
I really don’t understand why it shows more integrity to only predict films you’ve seen. It’s about buzz and how much buzz certain films have at this very moment based on trailer, or having read the script, or people having seen screenings of the film, or the pedigree of the talent involved, etc. Once all the critics have screened and weighed in on all the movies and critics groups and guilds have weighed in, the writing is pretty much on the wall. The more troublesome part is that there’s a herd mentality and no one is willing to go out on a limb – so they talk about the same 15 films for the entire season. Great films get left out because people don’t talk about them.
“I really don’t understand why it shows more integrity to only predict films you’ve seen.”
Andrew, this could be a matter of finding a more nuanced vocabulary for the two different phases of what we all like to do. If we want to be strict with what words mean, ‘predicting’ something that’s virtually unknown is not much different from ‘guessing.’
We could say “educated guess” but that sounds too timid for the way we like to come at the race more aggressively.
I really don’t have a good suggestion about how to distinguish between lucky guessing and the more serious (and far more interesting) business of actually assessing the real tangible value of movies.
Not that ‘forecast’ is really much different from ‘predict’ but at least forecast conveys a sense of unpredictable and unforeseen changes in the weather.
Look at it this way though. It would sound really wrong to say a roulette player is ‘predicting’ what number is going to win when the wheel starts spinning.
Making predictions this far out is somewhere between gambling and knowing, but it’s much closer to gambling. I have never seen the fun or understood the claims of achievement when someone gets lucky and gambles on the eventual BP winner in August.
Like, big whoop, use that talent to predict the lottery. See how that goes.
I would never want to put a damper on the fun part of anticipating which movies might rise to the top each year. We enjoy that aspect and we should. But for all the reasons Sasha outlines here, I think if we don’t play these early stages more carefully we can end up getting ourselves trapped in ruts and then we look around all bewildered when we get a set of rather shitty nominations in January.
Because here’s the thing. In simplest terms: Blind predictions are too damned predictable.
Game on.
I’m putting on my predictor hat and big-boy pants on for the first time in 2015 with my Nearly-Final Predictions in the Best Director category. All pre-Venice. Taking a big gamble with my cred on the site, but I believe it will be a year dominated by old masters who will know it out of the park and additionally are all overdue for a first, second, or third statuette.
In the Best Director category the names uttered on nomination morning will be:
Steven Spielberg for BRIDGE OF SPIES
Oliver Stone for SNOWDEN
Ridley Scott for THE MARTIAN
Marty Scorsese for SILENCE
George Miller for MAD MAX: FURY ROAD
Hey Bryce, pretty sure The Silence is moving to next year.
our brand is crisis by warner bros i think is the unseen dark horse of this awards season that people should keep an eye out for because the documentary it’s based on was excellent and the movie has a very worthy start cast with Sandra bullock leading the way
And where’s Oliver Stone’s SNOWDEN? No cred.
Very interesting Sasha!
I still think there is no chance of Mad Max being nommed for BP — it’ll just get some technical nominations, liked Editing (on the theory that the movie with the most cuts always wins), Cinematography, and maybe Makeup and Art Direction. It just in no way seems like the kind of movie that gets nominated for the big award — which is not a criticism, since I thought it was great, but just more an observation about what the largely conventional membership of the Academy has gone for in the past. I think they will just see Mad Max as the most action-y action movie ever made — which in a way, it is, since it is virtually one long chase sign with a couple of breathing spaces. Also, it is just too grungy and edgy for the Academy. Most members getting their screener will turn it off after five minutes because it is interfering with the mild buzz from their meds. I can’t really think of a precise precedent for a Mad Max film being nominated for BP, although I also admit and always push the perspective that every Oscar year is different, because the films competing are different, and the cultural, political, and economic context is different.
Here’s a question. When are these movies going to be seen? I know release dates don’t matter. And I don’t mean seen at all. I mean seen by people who vote. If something like BLACK MASS is released in theaters that seems like it could be a good thing but if Academy members have screenings of other films before then, maybe it won’t matter. In what order will the Academy members see these films? STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON had a screening already right?
I know release dates don’t matter. And I don’t mean seen at all. I mean seen by people who vote.
None of these major movies go out on screeners as early as you might think, because of the very real box-office-wrecking fear of piracy.
And when we hear about Academy and Guild screenings, bear in mind that those venues seat several hundred voters but thousands more voters are either not in LA at the time or else housebound.
Antoinette, it was really great news to hear that 700 members of the Academy gave Straight Outta Compton an enthusiastic reception at a VIP screening 2 weeks ago — but those in attendance were already predisposed to like it, or they would not have been there, right?
So a lot of applause from 700 voters at a premiere for Straight Outta Compton means about as much in the real world as applause for Bernie Sanders in New Hampshire.
We still have to try to help movies like this become “Must See” candidates for the other 80% of voters.
I think we all know that a small fraction of the Academy saw AMOUR compared to the nearly complete saturation (I wanna say “soaking”) that the voters got from SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.
I fucking refuse to believe that people who front themselves as sophisticated moviemakers could look at Emmanuelle Riva and Jennifer Lawrence side by side in those two films and somehow believe that Lawrence gave a better performance. It’s absurdly inconceivable.
So the only explanation for who won is disgustingly obvious: drooling middlebrow dipshits like Jeff Wells convinced people that AMOUR was “depressing” and he loudly boorishly repeatedly wondered: “who wants to sit through that?”
And that’s when the factor Sasha sensibly explains kicks in: With casual slander like that thrown at it, how many Oscar voters wanted to watch AMOUR over the holidays with their teenage nieces and nephews and their verge-of-dementia elderly parents? (Even though it could have been a profoundly memorable life-altering experience for every member of the family.)
So, yes, there were enough voters who saw Amour to get Riva nominated (roughly 30%, is my guess). But I’ll bet half the Academy never saw that brilliant film and never will.
Happens every year. Every one of us here can name the victims of casual slander whose chances were deliberately undermined last year (and the year before, and the year before that). And we know which Oscar pundits traffic in that sort of sabotage.
I think the reason I want to voice my feelings about this so strongly is the same thing Sasha writes about today. One of the most important purposes good Oscar coverage can serve is to try our level best to bring fairness and integrity to a process that would be dominated by loudmouth sleaze tactics if good Oscars sites did not exist to stand up to the rotten ones.
Gauntlet officially thrown down.
I don’t know why, but I get the feeling that this is the year the Academy turns it’s back on David O’ Russell and JOY gets only a best actress nomination.
My amateur predictions [just for kicks and sight unseen; probably my first time at this earlier stage]:
The Revenant
Joy
Bridge of Spies
Carol
Trumbo
Youth
Steve Jobs
Brooklyn
Suffragette
The Danish Girl
– – –
Anyway, in practice and reality, in addition to the first one from Birdniest81, here’s another Kudos bar from me to Ms. Thompson, as well.
Regardless of the probability, I’m not sure why Jeff Wells have left the last two spots empty for the time being since we never know how many titles will turn out to be nominated until the end — so it makes sense to me simply to make it ten at least for now.
(I thought Peter Travers would receive the severance pay . . . . Hoping he’s doing all right, now.)
Excelent piece, Sasha.
…. and good quick take, Benutty. perfect first post for this thread.
btw… they all love the predictions sites. they are so flattering. “people care, they really care”, ya know. deep down.
Basically, the Oscar race is like Miss America or other beauty pageants. It’s a long seasons were you do all sorts of campaigning (just smile and wave) in order to win that gold statue.
Kudos to Anne Thompson for keeping the race real. I look forward to the race every year, but right now, I’m not taking any serious bets as of now (especially when I’m focused on the Primetime Emmys now). I’ll wait until Decemberish/January to make any SERIOUS assessment.
I took these 12 Gold Derby Expert picks (I’m omitting Anne Thompson from this because her process skews the results of this) and applied (what I believe to be similar to) the Gurus process of aggregating the picks into a ranked list and got these results:
12/12 votes
1. The Revenant (lower total)
2. Joy
3. The Danish Girl
10/12 votes
4. Carol (lower total)
5. Steve Jobs
9/12 votes
6. The Hateful Eight (lower total)
7. Black Mass
8/12 votes
8. Bridge of Spies (lower total)
9. Inside Out
6/12 votes
10. Suffragette